WILLMAR -- Despite a 15-year policy of "no net loss'' of wetlands, Minnesota is still seeing significant losses of its shallow and seasonal waters, according to the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy.
No one knows the full extent of the losses, but the state's own figures show that wetlands continue to be drained. The Board of Water and Soil Resources indicates that 1,367 acres of wetlands were lost between 2001 and 2003 due to "regulatory gaps," according to the Center's first annual Minnesota Wetlands Protection report.
The actual wetland losses are probably much greater: There is no reporting or monitoring system in place to keep track of the wetlands that are drained under exemptions to the state Wetland Conservation Act, according to Janette Brimmer, legal director for the Center in a telephone conference with reporters following the report's release on Thursday.
She called for regulatory change, charging that the many exemptions to the law, inadequate enforcement and conflicts with 100-year-old drainage laws are allowing for the steady loss and degradation of Minnesota's remaining wetlands. More than one-half of the state's wetlands have been drained since 1861. Many areas of the state have seen the loss of more than 90 percent of their wetlands, she said.
Brimmer said the Center's report should serve as an "alarm bell.''
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The report's findings ring very true in the fields of west central Minnesota, according to staff with Soil and Water Conservation Districts in the region.
"It's right on track,'' said Joe Stangel, a district technician with the Renville County SWCD about the report's conclusions. "We are losing.''
One of the exemptions under the Wetlands Conservation Act allows for the drainage of type 1 and type 2 wetlands, or shallow, seasonal wetlands of less than two acres. Stangel said that is where the greatest wetland losses are occurring in the agricultural areas.
Landowners are allowed to drain type 1 and 2 wetlands without reporting it, making it impossible to keep track of how fast they are disappearing.
Also, their disappearance isn't included in the state's calculation toward its "no net loss'' policy.
The pressures on wetlands are equally as great or greater in Kandiyohi County, which very much represents a microcosm of the issues facing the state as a whole. Rick Reimer, with the Kandiyohi County SCWD, said development pressures and urban sprawl are both putting pressures on wetlands.
In the southern half of the county, the economic pressure on agriculture to increase production is the biggest factor.
Reimer said there is a "delicate marriage'' in the county between the need to preserve wetlands for environmental and recreational values and the economic pressures to drain them for development and agriculture.
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These pressures are taking a toll statewide, where the continued loss and degradation of wetlands is evidenced by the decreasing numbers of migratory waterfowl. Ducks are the "canary in the coal mine'' that tell us we are losing the effort to protect our wetlands, according to Dave Zentner, current co-chair for the Rally for Ducks, Wetlands and Clean Water. He participated in the teleconference with reporters.
Zentner, fellow co-chair Lance Ness, and Brimmer called for a variety of reforms to reverse the steady loss, starting with limits to the exemptions now in place.
