The Watershed Committee of the Ozarks, Inc. (WCO) is planning a watershed education and demonstration center at the Valley Water Mill site in Springfield, Missouri. Working with a sixteen-member Task Force, the Watershed Committee hired a design consultant to prepare a concept plan for the 100-acre, publicly-owned site. As a component to future site plans, the Watershed Committee has initiated a wetland restoration and enhancement project.

Adaptive Ecosystems worked with Intuition and Logic to obtain a Nationwide Permit (27) for restoration activities and to complete a natural resources inventory and wetland design with specifications. Adaptive also completed construction activities including reed canary grass eradication, site grading, spot burning, wetland seeding and erosion control measures. Adaptive Ecosystems, Inc. is continuing to serve the client by providing site maintenance and monitoring for the next several years.

Valley Water Mill
Riparian/Stream/Wetland Restoration

The Watershed Committee of the Ozarks, Inc. (WCO) is planning a watershed education and demonstration center at the Valley Water Mill site in Springfield, Missouri. Working with a sixteen-member Task Force, the Watershed Committee hired a design consultant to prepare a concept plan for the 100-acre, publicly-owned site. The McCracken Mill once stood on the site where the seventeen-acre reservoir, large spring, sinkholes, bluffs, wetlands, upland forests and about a half-mile of stream footage currently exists. The future site plan includes outdoor classroom facilities, trails, runoff demonstrations and a solar-heated, water-efficient building containing workshop spaces, a water quality laboratory, and meeting rooms. As a component to future site plans, the Watershed Committee has initiated a wetland restoration and enhancement project.

Adaptive Ecosystems worked with Intuition and Logic to obtain a Nationwide Permit (27) for restoration activities and to complete a natural resources inventory and wetland design with specifications. The project has two main components including fisheries habitat and public use improvements to the existing impoundment, and wetland/stream restoration and enhancement activities. The Water Valley Mill Wetland Restoration and Enhancement project included enhancement activities in forested riparian areas, restoration of a slough to emergent wetland conditions, restoration of a spring fringe wetland, streambank restoration activities, (840 linear feet), restoration of a meadow, creation of a wet meadow, restoration of a bluff seep fringe, creation of an open water marsh, and an increase in the depth of the Water Valley Mill Reservoir.

Adaptive Ecosystems, Inc. also completed construction activities including reed canary grass eradication, site grading, spot burning, wetland seeding and erosion control measures. Adaptive Ecosystems, Inc. is continuing to serve the client by providing site maintenance and monitoring for the next several years.