As part of an ongoing education series on land and water, the Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve, in partnership with the Great Works Regional Land Trust and the Great Works River Watershed Coalition, will be holding a demonstration walk/talk about efforts to prevent erosion and improve water quality.
l
Leigh’s Mill Pond, South Berwick
Wednesday, August 26th 6:00pm – 7:00pm., Free
This series is funded by the Piscataqua Region Estuaries Project. Visit www.gwrlt.org or call (207) 646-3604 for more information.
Leigh’s Mill Pond: A cherished swimming hole being loved too much
–by Christine Bennett Magruder, Development Director, Great Works Regional Land Trust
On the hot summer days who doesn’t look for a place to take a swim and cool down? Finding a place, short of the chilly ocean can be difficult. Public access to lakes, rivers and ponds is in short supply and No Trespassing signs seem to be more common these days.
Friends whisper their favorite places to take a dip, fisherman guard their special spots like state secrets. For good or for bad, the word is out about one such cherished location, the small thin stretch of land along Leigh’s Mill Pond, now owned by Great Works Regional Land Trust.
From this 2 acre parcel along Vine Street, one can see the lone Pine tree on Pudding Hill that is the logo for Great Works Regional Land Trust. At the base of the closed bridge over the Great Works River is a thin piece of land that has become a popular place to wade into Leigh’s Mill Pond. Some would say, too popular.
Since this property was donated for conservation purposes in 2002, approximately 1 foot of its shoreline has been trampled away each year by heavy use. By 2006, the landing where people went to swim had receded so much that it appeared that it would soon cease to exist and the integrity of the road could soon be compromised. So in 2007, Great Works and the Town of South Berwick undertook to stabilize the shoreline and remedy the road runoff in the hope of preserving this much loved place.
Truckloads of rip rap, topped with pea gravel where deposited in the area where the shoreline used to be only a few years ago. Drainage from the road was directed by curbing to a single culvert that would drain stormwater over gravel and into the shrubs along the foot of the bridge. Loam and grass seed was applied to improve the slope of the hill and bushes donated by Salmon Falls Nursery where planted by Urban Tree Service.
Heavy use of this land continues and once again is threatened to be “loved to death”. Wednesday, August 26th, the Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve, in partnership with the Great Works Regional Land Trust and the Great Works River Watershed Coalition, will be holding a demonstration walk/talk at Leigh’s Mill Pond to discuss past work and future options to combat the erosion of the property and the impacts on water quality.
This informal talk will be free of charge and is intended to not only educate those who know and love this swimming hole, but to also provide lessons that other shoreland landowners can take home to protect the integrity of their shoreline and the water that flows by it.
For more information or directions please call the GWRLT office at (207) 646-3604 or visit their website www.gwrlt.org
