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Home My WebLink About20001024 Ver 1_More Info Received_200802151 't `>I is once February 15, 2008 Mr. David Schiller Restoration Systems, LLC 1101 Haynes Street, Suite 107 Raleigh, North Carolina 27604 EcoScience Co Raleigh, North Carolina 919-828-3433 Re: Investigation of the Bear Creek -Mill Branch Mitigation Bank 08-393 Lenoir County, NC Dear Dave: Restoration Systems (RS) has contracted EcoScience Corporation (ESC) to conduct a brief site assessment of the Bear Creek - Mill Branch Mitigation Bank in Lenoir County, NC. This mitigation bank has been properly established, and the proposed mitigation has been designed, constructed, and monitored for five years. The purpose of our site visit was to make a determination as to the presence and general amount of jurisdictional wetlands versus open water within the approximately 88-acre wetland restoration portion of the mitigation bank (hereafter referred to as the "Site"). The Site contains wetlands located within the Bear Creek and Mill Branch floodplains which appear to be subject to overbank flows from these streams during normal conditions. ESC personnel reviewed the detailed mitigation plan (September 1999), the mitigation banking instrument (May 2002), and five years worth of annual monitoring reports (December 2002, January 2004, January 2005, October 2005, and November 2006). Two members of EcoScience (Sandy Smith and Michael Gloden) then visited the Site on Tuesday, February 12, 2008. During the visit, ,we walked much of the Site and made a best-professional judgment determination as to the presence and amount of open water. We found movement around the Site to be slow due to high water and dense thickets of brambles associated with early successional communities; however, we did manage to cover much of the Site on foot. We started from the middle northern boundary of the Site on Washington Street, worked our way south and west to the Promiseland Road crossing of Mill Branch, then southeast along the power line corridor to its crossing of Bear Creek, then north along Bear Creek to approximately the middle of the eastern boundary, then west to the center of the Site, then north along a filled former ditch back to our starting point on Washington Street. Our determination as to the presence of wetlands and open waters was made based on our experience as delineators of Section 404 jurisdictional areas. When conducting a Section 404 jurisdictional area delineation, we identify boundaries of wetlands and surface waters. Wetlands are described by (33 CFR 328.3(b) [1986]) as: EcoScience Corporation Mr. David Schiller February 15, 2008 Page Those areas that are inundated or saturated by groundwater at a frequency and duration sufficient to support, and that under normal circumstances do support, a prevalence of vegetation typically adapted for life in saturated soil conditions. Wetlands generally include swamps, marshes, bogs, and similar areas. Our primary source of guidance for conducting wetlands delineations is the Corps of Engineers Wetlands Delineation Manual (Environmental Laboratory 1987). Our experience is that the "vegetation" referred to in the above-referenced quote is considered by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USAGE) to be terrestrial and emergent vegetation, and not aquatic submerged or floating vegetation. The current1v accepted method for the identification of Section 404 surface waters is with the use of USAGE Regulatory Guidance Letter No. 05-05 (entitled "Ordinary High Water Mark Identification- and dated December 7, 2005). This Regulatory Guidance Letter provides guidance for identifying the ordinary high water mark, which is considered to be the outward boundary of Section 404 non-tidal waters. Based on this guidance, important physical characteristics considered when making the ordinary high water mark determination include "destruction of terrestrial vegetation'' and "change in plant community." Our recent experience with Section 404 jurisdictional area delineations for the proposed Little River Reservoir (Wake County) and US Highway 64 widening (Tyrrell and Dare counties) is that the USAGE regulators consider emergent vegetation to be indicative of wetlands and aquatic vegetation (whether submersed, floating, or emersed) to be indicative of open water. Examples of emergent vegetation include cat-tails (Ttpha sp.), wool-grass (Scirpus c}per•inus), rushes (Juneus spp.), sedges (Carex spp.), false nettle (Boehineria cylinclrica), and lizard's tail (Saurur•us cernnus). Examples of aquatic vegetation include pondweeds (Potcrrnogeton spp.), hydrilla (Hyclr•illa sp.). w°atermilfoil (1lvriophyllum sp.), bladderworts (Utricular=ia spp.), duckweeds (family Lamnaceae), and water-lilies (Vuphar sp., 1'yniphaea sp.). Our initial goal when visiting the Site was to determine if the Site contained open w=aters and, if so.. locate the boundary of wetland and open water with the use of GPS technology (w=e made no attempt to locate wetland/upland boundaries). This is how we began our Site investigation; however, difficulties encountered in moving around the Site caused us to change our effort to visiting all areas that looked to be questionable open waters from an aerial photo and hand draxving wvetland/open-water boundaries where apparently appropriate. Since our field investigation occurred in mid-February, winter vegetation is what was available for us to use when making our determination. Leaves were off deciduous trees, and emergent herbaceous vegetation has been brittle and deteriorating for several months. The apparent break between emer-ent vegetation and aquatic vegetation became the determining factor in our location of the wetland/open-water boundary (see Photo 1). Dominant emergent vegetation was rushes. cat-tails, and wool-grass. Dominant aquatic vegetation was water pertnywort EcoScience Corporation Mr. David Schiller February 15, 2008 Page 3 (4yclrocolyle rununculoides), bladderwort (Utriculcrria sp.), mosquito fern (.4-7olla caroliniana), and duckweed. The result of the field effort is presented on the attached Figure 1. Please note that information depicted on Figure 1 is an approximation and not the result of a detailed field delineation. We identified five areas of open waters, and believe the boundaries (and therefore sizes) of these waters may be determined to be different based on level of delineation effort and the season of the effort. The largest area of open water is in the northwestern portion of the Site (see Photo 1). The next largest area is in the southeastern corner of the Site. Shallow portions of these open waters support aquatic vegetation, and a couple of large, apparently floating mats of aquatic vegetation were visible in the southern end of the "north pond" (see Photo 2). We were not equipped to move into the middle of these open waters to determine depths. The open water area located along the central eastern boundary appeared to contain an almost homogeneous coverage of floating water pennyNvort (see Photo 3). Photos 4 and 5 depict areas of interest within the Site. Photo 4 depicts the vicinity of surface/groundwater gauge SF2. This area supports both emergent and aquatic vegetation. We have called this area a wetland on Figure 1; however, if vegetation dominance/prevalence is called into question, the eventual status of this area as wetland or open water may require a more intensive investigation than we have recently conducted. Photo 5 depicts an area north of the "south pond." Our investigation determined that this area is a wetland because saplings growing along the periphery of this stretch of water are expected to provide woody coverage of the water when mature - eventually resulting in a floodplain pool wetland type. During our visit, we observed a beaver swimming within the Site and beaver sign throughout the Site, including lodges and many dams of differing sizes and lengths. Also scattered throughout Site marsh vegetation were many mounds of vegetation that are likely muskrat houses. Thank you for providing us with the opportunity to assist you with this important project. Please let us know if we can answer any questions concerning our findings. Yours truly, ECOSCIENCE CORPORATION Alexander P. (Sandy) Smith Senior Project Manager Eco.SCience Corporation Mr. David Schiller February 15, 2008 Page 4 Photo 1. Wetland/open water boundary on the western side of the north pond, facing south. Fmergent vegetation is primarily wool-grass (Scirpus c}perinus). Photo 2. A mat of aquatic vegetation in the middle of the north pond, facing south (primarily water pennywort [flydrocotyle ranunculoides]). 4 Emo cience Corporation Mr. David Schiller February 15, 2008 Page Photo'). Open water supporting water peI nywort (Hy-drocott-le raminculoides) in the central eastern portion of the Site. Photo 4. Vicinity of Well SF'-'. characterized by emergent rushes (Juncos spp.) and floating aquatic veo etation (primarily water pennywort [I ych-ocoty-lc ranuncidohles]).