Fountain Grove Waterfowl page 4
MAHA's Fountain Grove wetlands is a large area even more so than this continuing duck blind picture series demonstrates.
From inside the blind looking out to the front, 10+ surface acres of water.
The average depth is 2 to 10 feet.
An easy 200 yard walk from the parking area.
The blind can be accessed by dry land but chest waders and/or a dog are required to place decoys and retrieve game.
This lake serves as a holding lake for the north half of the west marsh. The water level is controlled by a drop log pipe structure to drain and hold as much water as we desire. This open water lake has been productive for Canada geese more so than others as well as for ducks.
Over the years we have found some interest in the wetlands work the Association performs off season. The rest of this picture series is of some of the work that has been done on this Fountain Grove waterfowl area.
Any attempt to capture all that work in picture and text is futile. The best we can do are these snapshots. We provide this information to give the reviewer confidence that we do have the quality wetlands we advertise and the hunter that has any familiarity with wetlands will readily agree to that if having reviewed this entire duck hunting section of our web site.
A panoramic picture trying to show the large size of just one wetlands and in this case it is just the north lake of this wetlands. The picture makes it look small, it is not. The far tree line is just about a mile distant.
Drop log out flow control.
These two pictures were taken after three feet of boards were pulled from the drop log structure to lower the water level to allow it to dry between the duck hunting higher water level and where it is now for planting.
Once planted in Milo we will use a brush mower and cut open shooting pools in front of the blinds. The shooting areas around the blinds will be chest wader accessible once we re-flood the wetlands.
Planting food plots is more dependent on time consumed repairing beaver and muskrat damage as drying out the wetlands.
The other side of the same lake.
For this wetlands of three separate lakes we have a another reservoir lake to use during dry periods to ensure we have the water level we want in the duck hunting areas of the wetlands. The water seen in this picture is the back up should the fall rains fail us.
Pictures have the effect of showing landscapes far smaller in appearance than reality. This is a large lake that we cut into the dam a couple years back to insert a drainage pipe to draw 
water from the entire volume of this lake to drain into our duck hunting wetlands.
The holding lake after we drain it for the wetlands. It typically fills with fall rains before the regular duck season and well before the peak migration to give more surface water structure to the overall lease.
The flow out of the holding lake into the wetlands.
At this rate, 10 inch pipe, the lake will take 4 days to drain.
The flow from the pipe is directly into the wetlands.
The water within the separate pools of the wetlands is controlled by levees with drop log structures to make as good as possible the shooting pools for the best blind placement considering local flight patterns.