July 4th Update On The Cass River, Lyle And Davis Parks In Bridgeport Township Michigan

This was the best thing I saw at the Cass River today, a Soft Shell Turtle basking out on one of the many logs that lie all along the bottom of the river.

There used to be so many turtles in the river and the pond in Davis Park but it has been years since I have seen any.  In the pond and park area you could always see my favorite turtle, the Painted Turtle.  But since the pond is silted in and dried up the turtles aren't there anymore.  There used to be Snapping Turtles also but I haven't seen one of them in years.  I miss the Painted Turtles but not the Snapping Turtles.
So I took my dog for the long walk and thought I would check on the water levels inside of the seven tires that lie alongside the walking trail in Lyle Park.  I could only get to one of them because of the high thick weeds.  There was plenty of water in the one tire I could get to and it wasn't too nasty since we have had so much rain lately. I took three scoops of water out of the tire and didn't see any mosquito larvae swimming around in it.  Normally the mosquito's would be so thick down at the river that you can't even stand to be there but they weren't bad today.  I went during the sunny afternoon period so that helped but I give most of the credit for the lack of the "mosquito swarms" to the Saginaw County Mosquito Abatement Commission.  I placed the one tire up alongside the walking trail and if I can get someone to help me I will get the rest of them up out of the low area and out of the park.
I let my dog go swimming today and she was happy!!  The water level is a little higher than normal for this time due to the rains but there are still places where there are only several inches of water.  Soon the sandbars will be exposed and you can walk from one sandbar to the next all around in the area of the river by the Fort Street Bridge.  It just boggles my mind trying to figure out how Bridgeport Township thinks anyone will be running canoes up this river.  With the low water levels, sandbars, trees, and the many logs that line the bottom of the river, and the garbage; this is the last place I would want to go for a canoe ride.  Something has to be done to fill the canal back in that Bridgeport Township dug and to repair the damage to the pond and river!
The pools of stagnant water in the canal are back up, but the pond in Davis Park is still mostly dried up.  So the fish and turtles are gone now that the pond is gone, but so is most of the other wildlife that was there.  The pond and river would be so full of Blue Herons, Great Egrets and Canadian Geese, various breeds of ducks.   I even saw a pair of Comorants that came for several years to the river.  Out of water, the birds that you would commonly see here in the park and river area were Bald Eagles,  various breeds of Hawks.  There were a pair of Red Tail Hawks that were in the park almost everyday for years.  Lots of other birds like Northern Flicker, Baltimore Orioles, Bluebirds.  Most of these birds are gone now from the park and river area.  I did see a pair of Bluebirds along the river twice this spring and there was a pair of Bald Eagles that came during the flooding earlier this year.  This is the first time in years that I have seen either of these birds here. There were also a couple of Canadian Geese and their hatchlings in the pond when there was still enough water there for them.
There is the huge Rookery over in the wetlands across Fayette St. and it appears that they had a good hatching over there this year, but you can watch them flying away everyday to various points, but not to the pond or river here.  Only three times have I seen Blue Herons in the pond and river here this year.  There were Fox, Muskrats, Groundhogs, Raccoons, Coyotes, even some Mink that were here for several years in the park.  No mistaking their smell!  I saw them several times over the years but there has been no sign of the Mink in years now.  The one animal that is still here are the White Tailed Deer, maybe not as abundant as they were in the park and river area, but still here.  Most of this wildlife is gone now and all I can think is that is seems to have corresponded with the decline of the river and pond because of Bridgeport digging that stupid canal and screwing this whole area up.  All of this was destroyed so Bridgeport could put a canoe launch in the pond in Davis Park back in the 1970's.  Now the canoe launch is gone, everything is destroyed and Bridgeport Township now wants to put in two more canoe launches.  I don't think the Township employes that are planning on doing that have any idea what is going on down here at the river.  They have probably never walked down here, never observed the wildlife, never enjoyed this once beautiful Cass River.  Either they are totally clueless or they just don't care what is happening here.  They are making no attempt to fix this mess or even clean the garbage up out of the parks and river, well unless you want to count them burning the trash in Davis Park as an attempt to clean it up.

Burning trash in Davis Park Bridgeport Township, MI June 13th, 2014

I posted this video on YouTube on June 13th of the trash pile they burn in Davis Park here in Bridgeport Township. I can remember them burning this trash going back probably at least two decades and another person I talked to about it said they have been doing it for as long as they can remember since the dump was closed and they turned this area into a park.  I went back the next day and that pile was still burning.

"Bridgeport Township has had a huge trash and brush pile in a wooded area of Davis Park that they have been burning for years.  You can find every kind of piece of trash in this pile that you can imagine. They also pile brush and logs etc...  into the pile.  Normally when they burn this trash pile, they burn it all the way down and there have been years when you go there and the ground is smoldering for days.  This time they did not burn it all the way down, just burned it half way down and then covered one side of the pile with more trash and dirt.  That new trash will get burnt the next time they burn this pile.  Some of the trash in this pile appears to be illegal to burn.
Here is a link from Michigan DEQ concerning Michigan Laws about the trash you can and cannot burn, also the health dangers posed by the burning - http://www.michigan.gov/deq/0,4561,7-135-3310_4148_55793-234558--,00.html
So I suspect that this burn pile leaves behind some contaminant's on the ground there, then come the flooding season, this burn spot is under water, it sits just 10 to 20 yards from the Cass River.  Do the contaminant's then wash downstream in the Cass River with the floodwater's?   If so, then they end up eventually in the Shiawassee National Wildlife Refuge. 
There was some lumber and big logs that were still smoldering and one piece actually started burning again.  There was no one down to monitor this burning, not while my dog and I were there.
Here are Bridgeport's "Rules for Burning" from their own website - http://www.bridgeportmi.org/index.php/open-burning
There are some photos in this blog post of the trash pile taken 3 days ago before they burned it - http://bridgeportmusings.blogspot.com/2014/06/june-10th-update-on-bridgeports-lyle.html"

June 2nd Update On Bridgeport's Lyle And Davis Parks

I haven't been able to get to the parks in several weeks but my dog and I made it there this morning.  I thought with Bridge Fest starting in a few days that Bridgeport Township would have made a effort to clean up the old mosquito breeding tires and the trash in the parks.  Alas, nothing has been done to clean these parks up.
The water is gone from the low wet area alongside the walking trail through Lyle park for now until the next flooding or heavy rains, but the 7 tires remain. I was able to get to only 4 of the 7 tires due to the high weeds and heavy mosquito's, but the 4 tires I was able to photograph are sitting there with water in them breeding mosquito's.  If Bridgeport Township Government is not going to do anything to clean the trash up and get those tires out of there, then maybe there is some kind of state agency that needs to be notified.  If West Nile Virus, Encephalitis and Malaria aren't bad enough, there is a new mosquito borne disease that is expected to spread to the United States this year.  It is called Chikungunya --  Mosquito-borne virus could become public health nuisance for Florida
It is predicted that it will hit Florida this year, I am not sure if it will spread throughout the rest of the country or not this year, but it has been showing up in northern climates as well as the tropics.
After we left Lyle Park we went over the Fort Street bridge and I took my dog out on the big sandbar that has formed at the end of the canal that was dug back in the 1970's along Fayette St./Fort Rd. out to the Cass River.   You can walk out onto the sandbar from Fayette St. right by the base of the Fort St. bridge. The sandbar continues to grow in size but has not succeeded yet in totally closing off the canal from the river. There is only a little area of semi free flowing water at that end of the canal there and down in the big pool where the water flows from the wetlands on the other side of Fayette St. through the culvert.  The rest of the canal along Fayette St. is just isolated pools of stagnant water, perfect mosquito breeding grounds.  As the weather continues to get warmer the isolated pools will continue to dry up... UNTIL we get more rain or flooding, then they will fill back up, slowly go back down to the stagnant pools breeding mosquito's... It is a never ending vicious cycle.
Saginaw County Mosquito Abatement Commission just released a statement regarding the high mosquito population this year -- "As a result of a wet spring and significant rainfall in May, Saginaw County is experiencing high nuisance mosquito populations. To promote community-wide mosquito control our agency has temporarily discontinued all spraying of individual properties. Additionally, spray shifts are working extended hours and weekends to expediently reduce mosquito densities throughout the County."
Bridgeport Township could fix that problem of the mosquito breeding grounds that the canal has become if they would repair that damage that they caused by filling in that useless canal.  Maybe there is some free grant money out there for a project like this.  That would be a better use of the free grant money/taxpayer funds to repair the damage and close off that canal then to put in two more canoe launches that will probably end up failures like their previous attempts.
Once into Davis Park things weren't any better there.  The once beautiful pond is drying up like it does every year after the flooding is over.  I found ironic the "No Swimming" sign and the "Boat Launch" sign from the previous failed canoe launch fiasco that has caused all the damage to the river and pond.
The grass in Davis Park is once again only mowed in the front part of the park.  On the island part of the park the grass is only mowed near the picnic tables and the playground equipment, then there is one path mowed around the perimeter of the island.  The grass in the middle is way over ten inches!!  Where are you Ron Wheatley?  Maybe he is too busy out slapping fines on the private property owners in the township to notice that the township itself is in violation of their own codes..  Hopefully Bridgeport will find the time to at least mow the rest of the grass on the island before Bridge Fest. Then there is the rest of the island and wooded area in Davis Park that is waist and chest high weeds, including weeds that Bridgeport lists in their "Code Of Ordinances" as banned in this township.  Private property owners will get huge fines for the mess that is found in the township parks, maybe the township parks are exempt from their own codes.
My dog and I braved the mosquito's and high weeds to go back into the wooded area and I saw that the trash pile's were still there, the railroad ties with the rusty spikes sticking up were still there, the huge tractor tire was still there.
Nothing seems to change in Bridgeport and obviously nothing ever will. They can spend $10,000 dollars on all the flower pots they want, the flower pots don't hide the garbage in the parks.  Hopefully Bridge Fest will draw visitors to our little township, but my recommendation to the visitors is to stay out of the parks.

Damage Caused To The Cass River By Bridgeport Township

Many years ago the Cass River here in Bridgeport was very deep and had a strong current but that all changed once they dug the canal along Fayette St. in 1975.  The canal went from the pond in Davis Park, along Fayette St. out to the Cass River near the Fort St. Bridge.  This canal was dug to make a canoe path from the canoe launch in the pond in Davis Park out to the river.
Prior to the digging of the canal, the water naturally flowed from the wetlands on the other side of Fayette St. into the pond in Davis Park and then there was a small natural ditch where the over flow ran from the pond back into the Cass River.  The pond in Davis Park was so full of fish, even huge Pike.  That natural water flow kept the silt flushed out of the pond, kept that water fresh and crystal clear.  That was the natural order of things and it should not have been messed with.    The Cass River was deep, even during the lowest water levels in the summer, you could go out in the river in a boat, hang off the sides of the boat and never touch bottom in the river. And the pond in Davis Park, even during the summer when the water levels were low you could walk out into the pond and the water would be waist to chest deep.
Once they dug the canal it changed the flow of the river by diverting the water from the river down the canal into the pond. That caused the water flow in the river to not be strong enough to keep the silt flowing and it started depositing into the river.  The worst silting is right there by the end of the canal where it opens into the Cass River.  That silting is now so bad that the river there by the end of the canal and the Fort St. Bridge is now mostly huge sand bars, going from that spot down to the other side of the Fort St. Bridge. There is one small channel left there in that area that looks like it may have a little depth in it, but I haven't tested it to see how deep it is.  I have heard from other residents that other sections of the Cass River from the Fort St. Bridge to I-75 are also silted in to the point that you can walk across the river in the summer in several inches of water.  The area of the Cass River from the canal to the Davis Park Island is also silted in, again you have areas where you can walk across the river in several inches of water in the summertime.  From Davis Park Island to the old State St. Bridge, I am not sure how bad the silting is in that area.  I haven't tried walking across the river there, if I can't see bottom I don't try to walk it.  I don't know how the rest of the river from the old State St. Bridge down river is.  This summer I will try to check other areas of the Cass River and talk to residents along the river to find out.
The water that flowed from the Cass River down the canal into the pond in Davis Park interrupted the natural flow of the water from the wetlands.  Once those two flows collided with each other where the canal opened into the park at the culvert,  they created a swirling effect in the water flow, back eddies.  Again the water flow was no longer strong enough to keep the silt flushed out of the pond and it started depositing into the pond.  Now with the silting the pond in the park is dried up in the summertime.

There is no more fishing in the pond or in the river.  There is no more boating or canoeing in the pond or river.  There is not much of anything going on anymore in either place.  You used to see so much wildlife in and around the pond and river but much of it is gone now.

Someone should be responsible for cleaning this mess up, but who?  It has taken 30 years from the time the canal was dug for the damage to get to this point.  Now the sand bars are closing off the end of the canal most of the time from the flow of the river except during times of flooding.  Even if the river manages to totally close it off and go back to it's natural flow down the river, how many years will it take the river to repair the damage of silting on it's own? Another 30 years, maybe longer?