Federation Blog

Columbus Day was a busy day in the South River Watershed!  The Chesapeake Conservation Corps (CCC), a career and leadership training program funded through the Chesapeake Bay Trust (CBT), held their All Hands on Deck project at Historic London Town and Gardens.   The All Hands on Deck project was a competitive $2,000 CBT mini grant available to CCC volunteers to complete a large scale project and training opportunity for all CCCs to attend.  The South River Federation’s CCC volunteer, Jennifer Carr, joined forces with the Watershed Steward Academy’s CCC volunteer, Megan Wickless, to create a stormwater-themed day of learning and service at Historic London Town and Gardens.  In the end, partnering up paid off and they were selected for the grant!

The day kicked off with educational activities led by the Watershed Stewards Academy aimed to increase the CCC volunteers’ knowledge of stormwater.  The Corps, under the guidance of Master Watershed Stewards, performed a whole-scale site assessment of London Town’s property.  As a result, they were able to give recommendations on how to move forward with other stormwater related projects.

In the afternoon, the Corps volunteers rotated between three different service learning stations.  The first stop was on board the boat, Remedy, with the South RIVERKEEPER, Diana Muller, and Dr. Andrew Muller, a professor at the U.S. Naval Academy.  The Corps soaked in the issues of water quality and stormwater facing the South River and the rest of the Bay.  They were given the opportunity to use equipment such as the Hydrolab to monitor water quality and a secchi disk to measure depth.  Other topics covered included land use, shoreline restoration, and impacts of sewer and septic systems on the river.

The next stop, CCC volunteers got hands-on experience installing rain barrels around London Town’s new museum and archaeology lab.  These beautiful rain barrels from Rain Barrels of Annapolis will catch about two-thirds of the rain events over the course of a year.  The barrels will capture the water allowing the stormwater to cool down and be released slowly into the ground.

The final stop, stressed the importance of maintenance on any restoration project.  The Corps certainly got their hands dirty on this one as they worked hard to clear out a thick layer of silt that had been deposited into a series of step pools.  The step pools serve to slow down stormwater allowing it to infiltrate the ground instead of flowing directly into the river.

The project was a great success thanks to all the organizations and sponsors involved!

The Chesapeake Bay Trust funded the project and most importantly runs the Chesapeake Conservation Corps Program.

The South River Federation and Watershed Stewards Academy (WSA) organized the day’s events.

Historic London Town and Gardens hosted the event and worked very closely with the Federation and WSA.

Rain Barrels of Annapolis provided the beautiful rain barrels at a low cost, making the project possible.

Chipotle and Rita’s of Edgewater donated a delicious lunch for the volunteers and guests.

This morning (Oct 7, 2011) I took my first flight in a small aircraft in 32 years. I rode with my collegue and board member Lynn Buehl over the Chesapeake Bay Bridge to the Bay Bridge Aiport and the whole drive I was fraught with excitment and trepedation. I always have been nervous about heights and have always been a nervous flyer. Lynn and I meet our pilot that flew down from New Jersey to take us on our adventure over the South River Watershed. Pilot Mr. Mike McNamara is one of many volunteer pilots for a non-profit group called LightHawk. This is a great organization set-up to provide flights to other non-profits or academics for research and advocay. I submitted a proposal to search for SAV, clean-water plumes, and 5 legacy landfills. As I first got in the plane, my thought was "oh my goodness, I am not going to make it". But, as we tore down the runway toward the Chesapeake Bay and delicately lifted off into the air and over the Bay Bridge- I became totally filled with excitement and started taking pictures. Being in a small plane over the Chesapeake Bay and the South River is indescribably amazing. I was horrified at the amounts of debris still in the Bay. Then, as we approach the South River- both Lynn and I became very distressed at how our beatiful South River looked. Sediment plumes and oil plumes everywhere- brown water all over. Then as week approached South River Farm Park, where Pam Wood of the Capitol and I kayaked looking for our Submerged Aquatic Vegetation- the planes wings tipped and there is was. Our SAV survived Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee!! What a blessing that our grasses survived such storms!! I am showing 300 pictures, and although I am not a professional photographer, I hope you enjoy them.----Diana, South Riverkeeper

Good Afternoon,

There were three locations of higher that the allowable concentration of bacteria (104cfu/100ml). These creeks are Warehouse Creek, Almshouse Creek, and Church Creek. Glen Isle has been preventing the Canada Geese by stringing CD's in the area to prevent the geese from landing, must be working because for the past two weeks the counts have been good. Congratulations to them!!

South River Federation 2011 Enterococci Counts (cfu/100 ml)
#	Site	5/18/2011	5/25/2011	6/1/2011	6/8/2011	6/15/2011	6/22/2011	6/29/2011
SR1	Hillsmere Shores	84	16	88	16	8	92	16
SR2	Glen Isle Community Association	272	2	3427	144	156	28	80
SR3	Harbor Hills Association	56	12	2	1	6	6	68
SR4	South River Manor	X	2	344	22	4	92	148
SR5	Pine Whiff Community Association	X	X	178	122	374	112	380
SR6	South River Park Comm. Ass.	20	8	160	20	22	4	16
SR7	Selby Community Association	X	X	X	10	16	74	48
SR8	Londontown Beach 5	X	X	X	X	X	X	60
SR11	Wilelinor Community Association	32	16	16	4	10	60	716
SR12	Shoreham Beach Citizens Association	184	4	86	4	1	1	40

From the mouth of the South River all the way to Bacon Ridge Branch, over 40 South River Federation volunteers participated in the 7^th Annual South River Snapshot.  Volunteers spread out across the entire South River watershed on the morning of Saturday, April 9^th and conducted water quality tests to assess the River’s health.   Although the data represents just a “snapshot” in time, collecting the data from over 40 sites around the River simultaneously, and doing it at about the same time each year, gives a good general barometer of the relative health of our streams and creeks.  While most of the sites had safe or normal bacteria levels, a few sites did have high levels.  You can see the bacteria results on Diana’s blog. 
Patch.com wrote a nice article on the Snapshot!  Click here to read it.

The Enterococci data is now ready from this last Saturday's South River Federation's 7th Annual Snapshot.

On Friday the short rain event was only 0.38 inches of rain, but even with that small amount there were some spikes of bacteria in our watershed.  For a single sampling event the criteria is 104 cfu/100ml (colony forming units/100milliliters).  Therefore in the map above, anything in orange or red is higher than the State of Maryland's limit.

Thanks to our great volunteers I am now going back through the past 7 years of data and preparing a 'trend" analysis to find why our hot spot are HOT.  One stations is HIL 1, this is located in the Hillsmere community and is consistently high every year- now that we have the data to prove that there is a problem (thanks to our volunteers)- We can see what we can do to fix the issues.---Diana

This week's bottom dissolved oxygen measurements indicate the expanding hypoxic zone from mid-river up to the Rt 50 bridge.  Many of the tidal creek are also experiencing hypoxic conditions (2.0 mg/l or lower).  This is due to the excessive nutrients causing the algae blooms, which then cause the low dissolved oxygen.  Blue Crabs need above 3mg/l of dissolved oxygen to live, therefore at the moment the South River is not that hospitable for the blue crab. ---Diana

The South River Federation's Riverkeeper Tidal Water Quality montoring is in mid-season currently.  Some of you may have see us out there sampling the water quality.  I have been ask many questions about when and where we sample.  I have provided a GIS map of our current tidal stations.  I have 7 main stem stations, then 14 stations in each of the tidal creeks.  

 

EPA Unveils Chesapeake Bay Restoration Strategy

 The Chesapeake Bay Restoration Strategy is now out as presented by Lisa Jackson (EPA administrator) yesterday.  She stated that only thing needed is money and resources.

I would like to include Three more things:

1)  The absolute old fashion American CAN DO.  With out the can do/will do we will not have anything.

2 ) Much better enforcement,  marinas have put large piers/bulkhead/and pilings into the South River and have only received a 43,000.00 fine, and they did not have to take out the structures that were installed.  So, in reality the company folded the fine into the cost of doing the construction.  The State and Federal agencies need to not only have greater fines but mandate that these structures be removed! 

3)  I would also like to include more education on the true causes of the destruction of the Chesapeake Bay and the South River.  I speak beyond the choir quite often and have learned that most adults really do not know what stormwater runoff it,  they do not know how fertilizer can harm the Bay/River,  they do not realize how poor the infrastructure of our septic and sewer systems is.  I see very well educated folks over-fertilize their lawns in order to get the Crayola crayon green color, instead of managing their lawns in a River-friendly way.

http://wjz.com/local/Bay.foundation.epa.2.1689773.html