WATERWAY AND LOCATION: The project would affect waters of the United States (WOTUS) associated with an approximately 118.31-acre parcel along an unnamed Tributary of the Little Sioux River. The proposed site is located within Section 5, Township 84 North, Range 44 West, Monona County, Iowa at Latitude 42.119853 and Longitude -95.988011.
EXISTING CONDITIONS: The site consists of approximately 42 acres of row crop fields, approximately 76 acres of CRP in a mix of warm and cool season grasses, a straightened unnamed Tributary to Little Sioux River, and remnant oxbow of Little Sioux River. Land surrounding the proposed bank site is row crop agricultural production, with the Loess Hills located to the south and east.
PROJECT PURPOSE/BANK OBJECTIVES: The fundamental objective of compensatory mitigation is to offset environmental losses resulting from unavoidable impacts to waters of the United States authorized by Department of Army Permits. Other objectives include: provide economically efficient and flexible mitigation opportunities when wetland mitigation is required, support the national goal of no netloss of wetlands, restore and enhance terrestrial and aquatic habitat, reduce flooding by re-meandering the stream adding stream length, creating a multistage channel with floodplain benches, and provide additional flood retention and reduce impacts of flooding by capturing and storing water from high flow events.
PROJECT DESCRIPTION/BANK ESTABLISHMENT: The purpose of the Bank is to provide mitigation credits to satisfy compensatory mitigation requirements for adverse impacts to wetlands and Waters of the United States (WOTUS) within the Upper Missouri Service Area. The sponsor proposes to complete activities on 118.31 acres of property owned by SCP Little Sioux, LLC that would result in the generation of emergent wetland and stream mitigation credits.
The goal of the bank is to perform emergent wetland restoration and stream restoration and enhancement with buffer areas on 118.31 acres to generate an estimated 34.06 emergent wetland credits and 125,136.63 stream credits.
By enhancing the stream and restoring degraded farmland back to wetlands and high quality buffer, the Bank will expand wetland area and function within a priority landscape, reduce habitat fragmentation, filter nutrient and pollutant runoff, and improve flood attenuation through increased floodplain connectivity. For wetland restoration within three areas (two basins and one remnant oxbow), the bank sponsor would use restoration methods including shallow excavation, grading a connection from the remnant oxbow to the stream subsurface tile removal, reduction of invasive species, and installation of native seed mixtures. For stream restoration, the bank sponsor would use restoration methods including re-meandering the unnamed Tributary to increase stream length by approximately 2,245 LF, filling the former channel, grading floodplain benches, and placement of rock/boulder clusters. All restored areas, including buffers, will be seeded with appropriate native seed mixes.
SERVICE AREA: The proposed bank service area will be the Upper Missouri Service Area in Iowa.
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