ABSTRACT
In July 1980, the Ontario Ministry of the Environment (MOE) started the Listowel Marsh project in southwestern Ontario. The project established that properly configured cattail (Typha) marshes have the capacity to significantly improve the quality of sewage wastewaters. Vegetation was established in 1982 by planting individual cattail shoots with an attached piece of rhizome (>5 cm) at 1-m intervals throughout the plot. Cattails were transplanted from adjacent natural stands. Marsh growth and development paralleled marsh development at Listowel. Cattail height and density after one year were not as great as in Listowel, but the vigor with which the marsh established itself was similar. Although the marsh effluent varies widely through different seasons and conditions, bacteriological quality of the effluent in the better operating conditions far exceeds the quality expected of a traditional secondary treatment plant.
