How's the Delaware doing?

Two experts on insects in streams drove around Sullivan County one day last week to find out just how the Delaware River's tributaries are faring.

Stream entomologists Dave Funk and Mike Broomall waded into watery areas to sample aquatic insects, crayfish and worms in order to monitor water quality.

The May 11 work took place at the Laundry Brook in Jeffersonville, Shingle Brook in Youngsville, the Gulf in Callicoon Center, a tributary in Fremont Center and one in Hankins, as well as the beginnings of the Mongaup River in Swan Lake.

“Certain macro-invertebrates are sensitive to pollution and to disturbance - their presence or absence can tell you what is going on in the stream,” explained research assistant Jan Battle. She, along with Funk and Broomall, work for the Stroud Water Research Center in Avondale, Pa. near Philadelphia. The not-for-profit is joined in the project by Drexel University in Philadelphia.

The plan is to sample 50 to 60 streams in the Sullivan County region, all of which drain watersheds with a range of almost all forest cover to about 50 percent forest cover, according to Dr. John K. Jackson, Stroud senior research scientist. The project seeks to gain an understanding of how the water quality is affected by the percentage of forests in the watershed.

“Our sampling is designed to describe the gradual changes in the stream as the land cover is changed from forest,” said Dr. Jackson. He noted that planners and managers in areas like ours are interested in learning what changes in streams might occur if forests are converted to other land covers, that is, from forests to natural or planted vegetation or man-made construction such as buildings.

Said Jan Battle: “It's well established that as the density of trees in a watershed decreases there is a decrease in water quality. We hope to get a better understanding of when this degradation occurs.”

Unfortunately, waterways routinely accept pollutants from sewage treatment plants or other piped discharges, and from farms, front lawns, roads and parking lots. Streams in our region face pollutants like herbicides, insecticides, fertilizers, eroded sediment, oils and related chemicals from vehicles and road salts.

Samples from our local streams are brought back to the Stroud lab for examination under high magnification. Water chemistry and fish crews from The Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel UNiversity will visit this summer or fall.

The study is being funded by the Open Space Institute, a Manhattan-based conservation organization that seeks to protect the environment and preserve scenic, natural and historic landscapes for the public.

The Delaware River begins its journey not far from us. Its Eastern Branch starts in Delaware County near Grand Gorge and its Western Branch begins in Mount Jefferson in Schoharie County. The two branches then merge into one at Hancock, where the river flows into Sullivan County. From here, it flows down through Pennsylvania and New Jersey and then into the Atlantic Ocean at Delaware Bay, which borders the states of both Delaware and New Jersey.

On its run to the Bay, the Delaware is mother to 2,000 tributaries. The main feeders are local: the Mongaup River, which starts here in Bethel, and the Neversink River near Claryville.

The project is part of a larger look at hundreds of streams in the Delaware watershed by the appropriately named Delaware River Watershed Initiative. That initiative is studying water chemistry, algae, macro-invertebrates and fishes to get an understanding of how to best restore and preserve streams and rivers in the Delaware Watershed, that is, the area of land that drains all the streams and rainfall into the Delaware Bay.

“That project is being done by many watershed groups in partnership and is funded by the William Penn Foundation in Philadelphia,” said Battle.

The study is designed to provide a better understanding of how stream health can be protected, and thus better protect the uses of the Delaware: water for consumption, agriculture, industry, recreation and wildlife.

Stroud Water Research Center has a history of research, education, watershed restoration and the preservation of freshwater ecosystems. In the late 1990s, Stroud developed a plan that mollified locals in the Neversink area and others who hosted New York City reservoirs. Faced with having to build an expensive facility to filter its Catskill-Delaware Water Supply, New York City agreed to keep its water supply clean through land acquisition, regulations and city-funded but locally-administered environmental education programs.