Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation: Nolan Addition to English River Wildlife Area

Partners pull together to protect Nolan Addition for wildlife, water benefits

This article was written and released in January 4, 2010.

Washington County Conservation Board

At the closing for the Nolan Addition in late December, several of the project partners were present, including Steve Anderson, Washington County Conservation Board Director, Carl McCall, Treasurer of Pheasants Forever, Lee Sorenson, Iowa County Conservation Board Director, David Long, Keokuk County Conservation Board Director, and Bruce Mountain, Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation Land Projects Director.

An addition to the English River Wildlife Area brings a New Year’s gift to eastern Iowa from a group of partners that include the former landowners, three counties, several private organizations, and state and federal agencies.

The 167-acre Nolan Addition brings the public recreation area to 782 acres. The new land is on the west edge of the wildlife area, adjacent to the South Fork of the English River. It will improve the area’s value as habitat for waterfowl and other wildlife. It will also will help protect water quality and turn flood-prone crop ground into natural flood buffer.

“I am amazed that we were able to all get together so quickly, to complete this project and get it ready to open to the public,” said Steve Anderson, Director of the Washington County Conservation Board, who said the addition will predominantly be used for hunting.

“We’re going to do everything to make it the best wildlife area it can be,” said Washington County’s Anderson. “It’s going to be nesting cover, winter cover, shrubs and wetlands.”

The former owner had enrolled the floodplain crop ground into the federal Wetland Reserve Program, which meant it could no longer be farmed, according to Bruce Mountain, Land Projects Director with the Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation. With help from WRP funding, the land is being restored as a wet prairie ecosystem, with several shallow basins, swales and native grass seedings.

Steve Anderson, WCCB

Aerial of the English River Wildlife Area and Nolan Addition

Map view of Nolan Addition within English River Wildlife Area at the junction of Iowa, Keokuk & Washsington counties.

INHF initially acquired the land from Clemencia Nolan and Martin C. Nolan, who donated nearly 50 percent of the land's value. Washington, Keokuk and Iowa counties secured the additional funding needed to purchase the property, with help from an Iowa DNR Wildlife Habitat Stamp grant and three different chapters of Pheasants Forever, each of which made generous donations.

INHF is a nonprofit, conservation group that works with private landowners and other partners to protect Iowa’s land, water and wildlife. Since its founding in 1979, INHF has helped protect more than 100,000 acres of Iowa’s wild places. INHF had previously assisted in another English River Wildlife Area expansion in 1989, as well as with the Nolan Family itself on a 155-acre project in Harrison County.

For more information about the new Nolan Addition, contact the Washington County Conservation Board at http://co.washington.ia.us/departments/conservation/, or contact INHF at www.inhf.org, phone 515-288-1846.