Campus Stormwater Management Pond Enhancement

Project Profile

Project: Campus Stormwater Management Pond Enhancement

Project Sponsor: Private Retirement Community

Location: Baltimore County

Scope: This project focused on the enhancement of a highly visible SWMP, located along a main road within a well-respected retirement community campus. Much of the pond had become choked with cattails. What open water remained, was covered in duckweed and algae. Although these plants are native, they are highly aggressive and, in the right conditions, can monopolize a site, greatly reducing the diversity of resident plant and animal life.

ER&M worked with the owner and a local designer to do draft a plan of action aimed at removing the cattails, identifying and removing additional aggressive non-native plants growing around the perimeter and upland slopes (i.e. purple loosestrife), manage the duckweed /algae, and establish a diverse wetland plant community. The approved plan was successfully implemented by ER&M over several seasons. The cattails have been virtually eliminated and the plant diversity has been increased ten-fold, providing both an aesthetically pleasing landscape and valuable habitat for an increasing diverse wildlife population.