Fort McCoy personnel share August natural resources accomplishments during September 2026 Monroe County meeting

Representatives from Fort McCoy’s Directorate of Public Works (DPW) Environmental Division Natural Resources Branch shared updates on fisheries, forestry, threatened and endangered species, invasive-species management, and wildlife activities during the Sept. 14, 2026, meeting of the Monroe County Natural Resources and Extension Committee in Sparta, Wis.

The update provided an overview of natural resources accomplishments completed across Fort McCoy during August and highlighted the installation’s continuing efforts to manage and protect its natural resources while supporting military training.

Fort McCoy’s Natural Resources Branch routinely participates in the Monroe County committee meetings to maintain communication with county officials and conservation partners and to share information about the installation’s environmental stewardship, monitoring, research, and management activities.

Endangered Species Biologist Jessup Weichelt attended the September meeting and discussed the following update:

Fisheries

— Fort McCoy fisheries personnel continued extensive monitoring of the installation’s lakes, streams and fish populations during August.

— Staff collected water samples as part of adaptive-management sampling at 13 monitoring locations, along with runoff samples from U.S. Geological Survy gage stations and four runoff events. A total of 107 water samples were sent to a laboratory for analysis.

— Temperature and dissolved-oxygen data were collected on all 10 Fort McCoy lakes. Oxygen was limited at deeper depths in numerous lakes, which is typical during the later portions of summer. Staff also collected chlorophyll-a and total phosphorus samples from all 10 lakes to monitor lake conditions.

— Water levels at Sandy, West Sandy, and Big Sandy lakes were measured weekly on four occasions, with levels reaching their lowest point of the season, which is typical in late summer and early fall.

— Fisheries staff conducted 14 creel surveys, interviewing 58 anglers. Suukjak Sep Lake remained busy with anglers fishing while camping at Pine View Campground, while the North Flowage also had considerable fishing activity. Big Sandy Lake was closed for training for much of August before reopening later in the month.

— Staff tagged 139 new largemouth bass and recaptured 43 tagged bass on the North Flowage and Lost Lake. They also conducted 14 stream-habitat surveys and 19 stream-electroshocking surveys, tagging 122 brown trout and recapturing 36 previously tagged brown trout.

— Fisheries personnel moved 64 brown trout from LAX4.0, upstream of Trout Falls, to an area downstream of the falls. The effort helps maintain a brook-trout-dominated fishery upstream of Trout Falls. The fish moved included 27 adults and 37 young-of-the-year trout.

— Seven instream macrophyte mapping surveys were completed, bringing the year’s total to 23 mapped sites. Staff also conducted a SCUBA dive at West Sandy Lake to remove invasive Eurasian water milfoil and curly-leaf pondweed. Four Eurasian water milfoil stems were removed during the dive, with no curly-leaf pondweed removed. Through August, 49 Eurasian water milfoil stems and 313 curly-leaf pondweed stems had been removed from West Sandy Lake during 2026 — a large reduction compared with the previous year.

Forestry

— Fort McCoy forestry personnel coordinated six oak wilt treatment sites on North Post, with discussions beginning about potentially including South Post in future treatment efforts.

— Four timber sales were advertised for bid, with bid openings scheduled for September. Forestry staff also toured timber sales with loggers and introduced a new bidder to Fort McCoy.

— The forestry team completed its arduous pack test, assisted with a hunter-safety education class that graduated 25 students and assisted the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources with Forest Regeneration Monitoring surveys on Fort McCoy.

Threatened and endangered species

— Fort McCoy continued extensive monitoring of threatened and endangered species and other species of conservation concern.

— Biologists conducted biweekly telemetry tracking of up to three Blanding’s turtles and two wood turtles. A transmitter was removed from one Blanding’s turtle, while another turtle dropped its transmitter.

— The team completed 32 bumble bee surveys, observing 15 rusty-patched bumble bees, 17 southern plains bumble bees and one American bumble bee. Two rusty-patched bumble bee queens and a likely nearby nest were observed in the B10 firebreak, while multiple southern plains bumble bee nests were considered likely to be present on Fort McCoy.

— Other August surveys documented 91 Leonard’s skippers, 30 red-tailed prairie leafhoppers and more than 75 monarch butterflies that were tagged and released.

— Seven rare-plant surveys were completed. Staff surveyed for outlier populations of Virginia meadow beauty but found none in the A02 area. Surveys also documented 126 brittle prickly pear plants and four prairie flame flowers.

— Fort McCoy personnel maintained stationary acoustic bat detectors, completed four mobile bat surveys and began analyzing bat data. Five regal fritillary surveys were completed, with one butterfly observed during formal survey efforts and eight additional regal fritillaries observed outside those efforts. Eleven bloody flower moths also were documented in the R29 area.

Invasive species management

— Invasive-species management remained a significant part of Fort McCoy's natural resources work during August.

— The installation treated 1,260.59 acres involving invasive species, with 1,227.2 acres receiving herbicide or hand-pulling treatments. Spotted knapweed accounted for 915.7 acres of hand-pulling treatment.

— Other invasive plants treated included black locust, glossy buckthorn, honeysuckle, Siberian pea shrub, spotted knapweed, burning bush, common buckthorn, spotted knapweed and numerous other species.

— Goat grazing treated an additional 11.2 acres of glossy buckthorn. The goat-grazing effort wrapped up at the end of August, including a re-graze of C16 after cantonment units completed their work.

— Staff also attended an environmental DNA workshop at the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s Construction Engineering Research Laboratory facility in Champaign, Illinois. A CERL modeler also visited Fort McCoy for ground-truthing work.

Wildlife management

— Wildlife personnel continued preparing for the upcoming fall hunting seasons and coordinating hunting permits.

— The August update listed approximately 1,550 gun-deer hunters, 33 youth gun-deer hunters, 27 hunters with disabilities, 180 cantonment archery hunters and 16 trappers. Summer truck-book surveys for gamebirds, predators, mammals and deer continued. The surveys provide information used in population models and as indices for comparison with previous years.

— Deer surveys were showing approximately a 2-to-1 doe-to-fawn ratio during the summer, compared with roughly 3-to-1 in 2025. Turkey brood sizes also increased, with about two poults per hen recorded in 2025 compared with slightly more than four poults per hen in 2026.

— Fort McCoy personnel also worked with the Wisconsin DNR Wild Turkey Advisory Committee in reviewing and updating the state Wild Turkey Management Plan.

— The Fort McCoy hunter-education course was completed with a full class of 25 students, all of whom graduated. The course was held at Whitetail Ski Chalet, with optional range time afterward at the Sparta Rod and Gun Club. Staff also continued coordination for research involving tick repellents and acaricides and held a season close-out meeting with bluebird volunteers.

— Fort McCoy fledged 1,608 bluebirds during 2026, the second-highest total recorded during the past 10 years. The highest total during that period was 1,777 bluebirds in 2020.

— Fort McCoy personnel also attended the Monroe County Chronic Wasting Disease Task Force meeting. Discussions included outreach efforts, Wisconsin DNR updates, coordination of carcass dumpsters, sampling kiosks and sites, and deer-donation locations. Fort McCoy provided updates regarding CWD positives, season structure and sampling efforts.

— The August wildlife surveys documented 674 wild turkey observations, with an average brood size of 4.05. Other gamebird observations included grouse, woodcock, wood ducks and mallards. Mammal surveys documented 11 animals, including two black bears, three coyotes, two red foxes, three raccoons and one skunk.

— Fort McCoy's participation in the Monroe County Natural Resources and Extension Committee provides an ongoing connection with local conservation partners and an opportunity to share the installation's natural resources work with the surrounding community.

Fort McCoy manages nearly 60,000 acres of forests, wetlands, lakes, streams, wildlife habitat, and other natural resources while supporting its military training mission, Weichelt said. The monthly county meetings help maintain communication about that work and provide another avenue for cooperation on natural resources issues affecting the region.

Fort McCoy’s motto beginning in 2026 is “Training the Total Force and Shaping the Future since 1909.” The installation’s mission: “Fort McCoy strengthens Total Force Readiness by serving as a training center, Mobilization Force Generation Installation, and Strategic Support Area enabling warfighter lethality to deploy, fight, and win our nation’s wars.”

And Fort McCoy’s vision is, “To be the premier training center supporting the most capable, combat-ready, and lethal armed forces.”

Located in the heart of the upper Midwest, Fort McCoy is the only U.S. Army installation in Wisconsin. The installation has provided support and facilities for the field and classroom training of more than 100,000 military personnel from all services nearly every year since 1984.

Learn more about Fort McCoy online athttps://home.army.mil/mccoy, on Facebook by searching “ftmccoy,” on Flickr at https://www.flickr.com/photos/fortmccoywi, and on X (formerly Twitter) by searching “usagmccoy.” Also try downloading the My Army Post app to your smartphone and set “Fort McCoy” or another installation as your preferred base.

Fort McCoy is also part of Army’s Installation Management Command where “We Are The Army’s Home.”

(The Fort McCoy Directorate of Public Works Environmental Division Natural Resources Branch contributed to this article.)

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