Waterfront Property Owners
These videos and publications explore the connection of lakes and shoreland and how it impacts fish, wildlife, and water quality.
For additonal resources check out Healthy Lakes & Rivers. Learn five simple and inexpensive best practices that improve habitat and water quality on your shoreland property or try Score My Shore to help you determine the health of your lake.
Videos
Our Lakeshore Connection
Lakes create beautiful views and are great places to recreate, but they are also thriving ecosystems filled with animals, plants, microorganisms, and other wildlife, including people. This short video explores the connection of lakes and shoreland and how it impacts fish, wildlife, and water quality.
Value of Shoreland Zoning
Learn how shoreland zoning helps protect water quality, fishing, and home values in this short 3 minute animated video.
Impacts of Impervious Surfaces on Fish, Wildlife, and Waterfront Property
Healthy lakes and streams create fond memories of time spent near the water, like walleye fishing on a crisp fall morning, swimming with the kids in the afternoon, and entertaining friends on the evening shoreline. Healthy fish, abundant wildlife, and clean water depend on we make about our waterfront properties.
Choosing the Right Waterfront Property (Rev. 2021)
If you are thinking about buying waterfront property in Wisconsin, this guide is meant for you. A little time invested in learning about waterfront living will pay back sizable dividends in matching your expectations to the realities. This guide provides:
– Ideas to consider before you start your property search
– Considerations to help you decide on the right lake or river
– Factors to help you choose just the right property.
Protecting Your Waterfront Property (Rev. 2021)
Healthy watersheds make healthy lakes and higher property values. Created for people who live on a waterfront lot or plan to buy one, this publication describes a menu of opportunities to protect your property investment.
The Water’s Edge
This introduction to life at the water’s edge reveals the advantages of a natural, wildlife-friendly shore, and describes how you can restore, create, or maintain a natural shore without needing to give up your lawn and dock. In short, you can have your lawn, your dock, and wildlife too.
Shoreland Development Density and Impervious Surfaces
Learn how shoreland development density and impervious surfaces affect the quality of our lakes and streams.
A Second Life for Trees
As Useful in Water as They Were on Land
Remarkably, after a tree falls in the lake, it might last another 300 to 600 years in the water. Large submerged trees can host entire fish communities. Fish use submerged trees in a variety of ways. Many species spawn on, adjacent to or under trees that provide cover which help some species protect their incubating brood. Lake Property owners can increase fish habitat by leaving trees that fall in the water in place.
3 Simple Steps to Create Healthy Lawns
How we manage our lawns affects the health of our children, pets, wildlife and water quality. This one page information sheet outlines three simple steps for creating a lawn that’s healthy for all.