need advice for a swamp

Hi.. i am an individual..but i want to get some ideas for my Landlord, who has this big swamp on his property, right near where i live.

i would like to tell him to clean it up..but i have not the slightest idea what this would entail..

i think it may be simple for you 'professional gardeners'..to see from a photo what it looks like.

In my opinion, it is a breeding ground for mosquitos.

i do not want to suggest that he use chemicals..so i was hoping to figure out an alternative asto how to remove this green , mucky pool from our backyard.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2336/2421596800_f0ffd82433_b.jpg
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3030/2421605550_69deabf5bd_b.jpg

***ps..if this is entirely the wrong place to ask this question, could someone kindly direct me to a place or places where i might find some advice.!!

many thanks
alice


This message was edited Apr 17, 2008 2:56 PM

I'm not really sure how easily it could be removed, that water has to go somewhere so you need to think about where's it going to go if you don't want it there. Maybe there's an obvious place you could send it that I can't see in your pictures, but installing drainage and redoing grading and things like that can be expensive, so unless you can prove to your landlord that it's a significant hazard that he's legally obligated to mitigate I'd be surprised if you can convince him to do anything. If you just want to make it a little prettier, you could see if you could talk him into making it a bog garden (if it's almost always wet) or a rain garden (if it's only wet sometimes). Again there's cost involved, so I suspect he won't want to pay for it, but you might be able to talk him into letting you plant some things there (at your own expense).

If all you're worried about is mosquitoes, you can buy mosquito dunks and toss in the appropriate number for the amount of water that's there. The dunks contain a bacteria that eats mosquito larvae, so it won't cause the problems that chemical spraying for mosquitoes would. If you want the landlord to pay for it, you'll have to convince him why the mosquitoes are a problem, but once you convince him of that it's really at his discretion how he deals with the problem, and it's very possible that he might choose a chemical approach at that point since that may be cheaper than the dunks.

As I say all of this, I'm assuming you have a "typical" landlord who maintains the property to the extent he is legally required to but won't go out of his way to do other things. If yours is nicer than that, then you may have more luck with some of this.

Thank you ecrane.

Yes, i have just written a letter to the Landlord..
sigh..i am afraid that you are right.. He will probably do nothing.
But West Nile Virus is carrried by mosquitos, so i might harp on that idea for a few sentences,in my nice letter.

maybe some of us who live near the swamp can rally round and purchase some dunks.

Thank you so much for your kind response.

PS.. i guess a few loads of soil around the edges where the green algae is would not do much..?? would it?
I was hoping that might be a simple (albeit mostly ineffective in the long term)
method of at least dealing with the worst of the algae and juncque which has gathered around the edges of the swamp.

what do you think?
alice

Unfortunately when you've got stagnant water like that, algae is going to form. There are herbicides out there that kill algae, I have stuff that I use in my pond on occasion to keep it from growing, but you'd need a fair amount of it to kill the algae in the swamp, plus I know you wanted to avoid chemicals. I don't think putting soil around the edge will do much, I think you'll still have algae, but the edge of the swamp where it collects will be in a slightly different place. If it really bothers you to look at it, see if you can get permission to plant a hedge/screen between your house and the swamp so you don't have to look at it. Have you lived there for a long time? The other possibility is that it's a seasonal wetland like the one I have behind my house. Every winter when it rains, it becomes a nice pond and we get ducks and herons and little singing frogs, then around this time of year it's starting to dry up and looks sort of icky and gross with algae for a little while, but then it dries up by the summer. So if that's the case with yours, the whole thing may dry up in a little while so maybe nobody needs to do anything.

As far as the mosquitoes...feel free to harp on West Nile in your letter, but first decide whether you'd rather have chemicals or mosquitoes, or spend your own money and have neither. He may very well listen to you and decide to treat for them, but he's likely to take the cheapest approach which will probably be chemical sprays, and you won't have any room to complain because you asked him to get rid of the mosquitoes and he's just doing what you asked.

Thank you so so very much for your patient and kind response.

I have thought carefully over the points you raised, which are good ones.

i went to the hardware store today and dunks are a bit expensive, but they seem to cover a lot of area.

i think i will invest in some dunks.They cost $13 for a pack of 10 i think it was.

Yes, it is the type of wetland which dries up midsummer.
That is good.
Before that, It definitely is a breeding ground for mosquitos.
but, you are right.. it is just beautiful with all the peepers we hear in the summer..
and red winged blackbirds, and orioles...
not big enough for larger birds to actually enjoy the water, but the habitat is nice.
i even enjoyed some immature cat tail stalks..enjoying wild edibles.
That is why i did not want chemicals.

think i will scrap the note to the landlord.
Thankyou for helping me 'rethink' !
cheerio
alice

Glad I could help! I wish my wetland area (well, technically it's not mine, but it's behind my house so I call it mine!) would stay wet all year, but it's such a treat in the winter with the birds and the frogs singing me to sleep every night, I'm willing to put up with the month or so while it's drying up and looking sort of icky. I haven't noticed too much of a mosquito problem, I think there are maybe enough critters living in the water that eat the larvae that they never cause a problem. There are a few of course, but I don't feel like it's any more than were at my old house where there was no wetland.

You might also consider throwing in a few Brim, Perch or Catfish in the pond...The Brim and Perch will help with the mosquitos and the Catfish will eat the algae....just make sure your landlord gives you fishing rights...hehe!

Just saw this thread. The chemical approach that your landlord would probably use would probably kill or at least drive away the birds etc. The dunks are a much better solution.

If you are using fertilizer that would seep into the pond it would feed the algae. Stopping that would help.

It is such a pretty pond maybe you can enhance it with some native wet lands plants.

thanks again to all..

will try to go creative as well as dunk it.

i tried to plant some things around the edges last year ( surreptitiously) but i think the algae is pretty dominating..and probably makes the ph impossible to grow in..

but i am going to close my eyes more and remember the sounds of the peepers and blackbirds and things...

( and stay inside for the couple hours when the mosquitos are particularly active..or go for a walk elsewhere.

cheerio
]alice

Don't forget there is Deet. I live in MN where the critter is our unofficial state bird.

I'm not sure you should be putting chemicals in a pond that you do not actually own.

This sounds like a runoff/retention type of pond to me as it dries in the summer. This may have been done legally to hold runoff and keep it from where you are living. It looks like it might be dyked around the sides, and that to me would mean it is intended to hold in runoff water. These are fairly common. It most likely needs to be there. Even if it does not, you do not legally have any right to fill or alter any wetland. Like it or not, you have to live with it, so I would suggest you think about moving if you dislike it (sorry don't mean to be harsh). Wetlands are federally protected, even created ones, and even nonpermanent ones. Many states in addition have stricter laws about cutting or killing vegetation around wetlands.

My suggestion would be that you look into revegetaing the shoreline areas. You will accomplish the exact opposite of what you wat if you remove the vegetation, or fill the edges. Vegetation will hold in runoff and filter out chemicals such as phosphates that lead to algae growth. As this is a shallow pond, I think you will always see an algae bloom on the spring when the water warms. I would suggest, instead of that nicely manicured lawn surrounding the pond, you plant in sedges which are excellent at soaking up chemicals. Fox sedge is a common and widely used plant in restoration. In addition you should add some nice colorful forbs, because sedges look kind of like unkempt grass if left alone. New England aster, Eupatoriums, silphiums, and rudbeckias can all work depending on where you live. Does your sity have any rain garden programs? They are becoming increasingl;y popular, and that is what you are going for here. There are alot of resources on the web about raingardens, including showing in progress and completed projects.

I would suggest you hold a meeting with fellow tenants to feel out support for this, and find out how much funding you would have. I doubt any landlord will do it out of the kindness of his heart. I think if yougo to him and tell him what you want to do, and that he will have no liabilty, and maybe get some positive pr, he would let you do it. Some places even give tax credits for restotation work.

Good luck, again I don't mean to be harsh, just realistic. If you can't get permission to do this, you should look into moving if you are so worried about the mosquitos. I also think you could look into some other more viable mosquito control measures than chemical dunks. Look into pooling your resources to get a couple of the electric repellers. Also I think bats are excellent predators, maybe encourage them with some houses? Either way, I think there is a lot more you can do instead of killing another wetland.

The dunks are not chemicals, they're Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis) a type of bacteria that destroys mosquito larvae. No personal experience on how large a body of water they can work in, but I didn't want people to get confused thinking they were chemicals of some sort.