Federation Blog

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_7p_wUbbAM&feature=youtu.be

Last week, Robins returned to the South River watershed.  They are on fields, in highway medians, and in lawns. Perhaps you've seen one, making a fast dash north from its wintering grounds?

Nope.  Wrong Robin.

This Robin.  The American Robin.   Referred to as a "harbinger of Spring" in the Mid-Atlantic states, the American Robin has a highly variable migration pattern that is largely based on upon balancing caloric needs and food availability.  The Robin is a tough, adaptable bird, which is one reason we can see so many in an area like the South River watershed.  By songbird standards, the Robin is a "big bird" (actually, North America's largest thrush), and it's comfortable in agricultural, suburban, and forest habitats, and can eat almost anything you'd call "bird food."  So why do they migrate south at all?

Like many ducks and shorebirds in the Atlantic flyway, "our" Robins only migrate south when they feel they have no other choice.   What forces that choice? Songbirds like the American Robin uses between 40-80% of their (winter) calorie intake simply to maintain body temperature.   Once a few hard frosts have hit their habitat, their favorite food (soft-bodied insects, worms, and arthropods) become inactive and harder to find.  Robins then shift their diet to berries and seeds, which have higher carbohydrates but less protein than live food, and also require significantly more calories to eat and digest than live, soft food items like earthworms, grubs, and millipedes.   As the available seed supply starts to thin, the number of Robins in the South River watershed start to thin out - even though a few may stay through the winter.

It's the Robin's migration back north that captivates people.   An old farmers' tale is that Robins migrate north when the night and day temperatures average 36 degrees - and observations generally bear this out.  However, a little closer inspection tells us that it's not the slightly warmer air itself, but what that particular temperature does to the Robin's favorite food item - earthworms.

In the fall months, earthworms migrate downward through the soil to avoid freezing temperatures.  They seem conscious of where the frost line lies, and can often hibernate in large groups right below that important depth.  However, as the spring returns and the soil temperature bounces from 34 to 36 degrees near the surface, the earthworm's internal organs begin functioning again - including their respiration (breathing) apparatus in their skin.  Unfortunately for the earthworms, around this time, snow and ice begin to melt and spring rains begin, all of which fill soil pores with water instead of air.  The newly active earthworms have no choice but to climb to the surface to breathe, where new flocks of Robins are patiently waiting for them (like in the image below).

So much for "bird brains" - the American Robin has it all figured out.

If you thought keeping up with the Kardashians was tough, try keeping up with Kudzu! Also known as the Foot-a-Night-Vine and the Vine that ate the South, this Japanese native can grow up to a foot a day. Kudzu (Pueraria montana var. lobata) is an incredibly invasive woody vine that will consume the landscape from the ground to the top of the trees.

Kudzu was first brought to the States in 1876 to be displayed at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition, better known as the World Fair. After that, kudzu grew in popularity as an ornamental plant, soil conservation ground cover, and livestock feed. (Source: Sierra Club) By 1976, the USDA declared kudzu a noxious weed.

Keeping up with kudzu is certainly a challenge but that didn’t deter Master Watershed Stewards Nancy Tait and Leslie Riddle from teaming up with Edgewater Beach Citizen’s Association’s Joan Scott to remove the kudzu in their community. The team was awarded a mini grant from the South River Federation and also received funding from the Forestry Board and their community.

The process began back in the fall by first spraying the area, a steep hill overlooking the South River, with an herbicide. After the vines died back, community volunteers removed five large truckloads of kudzu and took it to the County landfill. Annual rye grass was then planted on the hill. Watershed Stewards Leslie and Nancy along with Joan plan to reassess the area this spring and will continue to battle the kudzu until the hill is reclaimed by native plants.

At Left: Master Watershed Steward Leslie Riddle chopping down the thick, woody kudzu vine.

At Right: Edgewater Beach community members removing the dead kudzu

Waterkeeper Celebrates Clean Water Act 40th Anniversary from W2 Films on Vimeo.

The Girl Scout Gold Award recognizes young women who make a difference in their communities.  The South River Watershed was lucky enough to be a beneficiary of a Girl Scout Gold Award last fall!  When Girl Scout Sarah Walsh applied for a $500 matching grant from the South River Federation for her Gold Award erosion and stabilization project at Camp Woodlands, we were thrilled to support her!

From the time she was in first grade, Sarah has gone to Arlington Echo Outdoor Education Center where she has developed a deep appreciation for the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries. Learning about the Chesapeake Bay watershed and the impact of society on the Bay’s ecosystem encouraged Sarah to dedicate her Girl Scout Gold Award Project to the preservation of the Bay.  Working with Ashley Jarvis of Arlington Echo as her advisor, she decided to focus her efforts on an area of Camp Woodlands along Broad Creek designated as a “critical area” for stabilization.

Working with Arlington Echo, a swale was designed and installed through volunteer labor.  In early September, volunteers lead by Sarah spread 400 cubic feet of mulch along the path to catch water not contained by the swale.  In October, they built the swale lined with weedblock and river jack to slow the flow of water coming downhill.  By the end of October, Sarah and her team of volunteers planted a variety of native trees and shrubs including: hackberry, serviceberry, tulip poplars, white oak, inkberry, highbush blueberry, and Atlantic white cedar. Sarah has plans to create an informational kiosk explaining the project and offering information on erosion control. In the long-term, a ranger at Camp Woodlands will continue to monitor the swale.

The leadership skills required for this project taught Sarah just how difficult it is to plan and execute these types of projects and gave her a new level of respect for people doing conservation work.  Recruiting volunteers to do physically demanding labor and communicating with so many different organizations and people proved to be one of the more challenging aspects of the project.  When the project was finally completed, Sarah said, “seeing everything come together made it worth all the headaches along the way.”

Sarah learned much more beyond project management, especially in regards to erosion. “I knew erosion was bad, but it was incredible to learn how shorelines are disappearing and how the pH of the Bay has changed. For me, the most amusing thing to learn was that rocks can be native. I thought that any kind of cheap rock would be fine for the swale. I was wrong. I had to research native Bay rocks because these rocks do not alter the pH of rainwater, and even have some filtration properties.”  Sarah feels that small projects to prevent erosion are important for our watershed. The change may not necessarily be visible, but the reduction of runoff will make the Bay healthier and create an environment more conducive to our native flora and fauna.

Sarah will continue to have a life-long appreciate for the Chesapeake Bay and plans on becoming a surgeon!  The South River Federation was proud to be able to support Sarah in her project and wishes her the best of luck in all of her future endeavors.  Although the grant program is geared towards Watershed Stewards, we are happy to work with Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts on their Eagle and Gold Award projects.

A lot of political hay is being made these days about funding the cleanup of our local rivers and creeks, especially designated impaired waters like the South River.  Impaired water bodies are recognized by the US EPA for failing to meet very basic guidelines for human safety and/or biological production .  However, stopping the flow of pollution into impaired waters requires political will, regulatory vision, and of course, money.    The Anne Arundel County Council recently heard a bill that would fund the restoration of the County's waterways by levying a $25-35 stormwater fee on most landowners in the County.   The bill was withdrawn in the hopes that instead, the Maryland state legislature will decide to pick up the tab instead.  The reasoning? "It's just not a good time for a new fee in this county."

Of course, during our historically unprecedented 15 years of economic growth in Anne Arundel County from 1993-2008, it "wasn't a good time" either - a stormwater restoration bill was narrowly defeated by the Council and opposed by two County Executives during that era.   You see, despite record tax receipts and development rates, it wasn't "a good time" for a new fee or tax.  So when will it ever be "a good time" for such a fee to support critical restoration efforts?  Not until the day when our elected officials and regulatory appointees decide that cleaning up our water is important enough to get done. 

Anne Arundel's elected leaders, and Maryland's as well, are well known as being some of the most visionary and progressive in the nation when it comes to assessing and understanding environmental issues. But since stormwater and restoration funding seem to cause such consternation, perhaps our leaders should look at how other highly progressive, highly effective municipalities have successfully tackled the de-listing of their local waters:

Huntsville, Alabama (Flint River). Listed for unknown impairment in 1998, revised to organic pollution and dissolved oxygen deficiency in 2002, the Flint River was highly impacted by agriculture and urban runoff.   In just two years, the City of Huntsville and local Soil Conservation District allocated $300,000 to match a $250,000 EPA grant, and implement 2,000 acres of stormwater and agricultural best management practices in just two years.  Flint River was delisted from the Impaired Waters list in 2006.

Grant County, West Virginia (North Fork Potomac).  After the North Fork Potomac was listed in 1996 for fecal coliforms, the North Fork Watershed Association worked with EPA to establish a non-point TMDL in 1998.  The WV Governor's Office provided $45,000 , which was separate from a $250,000 line item appropriation from the state budget, $500,000 from the state's NRCS conservation allocation from USDA, and $1 million from EPA.  Over the course of just 8 years, this impressive show of funding translated into the installation of best management practices on 85% of properties in the watershed - incredible by any standard.  In 2008, the North Fork Potomac was delisted. 

Virginia Beach, Virginia (Lynnhaven River/Bay).  Failing septic systems, sewer overflows, stormwater management facilities, and boat pump-out practices contributed to the listing of the Lynnhaven River & Lynnhaven Bay as impaired for fecal coliforms in 1998.  The area was subsequently listed as impaired for purposes of shellfish harvest in 2002.  The City of Virginia Beach worked aggressively with EPA to establish non-point and point-source TMDL goals, which were approved in 2006.  Between 2006 and 2010, in this small watershed alone, the City of Virginia Beach spent nearly $5 million of municipal tax and fee monies on restoration projects, over $25 million of municipal fee monies on sewer connections and upgrades,  and focused City employee staff time on procuring millions of dollars in additional federal and state grants.   The shellfish harvest ban, in place for decades, began to roll back in 2007, and the watershed was partially delisted in 2010.  

Let's get local again.  Anne Arundel County is full of some of the nation's brightest, most innovative minds in municipal and state government.   But these same minds, who proudly acknowledge how important clean water is to them and their constituents,  have failed to make important commitments to clean water that fiscally conservative,  anti-regulation, and tax-averse areas like Alabama, West Virginia, and southern Virginia have made and kept. They, like our County's leaders, believed that clean water was important.  Unlike some of our County's leaders, those men and women took action. 

 I'd like to think that Anne Arundel County, and Maryland as a whole, can do better than northern Alabama and eastern West Virginia, but as we continue to debate whether we'll try to clean up the Bay's rivers by 2020, 2025....or maybe whenever our grandkids think "it's a good time," we can only hope to catch up to visionary leaders who advocate and act for clean water in other areas of the country, faced with water quality impairments. 

But saying that $25 is too much to pay to clean up 300+ years of watershed pollution? That's impaired judgment.

Celebrating Martin Luther King, Jr. on the South River

To honor the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr., President Bill Clinton signed into law federal legislation transforming MLK Day into a day of citizen action volunteer service on August 23, 1994. The South River Federation was proud to be a part of this national day of service this year. On a chilly but beautiful winter day, 20 South River Federation volunteers came together to clean up the headwaters of Broad Creek along Harry S. Truman Parkway in Annapolis. Volunteers spent two hours picking up whatever trash they could find along the length of Truman Parkway from Riva Road to South Haven Road. In total, volunteers picked up over 30 bags of trash and recyclables along with four tires and even a stroller! We send a big thank you out to all the volunteers and Master Watershed Stewards that made the day a success along with Starbucks of Edgewater for donating the coffee. We hope to see even more of you at the next South River Federation event!

After a year of coping with the effects of three major rain storms, we were thrilled to end 2011 with the otter-ly fantastic news of a return of one of the River’s top predators. Even more exciting than sharing the news, was the response we got from our members! Coming with four reports, Gingerville Creek takes the lead in sightings followed closely by Beards Creek with three. Other sightings were reported in Duvall, near the mouth of the River past Cherrytree Cove, Glebe Bay, Harness Creek, Granville Creek, Flat Creek, and Boyd’s Cove. Below are excerpts from the many stories we received:

-Perhaps the most memorable experience came from a member that was fortunate enough to see an entire family of otters! “I have kayaked on the South River for 6 years and have seen river otters each and every one of those years...in fact, 4 years ago my friend and I were in the headwaters of Beard's Creek and not only did a large male otter swim across the front of our kayaks with a smaller (I assume the female) behind him and they were both hissing at us and not long afterwards, three small younguns swam between our kayaks, it seemed that they were either swimming extraordinarily close behind each other or swimming sort of piggyback and kept looking up at us and chirping...they were close enough that I could have reached down and picked one up. It was one of those special moments that I will never forget.”

– Sandy, Beards Creek -A longtime South River resident and avid fisherman finally got an up-close look at an otter just recently! “I have seen them numerous times over the last few years, but always from a distance. Every morning I run my dog to the river and back. Three days ago, I was down on the neighborhood pier, and out of the skim ice popped this guys head. It is the first time I have seen them up close, and they are a really unique and cool thing to see on our river.” – Nick, Davidsonville

-“I thought it was a seal the way it was swimming and playing until I got a closer look. I couldn't believe my eyes. Hope to see them again!” – Carol, Granville Creek - “It has been spotted a couple of times in the past few weeks as well as last year. We think it may "hide" at my waters edge. It seems to disappear into the underground tunnels.” – Theresa, Harness Creek

-It’s great to know they have been in some areas for so long! “We've had them in Boyd's Cove for years - didn't know it was a big deal!” – Marj, Boyds Cove

-Looks like the otters even appreciate the beauty of Quiet Waters Park! “I have seen otters in Loden Pond, near the South River Overlook at Quiet Waters Park, and in the pond between the Ice Rink and Lighthizer Gazebo” – Michael, Harness Creek

-He may not have seen an otter, but beaver sightings are just as great! While kayaking in Gingerville Creek, one member “discovered a beaver dam in the marsh at the head of the creek. It created a small, tranquil pond filled with ducks.” – Dwight, Gingerville Creek

The South River Federation would like to thank each and every person that took the time to report their sightings. If you see an otter or beaver, please do let us know! We did receive a concern over protecting koi ponds so that issue as well as more information about otters will be addressed in Part 3 of the series. But for now, we hope you enjoyed the stories from our watershed!

Photo Credits: Nick Serio, John Koontz, John Summers, and Erik Michelsen

When Glenn and Jane Amsbaugh moved from York, PA back to Jane’s hometown along the South River, there was one thing they knew they wanted to continue: gardening.  Mr. Amsbaugh knew he would have some work ahead of him since the South River does not have the rich fertile soils like York, PA which is in the heart of Amish County.   With a low-lying property along the South River, he had to battle higher salinity levels and poorer soil.

Having composted for over 15 years, the Amsbaughs knew this eco-friendly practice would help to improve the soil quality in the garden.  Every year,  they get nearly five wheel barrels full of compost  to enrich the soil in their garden.  According to Mrs. Amsbaugh, making composting easy is the key to making this a continued practice.  She keeps an attractive, small, stainless steel odor reducing composting pail next to her sink.  When that becomes full, she simply takes it to a larger bucket outside.  When the weather is nice, they take the compost down to the compost pile near the edge of their property. 

Why compost?  Well, why not? Like the Amsbaughs said, there is no sense in wasting left-over food – especially when it benefits the garden so much. If you create a simple routine and make composting easy, you will be more likely to stick with it in the long run. 

Mr. Amsbaugh has gone beyond only composting to improve his garden.  Originally, Mr. Amsbaugh used old dock boards to create a series of raised bed gardens.  When he noticed that his crops seemed to be doing better, he decided to raise the beds even higher to give the vegetables a greater depth of richer soil and to further separate them from the higher salinity soil.  On the beautiful warm January day when I went to interview him, he and a friend were already out laying the boards preparing for spring!   In addition to composting and creating raised beds, Mr. Amsbaugh waters his garden via irrigation piping connected to a large 1,200 gallon cistern that collects rain water from his roof.

Gardening is a wonderful way to connect with nature and get delicious vegetables right from your own back yard.  The Amsbaughs get almost 20 different vegetables  from their garden from April through November and definitely encourage others to considering both gardening and composting.  Mr. Amsbaugh does have advice for others wanting to do the same.  His first words of advice?  Simply, “do it!”  Carefully select the most appropriate site on your property for a garden.  Make sure you have convenient access to water or an easy way to water the garden.  Begin your soil preparation early and start composting today!

Curious to know what the Amsbaughs grow in their garden? They have been able to grow: asparagus, spinach, pumpkin, corn, tomatoes, onion, peppers, potatoes, sweet potatoes, cauliflower, cabbage, radish, swiss chard, beans, red beets, lettuce, eggplant, herbs, and cantaloupe.

A special thank you to Glenn and Jane Amsbaugh for inviting us to their home and sharing their yard with us! Go green at your home? Tell us about it and you could be the next South River Federation’s “Go Green Project of the Month!”

Winter weather has arrived in the South River, and most life has settled down throughout the watershed. Snakes, turtles, and frogs are hibernating. Our summer songbirds have, for the most part, left the area. Blue crabs and most fish species have also left the River in order to spend it in the slightly warmer waters of the lower Chesapeake Bay. People have settled down too - the River is free of paddlers, crabbers, and anglers, and indeed most boats have been winterized for a month or more, and now sit high and dry on trailers or boat lifts.

But if you look closely enough around the watershed, there are still signs of life. Otters and beavers continue their work. A light waterfowl migration has brought some additional ducks and geese to the River. And as of the new year - one native, yellow, flower still bloomed - the common or Virginia Witch-hazel. 

If you're out in the woods in December or even in a mild January, you're unlikely to see a lot of color unless you see a blooming Witch-hazel - literally one of the latest blooming plants in the forest. I've read some theories that this late bloom is an adaptation to the "availability" of bees and other pollinators on warm days in late fall and early winter - very little competition from other blooming plants. So where does this magical plant live around the South River, and how can someone recognize it?

Witch-hazel is pretty recognizable during the growing season because of its shrubby growth, broad, toothed leaves, and zig-zagging twigs holding cone-like seed pods year-round. It rarely grows more than 15 feet tall and the leaves turn bright yellow in the fall, prior to the appearance of its distinct yellow flowers. The shrub prefers to live along the edges of shady woodlands and bright yards or fields, in moist, acidic soils that are high in organic matter.

If this sounds like a spot that you know, maybe you already have a Witch-hazel! If not, they make are readily available at local plant nurseries. Witch-hazel's tolerance of deer browse, its amazing fall foliage and winter flowers, and its resistance to both pollution and pests make it a compelling native plant specimen for almost any landscape in the South River watershed.