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- Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Archives Revels Classifieds Real Estate Menu Guide Wedding Weather Subscribe Contact Us May 12, 2005 Construction around the lower Lithia Park duck pond is the latest attempt to find a permanent solution to the murky water problem. Photos by Orville Hector | The Ashland Daily Tidings After years of fighting murk and mire in the Lithia Park duck ponds, Ashland Parks and Recreation officials are determined to ... Get to the bottom of it By Buffy Pollock Tidings Correspondent After years of trying to come up with a way to de-muck the popular Lithia Park lower duck pond, city officials are going all out. A Gooey Legacy Jan. 1, 1997 : Downtown flood causes the removal of a damn that diverted water from Ashland Creek to the duck pond. Stagnation steadily increases December 2001 : Parks and recreation commissioners evaluate several proposals for cleaning Lithia Park’s upper duck pond, including a floating island device that could cost as much as $150,000. January 2002 : Commissioners approve $5,000 for Ashland resident Paul Kay to design a water-cleaning device called a “lake restorer.” June 2002 : Commissioners vote 5-1 in favor of paying Paul Kay $20,000 to install a design for naturally cleaning the lower duck pond. “Great, we’ll have it by the Fourth,” Kay said September 2002 : Pinehurst Elementary students tour the park and are given a demonstration of improving water quality. Kay is paid the initial $10,000 for reaching first benchmark. January 2003 : After the pond water became murky over the winter, Kay says improving the design will make the initial results more lasting, “The rest is in the details of the low, volume of water and the size of the system itself.” Later in the month a Daily Tidings online poll finds that over half the respondents say the cleanup of the pond is “very important, it reflects on the quality of our town.” June 2004 : “To combat the duck goo overload, Kay is working on a new-and-improved version of a biological filtering system the city first allowed him to install in 2002. The system circulates and breaks down solid waste in the pond, thus clearing the water without having to drain it completely.” — Mail Tribune Sept. 2004 : The city abandons Kay’s natural design concept. “We leave the pond cleaner than we found it.” — Paul Kay Parks and Recreation Director Don Robertson said crews had been busy installing a heavy-duty man-made, swimming-pool-style filtration system that could very well end the half-decade saga of too much duck goo. “Filtration has been an issue for awhile, but we’re hoping this fixes it,” said Robertson. Water quality in the ponds, requiring regular drainage and brainstorming sessions by city officials, became an issue after the flood of ’97. Fish habitat restoration, and removal of a dam that diverted fresh Ashland Creek water from the pond, resulted murkier ponds and may have contributed to the death of a popular female swan. Efforts over years to prevent stagnant water and a fungus been all but successful — crews have drained either or both ponds regularly over the years to remove accumulated muck — and community members and consultants alike have contributed a range of ideas to solve the problem. Solutions have ranged from regularly emptying and recycling of pond water to a cascading waterfall and a synthetic mesh aeration system. Most solutions pre-date Robertson’s year-and-a-half tenure. “The one I inherited was the natural pond clarification process ... using a natural filtration of floating plants in a median. Unfortunately that was not able to keep up with the volume of ducks in the water,” Robertson said. More recently, parks commissioners voted to post signs, despite initial attempts to educate the public on appropriate means of duck feeding, urging pond visitors not to feed the begging birds. "Basically, duck output is directly to duck input," said Robertson. "Ducks are natural foragers. By feeding them foods that aren’t natural to their diet, it not only produces more duck output but also harms the ducks overall health.” Robertson said while the pump was man-made, requiring some energy use, it was expected to be a final fix for the murky pond. “It’s a mechanical filtration system, set up similar to a swimming pool filtration,” he said of the $30,000 system. “We tried to go with a more natural system before going to the man-made system. This does require energy consumption but we believe it’s the best solution.” Tuesday, Ashland resident Brittany Orberly said her daily jogs through the park had not been the same in recent months since the duck pond had been emptied. “I love coming through here. It’s so peaceful and beautiful,” she said. “The duck pond adds so much charm. It’s not the same with it empty.” The construction netting and low water levels is not the typical photo opportunity normally associated with the Lithia Park duck pond. But parks and recreation officials believe the new filtration system will bring a lasting solution. Three-year-old Willow Marx was oblivious to concepts like aeration and excess goo. “She loves to come see the ducks. She laughs when they stick their heads under water and their butts poke up," said her mother, Farrah Marx. "This is one of our favorite places and we’ve been checking every week to see if it’s reopened yet... The hard part is convincing her she can’t feed them anymore. Maybe when they get the water dilemma squared away they’ll let us feed them again.” No promises, said Robertson. In addition, city officials have not yet discussed whether swans would be reintroduced. Robertson said he had received daily calls from locals and visitors eager to know when the pond would reopen, which he said could happen any day. “People are fascinated by it,” he said. “It’s a long term family tradition to visit the ducks. Tourists who come here every year, part of their annual pilgrimage is to visit the duck pond. It’s a significant asset to the community and to Lithia Park.” DailyTidings.com Home Page Archives | Revels | Classifieds | Real Estate Guide | Weather | Subscribe | Contact Us Copyright 2005 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers All Rights Reserved Deep Muscle Stimulator Ceramic Piggy Banks FREE Entertainment Guide Women's & Men's Slippers Accelerate Weightloss Products Backpacks Online Pharmacy Vegas Travel Guide Search Engine Optimization Student Loans Hotel & Airline Reservations Hammocks Water Filter Helzberg Diamonds Online Casinos Community Bonus Casino Mortgage Calculator Security Systems Mailing Lists Click Here Advertisement .:Advertisements:. Site Search: RESOURCES - Mail Tribune News - ODOT Road Cams