Description
Start Date-End Date: 08/12/2022-08/12/2022
Land Manager Office: Weld County Public Works
Land Manager Contact: Tina Booton
Funding Partner:
Programmatic Partner:
Summary: Kayak along the South Platte river and remove invasive weeds on this Friday project.
Description: Project photo by Cindy Bond
Where You'll Be:
The South Platte River flows 380 miles through Colorado from its headwaters near South Park to the Nebraska border and eventually drains into the Gulf of Mexico via a series of tributaries. From various Native American tribes and European settlers to modern-day wildlife, recreationists, and urban dwellers, the South Platte River has long been a critical resource for agriculture, drinking water, industry, and numerous other activities. On this project, you'll get up close and personal with this important river as you kayak a stretch of about 7 miles from Brighton to Evans.
Anyone that attends a VOC volunteer opportunity in August, September, and October will be entered in a drawing for the chance to win a $300 SCHEELS Gift Card. The more opportunities you attend, the more entries you will earn. Good luck!
What You'll Do:
Spend a Friday exploring nature in the urban Front Range! On this small project, you'll be led by former VOC employee (and now volunteer!) Dan Williams, as you spend the day kayaking about 7 miles up the South Platte River between Brighton and Evans. You'll stop along the way to identify and remove the invasive weed, purple loosestrife. This project is a great opportunity to experience the river in a new way while making a significant contribution to the health of the river and the surrounding plants and animals who rely on it.
Kayaks, life vests, and a shuttle back to your car at the end of the day will be provided.
Why It Matters:
While beautiful, purple loosestrife is an aggressive noxious weed that can rapidly degrade wetlands, diminishing their value for wildlife habitat. When purple loosestrife gets a foothold in an area, the habitat where fish and wildlife feed, seek shelter, reproduce and rear young, quickly deteriorates and can no longer support the number or diversity of living things. Your efforts will be a significant help to the Weld County Weed Department in mitigating this weed and helping wildlife thrive!
About Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (VOC)
Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (VOC) is the state's oldest, largest, and leading outdoor stewardship nonprofit organization. Founded in 1984 to motivate and enable people to become active stewards of Colorado's natural resources, VOC has engaged nearly 128,000 people in more than 1,000 volunteer projects for a donated labor value of $26 million. Through award-winning youth and volunteer programs, leadership training, capacity-building programs, and collaborative efforts with nonprofits and land management agencies, VOC is an invaluable resource in Colorado, especially as our outdoor stewardship needs are approaching near-crisis levels. For more information, visit www.voc.org or call 303-715-1010.
Latitude/Longitude: 39.986771, -104.812599
Additional Information: VOC will provide kayaks for all volunteers. If you have your own kayak that you would like to use, feel free to bring yours. VOC will provide life vests for all volunteers, but basic swimming ability is required to participate.
To organize carpooling please visithttps://www.groupcarpool.com/t/dca6jg
Please determine the following amongst yourselves:
1. Pick up location
2. When you leave
3. Vaccination status
4. Mask usage
VOC suggests coordinating carpooling in the safest way possible and encouraging a mask friendly policy in your cars. If you have any issues finding a rider or a ride, please feel free to reach out to myself. Happy volunteering!
Camping Available: No
Physical Difficulty: Moderate
High Altitude Project: No
Desired Number of Volunteers: 9
Total Adult Volunteers Attended: 7
Total Youth Volunteers Attended: 0
Total Volunteer Days: 7
Total Unique Volunteers: 7
Total Volunteer Hours: 60
Staff Hours: 5
Stipend Hours: 0
Project Summary: A note on the accomplishment numbers: volunteersfloated 9.2 miles which equals 48,576 feet. volunteers generally are going in 4 feet from the water to remove plants which equals 194,304 square feet of shoreline surveyed (48,576 feet x 4 feet). using a converter on google, 194,304 square feet roughly equals 4.5 acres.
From Jim:
Hi Kate and Beth, Here are a couple notes on the Weld County weed float project, assuming the project is done again next year?These are both intended to save a little money on the project rentals.
Kayaks: we used only two of the rental kayaks this year. Tina had enough kayaks from Weld County to cover the rest of the boat needs. Registration was a little light this year, plus we had two no-shows. If possible, it would be good to coordinate Tina's boats with the registration list, and only rent the number of kayaks that are actually needed
Vehicle rental: related to the kayak rental?.I wonder if a high top cargo van could be used instead of a box truck. I **assume** that a van is less expensive to rent (and also for the fuel) than a box truck; if that's not true then this idea can be ignored. Another assumption is that a cargo van would have capacity to haul the inflated kayaks. I didn't measure the rental kayaks, nor do I know the cargo length of a van, so this one would need a little homework to verify if a van would work.
Hopefully my message makes sense - please let me know if you have questions on my note.
From Tina:
Thank you for all of your help. On Friday with the float we removed 6 plants. In all total this year (6 float days) we removed 59 plants from the South Platte River. Plus what we did at 3 different slough areas (your project in late July and 2 other sloughs). So it was a good year.It is approx. 9.2 miles that the VOC did on Friday, August 12th
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Details
| 18 and older |
