Field Trip to Certified Wildlife Habitat @ closed landfill

Join us to tour the reclaimed site that is now a closed, i.e., not active, landfill that has been transformed into 365 acres of certified wildlife habitat. Located at Waste Management's former Westside facility, 13 miles west of downtown Fort Worth, just north of Interstate 30.

The area is now the site of a 47-acre lake which has been constructed to mimic lake conditions found in nature, including shorelines which contain a variety of slopes, benches and shelves, a lake bottom of varying depths, and native vegetation around the periphery. In 2008, the lake was stocked with five species of fish including red ear sunfish, copper nose bluegill, fathead minnow, large mouth bass and black crappie. Local Boy Scout troops were also recruited to construct and erect bird boxes along the edges of the lake.

In addition to the large lake, several small wetlands were created on the south and north sides of the entry pond. These areas had wetland plants and willow "waddles" installed. The "waddles" are made from the branches of nearby willow trees and provide a natural barrier which traps sediment and helps enhance the development of wetland areas. The wildlife team noted that the wetland plantings were slow to become established, and supplemental plantings took place in 2008.

Employees at the Westside Facility developed three food plots to supplement wildlife sustenance during site disturbance. In recent years, these areas have been expanded and additional perennial seed mixes have been planted. The food plots have also been supplemented with feeders containing feed material for deer.

In 2004, the Westside Facility was required to re-vegetate areas adjacent to the soil borrow area (now the lake) with a combination of Indian grass, big bluestem, sideoats grama, and Illinois bundleflower. The wildlife team has gone above and beyond these restoration requirements by including switchgrass plantings which act as a transition zone between the newly created lake and the native prairie. Since 2007, native grasses have been planted throughout the site, including on the final landfill cap and on an old stockpile area of 13 acres.

An area that was once part of the landfill operations will be reclaimed as a two-acre pollinator garden. The area was filled with soil and graded to drain, and was seeded with vegetation to stabilize the soil in the spring of 2007. As of 2008, the formal delineation of the pollination area was determined and "no-mow" signs were installed.