Iowans are marking this week as Soil and Water Conservation Week, a time to celebrate efforts to improve soil and water quality.

Not only is soil and water quality important for our communities and agriculture, it affects our wildlife, according to Department of Natural Resources Fisheries Biologist Chad Dolan, “Water quality and soil conservation is just hugely important, and that’s because, you know, if we don’t keep the soil on land and it gets into our waterways and eventually it drains into lakes like Lake Darling that sediment can collect and get resuspended in the water column thus reducing water clarity. If it does reduce water clarity, number one when people come here to recreate it just doesn’t look very good.”

Dolan adds how soil runoff can affect fish, “If we take that a step further biologically, if you have fish that depend on sight in order to chase down fish prey and they can’t see it then they can’t do that. They can’t eat and they can’t grow and the fishery suffers because over time, essentially you have a bunch of, let’s call them stunted fish that aren’t reaching their growth potential and nobody wants to catch them.”

The nutrient buildup in lakes from sediment runoff can cause abundant plant life which can make recreating and fishing difficult. For information on the DNR’s watershed improvement efforts and making a local impact, click here.