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The highlight of the annual Comfort Lake-Forest Lake Watershed District meeting  at the Forest Lake American Legion Post, was the awarding of Champions of the District honors.

The Chisago Lake Township Board and Chisago County were represented by Wayne Houle, Sherry Stirling, and County Commissioners Ben Montzka and Rick Greene, who accepted the government participation award for cooperating in the Moody Lake (round barn park) water quality improvements.   The outcome of work done within the lake basin and  on private property in the immediately surrounding area—will result in reducing many pounds of phosphorus loading a year, according to the “State of the Watershed” report.  Bone Lake and Moody share hydrology so both lakes benefit from nutrient elimination efforts.  

The projects included rain garden development at the round barn park, wetland enhancements and alum treatment of the lake itself.

(Before and after photos of Moody Lake and details are on the district website at www.clflwd.org.)

Also named one of the Watershed Champions was Kristyn Stephens as the monitoring program volunteer for the year.  Citizen monitor volunteers collect samples and measurements on lakes, and watershed streams. 

Reed Larson was unable to attend —but he was selected  for the watershed district’s shoreline restoration project award. He is making impressive progress to remove tons of concrete placed on his Comfort Lake property over the years with the end goal  bringing in beneficial vegetation. 

The Lower St Croix Partnership (a regional agency) also applauded Jean and John Schreckeis, Keewahtin Lake, for multiple years of work successfully restoring their property’s lakeshore and their impact in promoting the program and agreeing to their parcel being used as an example project.

Mike Kinney, District Executive Director, stressed that the agency is having better than projected successes at improving water quality in the watershed.   One key factor is support from private landowners, he added. They participate in the various public cost-sharing programs  and facilitate projects on their own land, with watershed district staff assistance.  The projects demonstrate use of native plantings, avoiding fertilizer and chemicals  and the importance of implementing run-off controls like rain gardens, catch basins, and shoreline buffer plantings when possible. 

The watershed district managers’ priority approach to achieving water quality is to first identify and address contaminants entering the water body, which was the reasoning behind the early years of heavy data-gathering.  Projects are then pursued to eliminate accumulated contaminants already present, and control known sources of pollutants.

These Champion annual awards were started in 2019.

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