Image: Ioway Creek Water (JT Colbert)
It was a warm sunny day with a strong west wind. One of many such days I have been fortunate enough to experience. The waves sparkled and dazzled in the sunlight. My empty Nalgene water bottle was rolling back and forth under my seat as the canoe was rocked by the waves. We, of course, were paddling west and needed a break from fighting the headwind. As most paddlers will know, 90% of paddling is done into a headwind, though a 50-50 split would seem to be statistically more likely. We slipped into a channel behind an island to hide from the wind. Taking a break from paddling I reached under my seat, grabbed my water bottle, opened it, and filled it with cool clear water from the lake just outside the hull of my canoe. I drank an entire liter of water and refilled the bottle before putting it back under my seat and picking up my paddle again. Where was I? Not in Iowa.
I was in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area of northern Minnesota. All together I’ve spent over a year of my life traveling and camping in the Boundary Waters and Quetico (in Ontario) areas. Mostly when the lake surfaces were liquid, but also many winter trips pulling heavily loaded sleds on frozen lakes covered with snow. I’ve drank water directly from these lakes many times and never once gotten ill from doing so. Let me be clear. I am NOT recommending this practice. I am simply pointing out that the “water quality” in this region is so high that the likelihood of getting ill is quite low, although it is not zero. So, I’m not saying “don’t filter your water” on canoe trips to this amazing place. But I’m quite confident in saying: “Do NOT drink from any untreated surface water in Iowa!”
Good “water quality” has at least two interconnected meanings: 1) The water coming out of the tap tastes good and is safe for people to drink; and 2) The waters of local rivers, streams, lakes, and ponds have low enough levels of pollutants that creatures living in the water can go on about their business of living and reproducing. The interconnection between these two meanings is clear in the “lawn watering ban” currently in place in Des Moines. One could ask (and I have) whether watering lawns is essential, but it is important to some. The problem is not that there is insufficient water, it’s that the sources of the water (the Raccoon and Des Moines rivers) are so polluted with nitrate from fertilization of corn fields that the water treatment facility cannot produce safe drinking water fast enough to allow lawn watering as well. Water quality meaning #2 is directly impacting water quality meaning #1. This is a concerning situation, but not being able to water lawns is also a very human-centric perspective. The many other creatures that live in, or drink from, water from these rivers don’t have access to water processed by a nitrate removal system as do the citizens of the Des Moines metro area. Are high nitrate levels, not to mention many other potential pollutants and microbial organisms, dangerous to raccoons? Or deer, or fish, or great blue herons, or freshwater mussels, or aquatic insect larvae, or any of the many other creatures that make use of Iowa’s surface waters? I don’t know. Somebody probably has some information about the impacts on some of these creatures, but in general we understand very little about what impacts the “impaired water quality” in our surface waters may have on non-human creatures. At least until water quality becomes extremely poor and large numbers of fish turn up dead. But if the water coming out of our taps tastes good and is safe to drink (meaning #1), most of us don’t seem to care very much about meaning #2.
How did the indigenous peoples of Iowa manage to survive without nitrate removal plants and water treatment facilities? Trick question. Prior to European settlement (and for some time thereafter), Iowa’s surface water was, usually, safe to drink. You would not have had a plastic “Nalgene bottle”, but you could have dipped your bison horn cup in the Des Moines River and slaked your thirst. That activity is best left for “dire emergencies only” today. In addition to nitrates there are various other pollutants including herbicides and pesticides, potentially pathogenic microbes, and enough silt that, as they say, “the water is too thick to drink and too thin to plow.” How and why has this happened? I am not a water quality expert but, spoiler alert, Iowa’s poor water quality is due to our activities.
I’ve spent a lot of my life mucking around in Iowa’s rivers, streams, lakes, ponds, and the silt traps that we call “reservoirs” for various reasons. One of those reasons is fishing for walleyes. Walleyes are highly sought after “gamefish” and excellent table fare. They are native to Iowa and were found in the Des Moines and Raccoon Rivers prior to European settlement. They can still be found in those rivers, as well as in other Iowa rivers. This might lead to one to think that Iowa’s water quality issues have not been significant for walleyes. Sadly, this is not the case. Although walleyes can live in the impaired rivers currently found in Iowa, they have very little reproductive success. Add a moderate amount of fishing pressure and soon there will be very few walleyes. Why are there currently good populations of walleyes in our rivers? We put them there. The Iowa Department of Natural Resources has fish hatcheries at Rathbun Reservoir and at Spirit Lake. Fish raised in these hatcheries are stocked into Iowa rivers and lakes to maintain walleye populations so fisherpersons can catch them. Why aren’t these stocked walleyes successful at reproducing in our rivers? Because of one “four-letter word”: silt. To successfully reproduce, walleyes require hard surfaces such as rocks and gravel. Our rivers have rocks and gravel but most of them are buried under silt. That silt primarily comes from two sources: row crop fields and streambank collapse. Annual disturbance of the soil in row crop fields makes them vulnerable to soil erosion, much of which ends up in our rivers. Streambank collapse is driven by rapid transport of water to streams after precipitation events due to wetland drainage, agricultural drainage tiles, drainage ditches, and impermeable surfaces such as roads and parking lots. The landscape of Iowa, which was once a sponge of wetlands and mesic prairies, is now a storm sewer rapidly transporting large quantities of water into streams and rivers.
It's great for fisherpersons that walleyes are still available in Iowa’s rivers due to a successful stocking program. What about the many other species native to Iowa’s rivers? Do we also have stocking programs for each of them? Of course not. Species without clear economic or recreational uses for humans are abandoned to their own devices to survive in the impaired water or die. Freshwater mussels are a group of Iowa animals that are especially vulnerable to impaired water quality. Twelve of Iowa’s fifty-four recorded mussel species have been extirpated from the state and fifteen more are endangered or threatened. One endangered mussel species, the Higgin’s Pearly Eye mussel, has been stocked in some eastern Iowa streams in an attempt to establish a self-sustaining population. Impaired water quality may make this effort suitable for Don Quixote to do some “windmill tilting”. Time will tell. But for many Iowa stream species we likely don’t know what impacts impaired water quality has had and we’re making no effort maintain their populations
What are we doing to improve water quality in Iowa? Iowa adopted a “Nutrient Reduction Strategy” in 2013 with the goal of reducing the amount of nitrogen (and phosphorus) in our rivers and streams. In part this is to improve conditions here in Iowa, but the big picture aspect is to decrease Iowa’s contribution to the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. This strategy includes the best available science and proven approaches to decreasing nutrient levels in surface waters. There are small successful examples of these approaches scattered around the state. Because widespread implementation of the strategy is voluntary it works just as well as voluntary speed limits on roadways and voluntary stop signs at intersections. Voluntary compliance with “No Trespassing” signs and voluntary time spent in prison after a murder conviction are other good examples of the effectiveness of this approach. Shockingly, the voluntary approach to nutrient reduction in Iowa’s water has not worked. Over a decade since its adoption effectively zero progress has been made in reducing nitrogen and phosphorus levels in our rivers. Why? Because people are unlikely to do difficult and costly things unless there are regulations that require them to do so. “Big Ag” and the Farm Bureau have, thus far, successfully lobbied the State Legislature to keep implementation of the Nutrient Reduction Strategy voluntary. To actually make progress there needs to be BOTH “carrots” (taxpayer funded cost-share) and “sticks” (assessments of results and regulations with penalties). Because agriculture is carried out by people, with all the tendencies of “people”, regulations will be required to get them to do the things that will lead to decreased nutrient levels.
Water quality issues in Iowa are “fresh as today’s headlines” and WAY fresher than Iowa’s water. What can we do to improve this situation? We can contact our State Legislators and tell them that improving the water quality in Iowa’s rivers and lakes is a priority for us. If they don’t listen, we can vote in people who do share this priority. We can support state and local entities working toward improving water quality. Here in central Iowa that would include local entities such as Prairie Rivers of Iowa, The Outdoor Alliance of Story County, Story County Pheasants Forever, Ducks Unlimited, The Iowa Environmental Council, as well as governmental agencies such as Story County Conservation and the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. We can express gratitude to those landowners and farm operators who are using limited cost-share funds and are trying to voluntarily implement aspects of the nutrient reduction strategy. Unfortunately, the scale of implementation is way below what is needed to effectively address the issue. Most wealthy businesses and landowners are not going to “voluntarily” make their work somewhat more difficult and their profits slightly less for the greater good. We will need to “strongly encourage” them to do so. Otherwise, we’ll have to keep stocking walleyes in rivers where they are native and it’s going to be a VERY long time before it’s remotely safe to drink water directly from an Iowa river. Tragically, given the recent activities of the current federal administration, I can only hope I’ll still be able to drink from the lakes in the Boundary Waters.
Another article that should be required reading for every resident in the state. Everyone. Pieces from you, Chris and others should be read aloud in each chamber of the state legislature and the members should have to pass a test about the content before being allowed to speak. Produce a video version for the schools too. Mandatory for all teachers, students and staff just like the “baby Olivia” video, except this one doesn’t need a “not science based” disclaimer. I remember going ‘logging in the Raccoon and Des Moines rivers as a kid. Now, there’s no way I’d voluntarily place a foot in either one, let alone eat a fish caught from them or any other Iowa water source. Until it’s jail time (including forced water consumption) for all those responsible, they’ll pay the fine, because it’s cheaper than fixing the problem. Always has been, and unless we treat crimes against natural resources like we do other criminal offenses, nothing will ever change.
Your photo tells the whole story Jim. Yuk! We too have the quality problem in both fresh and salt water. Most streams look pristine but don’t drink from them. During the summers our salt water beaches are mostly closed to shellfish harvest due to toxins. The large, well fertilized lawns are a problem here as well for both fresh and saslt water. There are heroic efforts to change the public’s habits here but progress is very slow.