Federation Blog

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!

From drab to fab, we rescued the Lincoln Drive rain garden with the help of 24 volunteers!  Why is this rain garden so special you may ask?   Installed in the spring of 2007 with help from the South River Federation, the Lincoln Drive rain garden treats runoff from 1.6 acres of impervious surface in the Spa Creek watershed.  With a storage volume of 2,001 cubic feet, this garden can handle 80.5% of a 1.2 inch rain storm and cleans an estimated 60% of each rainfall before it reaches Spa Creek.  This amounts to a little over 2 million gallons of stormwater treated each year!

How is the one on Lincoln Drive different from any other garden?  Rain gardens are bio-retention sites specially designed to handle and treat stormwater.  First, the area is excavated to remove existing soils and pavement.   Once removed, the area is filled with a 50% sand and compost mixture.  Storm drains are cut to fit high water levels.  You want the storm drains to sit above ground level so that the stormwater stays in the garden and does not go directly down the drain.  The stormwater drains only catch the rain during higher water levels.  On the upper slope of the garden, a rock diaphragm lined with filter cloth is placed to dissipate the force of water entering the garden.  A rock-lined swale is also placed between the sidewalk and parking lot to handle water coming from that direction.  Finally, the garden is planted with native plants that help to absorb stormwater.   With all the hard work that went into making this garden, we want to keep up with the maintenance!

For three hours, volunteers braved the hot summer sun and removed invasive plants and vines that had taken over the garden.   The rain garden looked beautiful afterwards – almost unrecognizable thanks to all the great groups involved.  Coordinated by the South River Federation, volunteers from the Spa Creek Conservancy and Watershed Steward Academy guided volunteers as to what plants needed to be removed and what could stay.  This was a great crash course in invasive species identification!  We even had a hard working group from the Family Service Foundation come out to help us clean up all the weeds that were removed.  Thank you to everyone who helped make this day possible!

Enjoy the slideshow!

 

Project Clean Stream 2011 was a great success thanks to the 42 hard working volunteers that came out to support this annual event organized by the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay. The South River Federation and its volunteers cleaned up a portion of Church Creek, bordered by Rt. 2, Forest Dr., and the Forest Plaza parking lot. Notorious for illegal dumping and prone to trash run-off from nearby roads and parking lots, this creek was in desperate need of attention. Our dedicated group of volunteers picked up 83 bags of trash, up to 50% of which was plastic bottles and bags. Other interesting items included: part of a Lazy-Boy, TV, sink, two filled trash cans, 6 tires, and a vacuum cleaner. In total, the volunteers picked up 1.38 tons of trash!  Needless to say, after all this was removed, Church Creek looked beautiful!

We would like to thank our generous local sponsors who helped make this event a success:

Home Depot donated 10 boxes of eco-friendly heavy duty contractor bags, allowed us to use their trash-grabbers, and recruited eight Home Depot Associates and Managers to help with the cleanup.

Bertucci’s generously donated eight delicious pizzas for the volunteers to enjoy as a thank you for their hard work.

Keeper Springs Natural Spring Water provided water bottles to keep the hard working volunteers hydrated.

We also received great media coverage from Patch.com and the Capital. Enjoy the slideshow below!

Looking for something to do on Saturday? 

Join the South River Federation’s 2011 Project Clean Stream!

 

Saturday, April 2^nd from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.

Home Depot, 55 Forest Plaza, Annapolis

 

Project Clean Stream, coordinated by the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay and partnering watershed organizations, is an annual stream and shoreline clean up. This event is held the first Saturday of April and engages community volunteers throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed.  By engaging volunteers in stream clean ups, we are promoting and reinforcing the direct relationship that cleaner, litter-free streams and woodlands result in a healthier, more beautiful Bay.

 

In 2010, more than 3,600 volunteers helped out at 140 cleanup sites, including a site hosted by the South River Federation along Beards Creek, to remove an estimated 118,000 pounds of trash and debris from streams and wooded areas throughout the Chesapeake Bay Watershed.  This year, the goal is to have 4,000 volunteers remove 150,000 lbs of trash at 165 different sites.  
 

Be one of the 4,000 people volunteering to clean up the Chesapeake Bay watershed on Saturday.  Email Jennifer to signup and help clean up an area around Church Creek.

 

Special thanks to Home Depot for donating trash bags and to Bertucci’s for donating pizza for our volunteers to enjoy.

 

Volunteers started their day extra early Sunday morning to work an important water stop along the route for the Zooma 1/2  marathon.  We had 12 folks show up ready to set up tables, fill water cups and cheer runners along.  Thanks to everyone who came out to help and thank you, Kerri, for rallying!  Couldn't have done it without you!!!  For our efforts, the Federation will receive $250 from Zooma!!

Front Row, L to R: "Chip" Wilson, Bill Snyder, Kerri Reilly  / Back Row, L to R:  Sarah, Kate Fritz, Robin Nuskind, Cindy Wallace, Patricia Hicks, Bill Tham, Issy  /   Not pictured:  Bridget Gallagher, Dick Lahn, Richard Snyder

As part of the development of the Homeport Farm property, Anne Arundel County Department of Recreation and Parks received approximately 25 acres of land alongside Church Creek for future use as a County park.  The advisory committee for the park consists of representatives from the surrounding communities and user groups such as the Chesapeake Paddlers, the Annapolis Rowing Club (below), the Anne Arundel Sierra Club, and the Federation.

 Thankfully, all of these groups support keeping the park largely in its natural state, with some opportunities for passive recreation and low impact activities.  Eventually, the plan is for the park to have a natural surface hiking loop, a launch for canoes and kayaks, and several community garden plots.  In addition, the plan calls for reforesting something on the order of 7 or 8 acres of the property which are currently fallow farmland.  

Last weekend, volunteers from the Federation, the Rowing Club, the Sierra Club, and the County came out, in the driving rain, to plant 400 trees and shrubs and begin the reforestation effort.  Thanks to all the volunteers who came out and put in a few hours to help improve the health of the river.

 From left to right: County forester, Bud Reeves; County Executive, John Leopold; Federation Executive Director, Erik Michelsen; Sierra Club Chair, David Prosten; County Parks Manager, Karyn Molines.

 This morning, over 25 Federation volunteers cleaned-up along Chesterfield Road, in the Bacon Ridge Branch area, and along the headwaters of Church Creek in Annapolis.  The picture below is of the haul at Church Creek, which included about 50 yards (over a full dumpster) of metal and other recyclables (including a couple of shopping cars), about 10 yards of trash, and between 50 and 60 tires.  Thanks to all the volunteers who came out and made the event a success and to the Anne Arundel County Department of Public Works for providing the dumpsters.

 

Today over 30 volunteers from the South River Federation, the Anne Arundel Sierra Club, and the community-at-large worked in the headwaters of Church Creek to pull out tires, discarded road signs, and several tons of garbage from the stream valley.  Special thanks to all who volunteered and helped out.

 Thanks also to the Anne Arundel County Department of Public Works who hauled all the garbage off to the landfill.