The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Buffalo District Regulatory Branch brought together 27 Regulatory Project Managers for a NCNE Wetland Delineation Refresher Training with a focus on Atypical and Problematic Situations. Instructors Doug Kapusinski, Tina Stonemetz from the Stow Regulatory Field office lead the two-day classroom and field training, June 14-15, 2023.
The classroom portion of the delineation training took place at the Buffalo District Office and the field component took place within the Tillman Road Wildlife Management Area and Iroquois National Wildlife Refuge/Tonawanda Wildlife Management Area.
While in the comforts of the classroom attendees learned about reviewing submitted wetland delineation reports for completeness, how to set up transects for routine delineations and mosaic wetland situations, using government cell phones to collect field data, determining presence absence of wetlands in problematic situation and atypical delineations, aerial photo review, etc.
Although, thunderstorms were predicted for the first day of the field sites the weather held out and field staff enjoyed a rain free field day. During these outdoor sessions Regulators navigated treed areas and emergent vegetation as they utilized typical field operation tools to dig soil pits to identify hydric soil indicators, measured out vegetation sampling plots to identify wetland hydric soil indicators, and identified wetland hydrology indicators. Several team competitions were held to further reinforce the material learned throughout the course. One of the team competitions involved finding and defend hydrology indicators and another team competition involved identifying a number of plant species.