Keep Austin Beautiful is more than cleanups.  When people first hear about KAB they zone in on the fact that we pick-up litter, a LOT of litter, but after volunteering for their first cleanup they realize the impact is much bigger than simply making a space look pretty.

Removing litter from our public spaces improves water quality, protects wildlife, and even has social implications like crime reduction. It changes the way you make decisions about using materials like Styrofoam and peaks interest in environmental stewardship.

Trash Floating on the Water, June 6th 2011

On June 11th KAB has 286 volunteers ready to clean the lake!

To meet the demand from our volunteers who want to not only take care of Austin’s environment but also to learn more about it, KAB created a Cultivating Leaders Field Trip Series.  On June 6th we were proud to partner with Watershed Protection Department Scientist Mary Gilroy to offer our regular Lake Leader volunteers an on-the-water tour of Lady Bird Lake and a first peek at WPD’s new aquatic plant nursery.    

WPD Scientist, Mary Gilroy, unloading the boat

A caged aquatic revegetation site.  The cages protect the native aquatic plants from turtles and water fowl.  There are twenty of these sites in Lady Bird Lake.    Native plants used in these cages include:  arrowhead, pickerelweed, fragrant water lily, and American water-willow. 

Native pickerelweed flowering beautifully in a protected revegetation cage. 

Mary Gilroy points out Eastern Gamagrass, a native bunch grass that helps with bank stabilization.

A volunteer gets a close up shot of a native buttonbush. 

KAB Staff & volunteers learn a new native plant.  Jamaican Saw-grass, Cladium mariscus ssp. jamaicense.  

Volunteers enjoy the ride while cruising by native reeds and learning about freshwater mussels.

Invasive Asian mussel shells.  Native mussels that have been found in the lake include: 3 ridge, giant floater, & maple leaf.

A monoculture of invasive Arundo donax, giant reed. 

Getting up close and personal with Arundo to learn about its negative impacts & how wasps may impact its health.

Can you spot the yellow-crowned night heron?  Other wildlife spotted included green herons, red eared slider turtles, bass, and damselflies.

Dragonfly exoskeleton

VIP behind the scenes tour of WPD’s new aquatic plant nursery.  The nursery holds native plants that have been rescued from development sites and will be re-planted during restoration projects.  KAB’s Adopt-a-Creek partners and our Clean Creek Campus ponds will benefit from some of these plants

A rescued Arrowhead, Sagittaria latifolia, blooming happily in the aquatic plant nursery. 

HOPE YOU ENJOYED THE TOUR!