Verstraten's Farm Pond

Highlights

This project was completed in 2002 and was part of a Maritime wide initiative to create small farm ponds within the agricultural landscape, thus improving water quality.

Cattle at the Verstraten farm were accessing a small pond for water and the manure storage area was leaching into the pond. The nutrient and bacteria levels were elevated in the pond and the farmer was worried that the water quality in the adjacent creek might be affected. The small creek continues into the Northumberland Strait, where there is a thriving shell fishery. The farmer was very concerned that the manure runoff could negatively affect this fishery.

The farmer built a concrete manure storage facility to house the waste. The associated runoff was then diverted into a series of constructed wetlands. Three wetland cells, equaling 2.5 acres, were designed to filter both manure and milk house waste runoff before it flows into the creek.

An electric fence was installed around the wetlands and along 500m of stream to remove the cattle from both water sources. A gravity fed trough system was installed to supply fresh, safe water from the creek to the cattle.

Water quality testing since construction has shown a decrease in nutrient and bacteria concentrations downstream from the wetlands.