New Berlin Watershed

In the county of New Berlin, there are two basins. There is the Fox River Basin, and the sub-watersheds New Berlin has of this basin are the Upper Fox River Watershed, the Middle Fox River Watershed, and the Muskego Lake Watershed. These three watersheds are found in the Western, Central, North, and South regions of New Berlin county. The second basin, the one that I live in, is called the Lake Michigan Basin. This basin has two watersheds in New Berlin, the first one (the one I live in) is the Root River Watershed, and the second one is the Menomonee River Watershed. All of my descriptions can be seen in the graph below. 

Since I live inside the Lake Michigan Basin, that means that my family gets our water from Lake Michigan. Since Lake Michigan is one of the Great Lakes, it can get a lot of pollutants in its waters. PCB's and mercury accumulate in fish tissues, which, as we learned in class, has greater affects on organisms higher up on the food chain (i.e. humans). The mercury and PCB accumulation is due to the old pipelines at refinery sites and disturbed sediment. According to the DNR, removing old pipelines and sediment clean ups are one of Lake Michigan's Area of Concern, and efforts are being made to reduce the amounts of PCB's and mercury in Lake Michigan water. For example, 23,804 cubic yards of contaminated sediments were removed from the Lake George Branch in 2020. In 2024, an additional 50,000 cubic yards are expected to be removed from the Lake George Branch. These efforts are all thanks to the DNR and their care for our Great Lake Michigan (1).

Another threat to my watershed are invasive species. According to the DNR, around 140 species have become established in Lake Michigan. These species outcompete native organisms, and also can thrive in contaminated waters. They reduce both biodiversity and water quality. The DNR, in an attempt to remove some of these species, has developed a new program called the Lake Monitoring and Protection Network (or LMPN). This program provides funding to all of the counties in Wisconsin for lake monitoring and invasive species prevention (2). This network provides uniform coverage, which is the smoothest way to go about preventing invasive species.

Sources:

(1) https://dnr.wisconsin.gov/topic/GreatLakes/Learn.html#:~:text=Some%20are%20found%20nowhere%20else,valuable%20resources%20need%20special%20care. 

(2) https://binational.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Lake-Michigan-LAMP-Annual-Report-2021.pdf