{"id":7068,"date":"2025-04-03T10:02:17","date_gmt":"2025-04-03T10:02:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/?p=7068"},"modified":"2025-04-03T10:02:17","modified_gmt":"2025-04-03T10:02:17","slug":"on-board-with-tracy-nowacki","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/?p=7068","title":{"rendered":"On Board With: Tracy Nowacki"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>    On Board With: Tracy Nowacki<br \/>\n \t<BR><br \/>\n<BR><\/BR><br \/>\n    <!-- no image --><br \/>\n \t<BR><br \/>\n<BR><\/BR><\/p>\n<div>\n<section class=\"hydra-container\">\n<div class=\"hydra-canvas\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.boatingmag.com\/uploads\/2025\/04\/BTG425-OBW-Nowacki-1024x768.jpg?resize=800%2C600&#038;ssl=1\" class=\"hydra-image disable-lazyload\" alt=\"Tracy Nowacki on the dock\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1400px) 100vw, 1400px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.boatingmag.com\/uploads\/2025\/04\/BTG425-OBW-Nowacki-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.boatingmag.com\/uploads\/2025\/04\/BTG425-OBW-Nowacki-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.boatingmag.com\/uploads\/2025\/04\/BTG425-OBW-Nowacki-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.boatingmag.com\/uploads\/2025\/04\/BTG425-OBW-Nowacki-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.boatingmag.com\/uploads\/2025\/04\/BTG425-OBW-Nowacki.jpg 2000w\">                <\/div><figcaption class=\"caption margin_top_xs full border_1 hydra-figcaption\">\n                <span class=\"hydra-image-caption\">Tracy Nowacki helps protect waterways from invasive species. <\/span><br \/>\n                <span class=\"article_image_credit italic margin_right_xs\">Charles Plueddeman<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/section>\n<p>Launch a boat in Green Lake, Wisconsin, and you may run into Tracy Nowacki, a friendly woman with a clip board. We met Nowacki on duty at the Horner\u2019s Landing ramp, dressed in her bright blue <a href=\"https:\/\/www3.uwsp.edu\/cnr-ap\/UWEXLakes\/Pages\/programs\/cbcw\/default.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">\u201cClean Boats\/Clean Waters\u201d<\/a> shirt and standing next to a compost pile of weeds she\u2019d removed from boat trailers. Her mission is education and data collection. Funded by a grant from the Wisconsin DNR, the Green Lake Association stations Nowacki and other watercraft inspectors at six launch ramps on the 7,300-acre lake primarily to gather data for the DNR and the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point College of Natural Resources, which is studying how invasive species such as zebra mussels and spiny water fleas spread. The information is entered into an online DNR database called SWIMS, which stands for Surface Water Integrated Monitoring System. In 2024 the program inspected 144,691 boats across the state.<\/p>\n<p><iframe id=\"wxuzj5efbz\" src=\"https:\/\/boatingmag.dragonforms.com\/wxuzj5efbz\" scrolling=\"no\" style=\"width:100%;height:165px;border:none;overflow:hidden;\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How often are you out at the launch ramp?<\/h3>\n<p>This is my third season, and I work a four-hour shift three days a week. They usually have some college kids doing this, but I\u2019m semi-retired and like to be outdoors. It gives me something to do while my husband is fishing.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What kind of questions do you ask boaters?<\/h3>\n<p>When they pull in to launch, I ask if the boat has been used in another body of water in the past five days. If the answer is yes, I ask where the boat has been. The idea is to help researchers track patterns that could transport invasive species.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Looks like you are collecting weeds too.<\/h3>\n<p>When a boat is retrieved, I help remove any weeds from the trailer and remind the owner that by law they need to drain their boat and discard any live bait. I try to keep it friendly. I\u2019m not enforcing the law. Many people are still unaware about the spread of invasives, especially younger people. I also point out the wash stations we have at two of our ramps.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Read Next:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.boatingmag.com\/how-to\/how-boaters-can-stop-the-spread-of-invasive-species\/\">How Boaters Can Stop the Spread of Invasive Species<\/a><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How many boaters do you encounter a day?<\/h3>\n<p>Usually 30 to 40 boats launch in my shift, more if there\u2019s a tournament on the lake.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Does anyone give you a hard time?<\/h3>\n<p>Most everyone is cooperative, and many people actually thank me for being out here to protect the lake. I\u2019ve only had one a$$hole this year.<\/p>\n<p>The post <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.boatingmag.com\/how-to\/on-board-with-tracy-nowacki\/\">On Board With: Tracy Nowacki<\/a> appeared first on <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.boatingmag.com\/\">Boating Mag<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p> \t<BR><br \/>\n <BR><\/BR><br \/>\n    Charles Plueddeman<br \/>\n \t<BR><br \/>\n<BR><\/BR><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.boatingmag.com\/how-to\/on-board-with-tracy-nowacki\/\">Go to boatingmag<\/a><br \/>\n \t<BR><br \/>\n <BR><\/BR><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On Board With: Tracy Nowacki Tracy Nowacki helps protect waterways from invasive species. Charles Plueddeman Launch a boat in Green Lake, Wisconsin, and you may run into Tracy Nowacki, a friendly woman with a clip board. We met Nowacki on duty at the Horner\u2019s Landing ramp, dressed in her bright blue \u201cClean Boats\/Clean Waters\u201d shirt [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[126,175,3463,1791],"tags":[127],"class_list":["post-7068","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-boatingmag","category-how-to","category-may-2025","category-on-board-with","tag-boatingmag"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7068"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7068"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7068\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/krogragg.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}