Gervais Lake: Meet the Owners

Lake Gervais project site before restoration

Arnie Linder and Chris Drake, two adjacent property owners share nearly 200 feet of shoreline on Gervais Lake. Keller Parkway, a residential road, separates the property owners' homes and the shoreline.

These properties were selected as a shoreland demonstration site for the Ramsey-Washington County Metro Watershed District.


headphone icon, Arnie Linder closeup Arnie Linder talks about Gervais Lake before the restoration.


Problems and Challenges

Each property had a sand beach with turf mowed to the beach or water's edge. Due to additional development and stormwater runoff in the area, a drainage culvert on the Drake property, was causing upland erosion. The erosion was a major concern for the Drakes.


headphone icon, Bill Bartodziej closeup Bill Bartodziej, project manager: drainage culvert strategy.


reed canary grass

Reed canary grass, an invasive non-native species (photo, right), was present along the shoreline. It had been spot sprayed with herbicide in selected areas.

The reed canary grass needs to be pulled or spot treated every year on this lake in order to prevent this undesirable plant from taking over.

A special consideration at the site was the presence of an ice ridge, a ridge or hump of earth pushed up by the movement or expansion of ice, along the shoreline. Owners sometimes want to remove ice ridges but they do serve useful purposes, such as filtering runoff from the yard and stabilizing the shoreline when covered with vegetation.


headphone icon, Bill Bartodziej closeup Bill Bartodziej talks about dealing with ice ridges.


 

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