Luedtke Engineering Company has returned to Green Bay Harbor for the fourth time in the last five years to complete maintenance dredging of the federal navigational channel, informs the Wisconsin Domestic Maritime Coalition.
Each year clean dredge material is beneficially reused and pumped into island cells of the Cat Island Chain restoration project.
Environmental windows continue to pose the challenge of restricting the time allowed to complete the work each year, reported WIDMAC.
The aim of this 20+ year project is to diversify wetland habitat for various wildlife species, improve water quality, and help the local sport and commercial fisheries.
Already, there have been documented increases in bird numbers with the white pelican, snowy owl, and the endangered whooping crane and piping plover.
A fourth generation, family-owned business since 1930, Luedtke Engineering Company is a full-service marine construction company specializing in mechanical and hydraulic dredging, dock walls, breakwaters, and other marine structures.
Luedtke founder Elroy R. “Duke” Luedtke was born in Reedsville and began his career with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Milwaukee.
Some of the company’s first projects were constructing and rebuilding breakwaters in Algoma in 1932 and Kewaunee in 1935.
Photo: Wisconsin Domestic Maritime Coalition