The Kickemuit River Restoration Project, done by the Bristol County Water Authority in concert with Save the Bay, recently reached its near completion when a vast variety of vegetation was planted in the areas where two dams once were.

The upper dam, located east of Schoolhouse Road, and the lower dam, right at the BCWA headquarters on Child Street, were removed last year. The plantings done over three days earlier this fall were an effort to "restore what was a pretty disturbed area," according to BCWA Executive Director Steve Coutu.

The plantings were the culmination of a near-decade long effort to remove the dams, one of which had been in place for well over a century and the other for some 70 years to create and protect the area's water supply. 

Coutu gave much credit to Wenley Ferguson, Save the Bay's Director of Habitat Restoration, for guiding the restorative process.

"Wenley has been working on this for a long time. Well before I got here. She's been a champion for this project," Coutu said.

"It was a combination of trees and shrubs," Coutu continued. "We put native wetland plants and trees back. Some were really tiny. We bought all the trees and shrubs. And then Wenley gathered her volunteer troops, and so for two days volunteers helped put the trees and shrubs in. We also had BCWA staff on hand to help out as needed.

"So we planted roughly 250 trees and shrubs to help bring it back to what it once was. But it's gonna take many, many, many years for it to come back."

Ferguson said in total 105 trees were set in place, ranging in size, measured in gallons, from two to 10. She said Save the Bay's involvement began nine years ago, teaming with the BCWA on the planning and design phases along with the grant writing needed to gain the necessary engineering permits to remove the dams.

Key to the finishing aspects of the project was the cost savings seen once the deconstruction took place. Ferguson said the amount of sediment to be hauled from the sites was less than anticipated, which allowed for the surplus to be used for the plantings.

Ferguson said the lower dam, installed after Hurricane Carol in 1954 to stop the reservoir from flooding, was considered more like a typical preventative structure. She described the upper dam, which she said dated back to the late 1800s, as a "berm." Because it was an "earthen structure," Ferguson said another 800 feet of land was able to be recaptured for the project.

"So that expanded our footprint for planting, too," Ferguson continued. "And we planted wetland species because the berm was located in a wetland, so there's a red maple swamp on either side of the berm. And as we were planting, we were looking at it and making sure that we created a path so that people could park at the former entrance to the berm."

Residents can access the location at the corner of Schoolhouse and Serpentine Roads. Ferguson said the project made sure not to block a pathway to the wetlands created previously by the town's conservation commission and local Boy Scouts.

"So we, again, wanted to restore the wetlands, but we also wanted to look at envisioning how the public could be using this site in the future," Ferguson added.

Though most of the plantings are established, the location will continuously be observed to see what took root and what else potentially could be added to bolster the site.

"We're going to keep monitoring and then determine if there's other, what we call adaptive management opportunities," Ferguson added. "We're going to probably be doing more planting next spring, now that we're seeing what's recolonizing at what elevation. We'll have a better sense of where we should target these species."

Now that the fresh water from the river is intermingling with the salt water from the Narragansett Bay, the land itself will reveal what can and can't thrive going forward.

"It's more complicated restoring a brackish area than a salt marsh, because the salinity regime is a much greater," Ferguson explained. "In the fall, winter, spring, it can be much fresher and more brackish. In the summer, it can be pretty salty. So we're trying to figure it out, letting nature show us what plants can live where."