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CLEAR GRAND Nonpoint Source Pollution Reduction for Grand Lake Watershed, Oklahoma "Land Grows Green, Water Stays Clean" |
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Rain Garden (Bioretention Cell) Project Rain gardens are beautifully arranged plantings in depressions that can enhance your landscaping while cleaning rainwater that enters them. Bioretention cells are engineered, planted depressions where soils are replaced and drainage ensured, but essentially perform the same role as rain gardens. How do they work?When it rains, water runs along the surface picking up pollutants (such as fertilizers, pesticides, oil, heavy metals). Rain gardens and bioretention cells are designed to trap that polluted rain water during storms and significantly clean the water before allowing it to run into local streams or lakes. Bioretention cells are created by 1) filling a depression with special soils that chemically alter stormwater and 2) growing plants on the surface that take up excess fertilizer and other pollutants.
Most rain gardens and bioretention cells are designed to hold and treat only the “first flush” (in urban areas) from a rainfall event; typically runoff from the first ½ inch of precipitation over the contributing area. Most pollutants that build up during dry days are washed off quickly. Water from the end of a storm is usually cleaner and can be released safely.
What’s going on around the Grand Lake watershed?The CLEAR GRAND project will install and test 9 demonstration bioretention cells (aka - rain gardens) in the Grand Lake area. These gardens, designed and monitored by researchers from the Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering Department of Oklahoma State University, will help clean water that runs toward Grand Lake, but will also serve as examples that should help expand the practice in the area. See Photos of Local Bioretention Cells (Rain Gardens)
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