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Little Prairie was the fifth and final phase of the project, reconnecting wetlands to the Shiawassee and Flint Rivers.

Ducks Unlimited

Ducks Unlimited (DU) has completed three restoration projects at Shiawassee National Wildlife Refuge (SNWR). The first two, Moist Soil Unit 9 and Little Prairie, finalized a five-phase plan that connected nearly 3,000 acres of wetlands in the 10,000-acre refuge to four major river systems. The third project at SNWR focused on restoring a former golf course pond to wetland habitat. This area was reconnected to the Tittabawassee River and provides essential flood storage and open passage for marsh-spawning fish.

“Partnership-driven conservation is essential to the future of public-land habitats,” said Eric Dunton, Shiawassee’s wildlife biologist. “We’ve been working with DU for more than a decade on this multi-phase project and are now better equipped to provide resting areas for migratory birds, essential resources for wildlife to thrive and more opportunities for visitors to enjoy the refuge.”

Facilitated by Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) funding, DU has worked alongside the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service since 2011 to reconnect Shiawassee Flats wetlands to the floodplain. Moist Soil Unit 7 was the first habitat restoration project funded by GLRI in the Great Lakes Basin. For the next decade, Maankiki Marsh, a 940-acre unit in the heart of the refuge, underwent a lengthy hydrology restoration. In 2018, a dike was removed and a small barrier island was built to stop wave fetch and erosion of Wildlife Drive. Another 850 acres of floodplain forest and prairie habitat were enhanced in 2019. In 2020, carp exclusion gates and actuators were installed to limit invasive species entering the refuge.

“Shiawassee is one of Michigan’s largest managed wetland complexes,” said DU Regional Biologist Kali Rush. “Shiawassee NWR is at the confluence of four rivers, all flowing downstream through the Saginaw River and into Saginaw Bay. It’s a critical landscape that we must restore and protect for the future of healthy waterfowl populations, flood mitigation, and water quality.”

The Shiawassee Flats (the refuge, Shiawassee State Game Area, and private land) is a 30,000-acre floodplain at the confluence of the Bad, Cass, Flint, Shiawassee and Tittabawassee Rivers. Historically, the Flats were a diverse complex of emergent, submergent, scrub-shrub and bottomland wetlands. Today, much of the region and the upper part of the watershed is intensively farmed. Following extensive human development and agriculture, flood-control levees and water pumps segregated the Flats from the floodplain to drain wetlands and improve farming.

Shiawassee NWR and Shiawassee State Game Area (SGA) provide many ecological and socioeconomic benefits, including habitat for wetland-dependent fish and wildlife, flood storage, water quality improvement, and outdoor recreation and education opportunities.

“DU has worked with federal, state, and private partners for decades to ensure the native habitats of the Flats remain as such,” Rush said. “To accomplish this, we have engineered many of our projects to manage them with less human intervention. This passive management approach allows for a more natural flow of water and puts less stress on staff.”

The restorations at Little Prairie Moist Soil Unit 9 (MSU9) and the golf course pond (Germania Long Pond) were completed in late 2024. Here is a look at the work that was done.

Little Prairie

This fifth and final phase of the project reconnected wetlands to the Shiawassee and Flint Rivers. The project included construction of low-level dikes and the implementation of several water- control structures. The restored wetlands will safeguard the town of Saginaw through flood mitigation and during river fluctuations. They will also protect water quality, ecology and wildlife habitats. A new parking lot was built on higher ground so visitors can enjoy the refuge’s cherished Wildlife Drive and the Ferguson Bayou hiking trail. The areas are popular with local birders and wildlife enthusiasts, drawing an estimated 90,000 visitors per year.

Moist Soil Unit 9

This phase of the restoration converted 100 acres of agricultural fields to moist soil habitat along the Flint River. Water can now be pumped from the Flint River to a new private pumping station under a cooperative agreement with the Saginaw County Public Works Commission. An existing drain (Eastwood Drain) is the primary distribution channel to pump water into Moist Soil Unit 9 (MSU9). Water from the Shiawassee River can also be gravity-fed into the unit (and drained). Eastwood Drain connects to Little Prairie West, allowing water and aquatic organisms access to that restored marsh. Control structures were installed so water from the forested area east of MSU9 can drain directly into Ferguson Bayou, a floodplain forest.

Germania Long Pond

Long Pond was once a steep-sloped pond used to irrigate a nearby golf course. USFWS took possession of the course in 2014, and DU recently restored the pond to a floodplain wetland by replacing the water control structure, opening it to the river, and softening the side slopes. It now serves as a backwater marsh directly connected to the Tittabawassee River. The wetland supports various species of waterfowl (wood ducks and mallards), waterbirds and other wildlife. It also provides additional flood storage during storm surges.