South Guilford News

It looks like another lovely summer afternoon on the western edge of Lake Townsend. Few clouds populate the blue skies as a warm breeze passes over the calm waters. Birdsong fills the air as dragonflies dart along the shoreline.

Suddenly, the roar of a 525-horsepower airboat pierces the tranquility and sends ducks, herons, and egrets to flight.

This wasn’t an inconsiderate boater or an aspiring powerboat racer, but Water Resources Laboratory Specialist David Jackson surveying part of Lake Townsend’s western shoreline. Townsend, neighboring Lake Brandt, and Lake Higgins provide most of the City’s drinking water and abundant recreational opportunities for both residents and visitors.

The lakes also provide homes for invasive plant species, which could wreak havoc on the lakes’ natural ecosystem and interrupt the water supply if left unchecked. Jackson, along with his partner Ronnie Simpson, frequently patrols the City’s three lakes in search of invasive species in one of two City-owned airboats. They also develop treatment plans, conduct twice-monthly water sampling of the lakes, answer the occasional random request, and maintain the boats.

“This could be the best job in the city,” Jackson said. “A lot of people think it is. Then again, they're not here in the middle of the summer or in the middle of the winter.”

Since Greensboro and its surrounding communities and ecosystem rely heavily on the three lakes, Jackson’s role is important. Last summer he discovered large patches of hydrilla, an aggressive aquatic plant native to Korea, growing on Lake Higgins. The state considers the underwater growth a noxious weed and it has spread widely across the state’s lakes and rivers since its discovery in Wake County around 1980. If untreated, hydrilla can alter wildlife habitats, clog water-supply intake equipment, and interrupt recreational activity.

It looks like Jackson’s treatment with a combination of herbicides and grass carp (yep, fish that eat hydrilla) is working. “So far this year it's been really successful. Higgins looks great,” he said. “It’s still early in the season. It may be that the lake is so turbid and the season a little cooler, but it's really not showing up; just in a couple of isolated patches. We had 75 acres last year.”

While Jackson keeps his eyes on hydrilla growing in parts of Lake Townsend this year, it was a dangerous crop of creeping water primrose in 2003 that inspired the City to create the position he holds today.

After Lake Higgins was nearly drained due to drought in 2002, the primrose took hold with a vengeance as the lake refilled the following year. Thick growths of the yellow-flowered plant provide breeding areas for mosquitoes and degrade both water quality and habitat for fish and wildlife. Like the hydrilla, if untreated it can foul intakes used to supply drinking water and create navigation hazards. Also, when the primrose dies in the winter, it decomposes in the lake and depletes its oxygen levels. It has also earned noxious weed status from the state’s Department of Environmental Quality.

Since this was Greensboro’s first major recorded water primrose outbreak, the City called on Jackson, who had his aquatic pesticide applicators license, plus state assistance, to restore the lake’s waters to safety. But long-term state help was not available. “They just didn't have time to dedicate to it,” Jackson recalled. “They service the whole state, so we adopted our own program and bought our first airboat.”

And Jackson was its captain and mechanic.

The new role suited Jackson just fine. The Summerfield, NC, native didn’t always envision a lengthy career with the City’s Water Resources Department, especially as he earned his degree in geography from UNC Greensboro in 1984.

“When I graduated there weren’t a lot of geography jobs open, except in planning,” Jackson recalled. “And the entry-level planning jobs really didn’t pay what the (water treatment plant) operators’ jobs were paying, so I got the job at the (North Buffalo Creek) wastewater plant.”

Jackson is one of the few remaining employees to work with Jim Moorefield, who served more than 50 years in Water Resources before retiring as the City’s water supply manager. Their relationship started when Jackson was a student working summers under Moorefield.

“Jim was instrumental in a lot of the people that are here now,” Jackson recalls. “He dedicated a good deal of his life to the department.”

As Jackson approaches 39 years with the City, some have asked how much longer he intends to work. He could spend more time doing consultant work for the cities of High Point and Raleigh. He could tinker with his airboat (the first one purchased by the City, which Jackson bought at auction). Or, he could devote more time to his beekeeping hobby. But he knows when he does retire, he will leave a vocation his friends tell him sounds like “the best job ever.”

“People keep asking me, why don't you leave?” Jackson said. “Well, I couldn't do the shoreline survey if I left, right?”

Original source can be found here.