About the nursery:
Wetlands Working at Munnell Run Trout Nursery
Munnell Run Trout Nursery is one of 165 cooperative nursery units of the Pennsylvania Fish & Boat Commission. The Neshannock Chapter of Trout Unlimited is its sponsor.
The trout nursery is located on a 163 acre working farm owned by the County of Mercer and managed by the Mercer County Farm Foundation. Located one mile north of Mercer, Pa., on route 58W, the farm is dedicated to providing quality education experiences for children and adults on a wide variety of topics.
Neshannock TU and nursery personnel take great pride being a participant in the district’s conservation education program.
Nursery personnel raise and stock approximately 1,600 trout each year. (A seldom published fact is that last year the Fish & Boat Commission’s 165 cooperative nurseries raised and stocked well over one million catchable salmonids. That’s quite an accomplishment for an all-volunteer operation.) The trout are stocked in state approved trout waters that are open to the public.
How did Munnell Run Nursery become a reality? The idea surfaced during a preseason stocking in the spring of 1996. Frank Parise, WCO for Mercer County, mentioned to a Neshannock TUmember that Mercer County was one of few counties that didn’t operate a cooperative nursery unit.
The comment resulted in a visit to the Red Maple Nursery, an old abandoned cooperative trout nursery unit that was located on Mercer County Vo-Tech School grounds. Frank met with school officials and received permission to pursue the feasibility of reopening the site.
Cecil Houser, manager of the Fish & Boat Commission’s Cooperative Nursery Unit, visited the site, checked the site, its water quality, and authorized continuance of the feasibility study. A team was formed to complete the study, and if approved, oversee the construction and operation of the nursery.
Original team members were Chuck Rohrer, Ed Wilcox, Ray Magensky, Don Garrett, Ken Tarczy and Pete Anthony. (Since then, Joe Benes, Shawn Hedglmi, Jim Williams and Jim Noble have joined the Nursery Operations Team.)
We know from life experiences that one’s best laid plans don’t always work. It didn’t take long to learn that the site of the nursery would end up being a logistical nightmare. One didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to see the need for a different location for a nursery
The search for a new site led us to the door of the Mercer County Conservation District. The office was located across the road from the abandoned Red Maple Nursery site. A meeting and a tour of the Mercer County Government farm grounds was conducted by Jim Mondok, conservation district manager.
Eureka! This time we found the right site. Located on the farm was a 3,500 gallon capacity reservoir with water supplied by local springs at a flow rate of approximately 36 gallons per minute.
Jim had 10 years of data on the spring’s water quality. Again Cecil Houser and his staff were asked for assistance and approval. Bob Hetz of the 3CU club was also asked and graciously accepted the invitation to assist in the analysis of the site. The site was approved in January 1997.
This time around the plans worked. An old, abandoned slaughterhouse adjacent to the main farm building was restored. The raceway was constructed indoors, on a platform separate from the main floor, so as to minimize structural damage.
The indoor-raceway also meant fewer problems with vandalism and predators. Water from the 3,500 gallon reservoir is transported via a 4-inch steel pipe over a distance of about 1/8th of a mile to a 700-gallon tank next to the nursery.
At this temporary stop a solar panel system is used upon demand to pump water to higher elevations for cattle during the non-freezing months of the year. The remaining water (99.9 percent) flows into the trout nursery.
Most of the piping system was installed ‘in the 1920s to provide water for the Old County Home’s heating system. The water system was disconnected in the 1950s. Pumps are not needed in the process to deliver the water, nor is electricity. Transporting the water uses an age old process – gravity.
During the following five-month period, thousands of volunteer man-hours contributed to the construction of the nursery. The nursery became operational and received its first shipment of fingerling brook trout from the Fish & Boat Commission on June 28, 1997.
This past fall the nursery reached another milestone. The Mercer County Conservation District under the leadership of Jim Mondok constructed a quarter-acre wetland to help control manure run-off from the barnyard, and to treat discharge water from the trout nursery. (See photo above. The tall white building on the right is the trout nursery.)
The water enters the wetland and slowly flows in a serpentine pattern through a series of small, shallow ponds planted with various species of wetland plants. The purpose of this type of treatment is to retain the water in the wetland long enough for bacterial action and chemical processes associated with the plants to break-down and/or absorb excess nutrients that might otherwise enter local streams – in this case, Munnell Run.
The water from the constructed wetland flows into a natural wetland area adjacent to the stream, which further filters and treats the discharge, again through natural processes. (If interested in further details on this wetland project, Jim Mondok can be contacted by phone at (724) 662-2242, or by mail: Mercer County Conservation District, 747 Greenville Road, Mercer, PA 16137.)
Originally seen in Pennsylvania Trout; Written by Pete Anthony
Munnell Run Trout Nursery is one of 165 cooperative nursery units of the Pennsylvania Fish & Boat Commission. The Neshannock Chapter of Trout Unlimited is its sponsor.
The trout nursery is located on a 163 acre working farm owned by the County of Mercer and managed by the Mercer County Farm Foundation. Located one mile north of Mercer, Pa., on route 58W, the farm is dedicated to providing quality education experiences for children and adults on a wide variety of topics.
Neshannock TU and nursery personnel take great pride being a participant in the district’s conservation education program.
Nursery personnel raise and stock approximately 1,600 trout each year. (A seldom published fact is that last year the Fish & Boat Commission’s 165 cooperative nurseries raised and stocked well over one million catchable salmonids. That’s quite an accomplishment for an all-volunteer operation.) The trout are stocked in state approved trout waters that are open to the public.
How did Munnell Run Nursery become a reality? The idea surfaced during a preseason stocking in the spring of 1996. Frank Parise, WCO for Mercer County, mentioned to a Neshannock TUmember that Mercer County was one of few counties that didn’t operate a cooperative nursery unit.
The comment resulted in a visit to the Red Maple Nursery, an old abandoned cooperative trout nursery unit that was located on Mercer County Vo-Tech School grounds. Frank met with school officials and received permission to pursue the feasibility of reopening the site.
Cecil Houser, manager of the Fish & Boat Commission’s Cooperative Nursery Unit, visited the site, checked the site, its water quality, and authorized continuance of the feasibility study. A team was formed to complete the study, and if approved, oversee the construction and operation of the nursery.
Original team members were Chuck Rohrer, Ed Wilcox, Ray Magensky, Don Garrett, Ken Tarczy and Pete Anthony. (Since then, Joe Benes, Shawn Hedglmi, Jim Williams and Jim Noble have joined the Nursery Operations Team.)
We know from life experiences that one’s best laid plans don’t always work. It didn’t take long to learn that the site of the nursery would end up being a logistical nightmare. One didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to see the need for a different location for a nursery
The search for a new site led us to the door of the Mercer County Conservation District. The office was located across the road from the abandoned Red Maple Nursery site. A meeting and a tour of the Mercer County Government farm grounds was conducted by Jim Mondok, conservation district manager.
Eureka! This time we found the right site. Located on the farm was a 3,500 gallon capacity reservoir with water supplied by local springs at a flow rate of approximately 36 gallons per minute.
Jim had 10 years of data on the spring’s water quality. Again Cecil Houser and his staff were asked for assistance and approval. Bob Hetz of the 3CU club was also asked and graciously accepted the invitation to assist in the analysis of the site. The site was approved in January 1997.
This time around the plans worked. An old, abandoned slaughterhouse adjacent to the main farm building was restored. The raceway was constructed indoors, on a platform separate from the main floor, so as to minimize structural damage.
The indoor-raceway also meant fewer problems with vandalism and predators. Water from the 3,500 gallon reservoir is transported via a 4-inch steel pipe over a distance of about 1/8th of a mile to a 700-gallon tank next to the nursery.
At this temporary stop a solar panel system is used upon demand to pump water to higher elevations for cattle during the non-freezing months of the year. The remaining water (99.9 percent) flows into the trout nursery.
Most of the piping system was installed ‘in the 1920s to provide water for the Old County Home’s heating system. The water system was disconnected in the 1950s. Pumps are not needed in the process to deliver the water, nor is electricity. Transporting the water uses an age old process – gravity.
During the following five-month period, thousands of volunteer man-hours contributed to the construction of the nursery. The nursery became operational and received its first shipment of fingerling brook trout from the Fish & Boat Commission on June 28, 1997.
This past fall the nursery reached another milestone. The Mercer County Conservation District under the leadership of Jim Mondok constructed a quarter-acre wetland to help control manure run-off from the barnyard, and to treat discharge water from the trout nursery. (See photo above. The tall white building on the right is the trout nursery.)
The water enters the wetland and slowly flows in a serpentine pattern through a series of small, shallow ponds planted with various species of wetland plants. The purpose of this type of treatment is to retain the water in the wetland long enough for bacterial action and chemical processes associated with the plants to break-down and/or absorb excess nutrients that might otherwise enter local streams – in this case, Munnell Run.
The water from the constructed wetland flows into a natural wetland area adjacent to the stream, which further filters and treats the discharge, again through natural processes. (If interested in further details on this wetland project, Jim Mondok can be contacted by phone at (724) 662-2242, or by mail: Mercer County Conservation District, 747 Greenville Road, Mercer, PA 16137.)
Originally seen in Pennsylvania Trout; Written by Pete Anthony