Water Quality Monitoring Program Report 2006 Clay Houston Water Quality Monitoring Program Director Windham County Natural Resources Conservation District January 2007 1 2 Acknowledgments The West River Watershed Alliance (WRWA) and its partners, the Windham County Natural Resources Conservation District (WCNRCD) and Windham Regional Commission (WRC) would like to thank the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation and the LaRosa Laboratory, the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Conservation License Plate Grant Program, the Vermont Environmental Board, and the Exit 6 Shell station manager and employees for their support of the 2006 WRWA Water Quality Monitoring Program. We would also like to thank the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for their cooperative reporting effort for the Townshend Recreational Area and the Winhall Campground, as well as the Green Mountain RSVP Center for working with us and providing valuable volunteers for the program. The WRWA Water Quality Monitoring Program would not have been possible without the conscientious dedication of our Volunteer Field Assistant, Stacy Birch, and our WRWA volunteers who braved challenging conditions and early mornings to collect their samples during all phases of this program. We are forever grateful to our dedicated and determined volunteers and their families, both new and old who make this program possible: Fred Bacon and Laura Wallingford-Bacon Michael Marantz Lynne Beehler Simon Norton CB Beehler Frederick Noyes Stacy Birch Darlene and Ernie Palola Jeff Burkert David Plant Marie Levesque Caduto Em Richards Laurie Callahan John and Targ Spicer Bill Callahan Cory Stark and family David Charis-Mink Tom and Sally Topitzer Patty Famolare and family Bill and Betsey Uptegrove Fred and Lorna Hard Kathy Urffer Andrew Harper David Williams David Malko The staff at Rockingham Mobile 3 4 Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGMENTS...........................................................................................................................................3 ACRONYM LIST: ......................................................................................................................................................6 1.0 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................................................7 1.1 RATIONALE..........................................................................................................................................................7 1.2 SUMMARY OF THE PROGRAM...............................................................................................................................7 1.3 FUNDING..............................................................................................................................................................8 1.4 LOCATION OF MONITORING PROGRAM ................................................................................................................8 2.0 METHODS.............................................................................................................................................................9 2.1 WRWA QUALITY CONTROL AND QUALITY ASSURANCE (QA/QC) ....................................................................9 2.2 VOLUNTEER RECRUITMENT AND TRAINING.........................................................................................................9 2.3 THE THREE-PHASED MONITORING PLAN.............................................................................................................9 2.3.1 Phase 1........................................................................................................................................................9 2.3.2 Phase 2......................................................................................................................................................12 2.3.3 Phase 3......................................................................................................................................................13 3.0 SUMMARY OF RESULTS ................................................................................................................................13 3.1 E.COLI (ESCHERICHIA COLI)................................................................................................................................16 3.2 TOTAL PHOSPHORUS (TP)..................................................................................................................................17 3.3 NITRATE/NITRITE (NOX)....................................................................................................................................18 3.4 TOTAL SUSPENDED SOLIDS (TSS) .....................................................................................................................19 3.5 TURBIDITY.........................................................................................................................................................20 3.6 WATER TEMPERATURE ......................................................................................................................................20 3.7 PH......................................................................................................................................................................22 3.8 CONDUCTIVITY ..................................................................................................................................................23 4.0. DATA MANAGEMENT....................................................................................................................................23 4.1 DATA REPORTING/PROGRAM ASSESSMENT .......................................................................................................23 4.2 ADVANTAGES OF WRWA MONITORING PROGRAM...........................................................................................24 5. 0 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS............................................................................................24 5.1 CONCLUSIONS....................................................................................................................................................24 5.2 RECOMMENDATIONS..........................................................................................................................................25 6.0 COOPERATING ORGANIZATIONS..............................................................................................................25 APPENDIX A.............................................................................................................................................................27 WRWA PHASE 1 AND PHASE 2 SAMPLING RESULTS GRAPHS AND TABLES ............................................................27 West River Phase 1 Sampling Results 2006 .......................................................................................................45 Williams River Phase 1 Sampling Results 2006.................................................................................................49 Saxtons River Phase 1 Sampling Results 2006 ..................................................................................................51 General Water Quality Phase 2 Sampling Results 2006 – All Watersheds........................................................53 5 Acronym List: BUHS - Brattleboro Union High School E.coli - Escherichia coli EPA - Environmental Protection Agency GIS - Geographic Information System NOx - Nitrates QA/QC - Quality Control/Quality Assurance QAPP - Quality Assurance Project Plan SAC - Stream Action Committee (WRWA) TNC - The Nature Conservancy of Vermont TP - Total Phosphorous TSS - Total Suspended Solids USDA - United States Department of Agriculture USFWS - United States Fish and Wildlife Service VT DEC - Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation WCNRCD - Windham County Natural Resources Conservation District WRC - Windham Regional Commission WRWA - West River Watershed Alliance 6 1.0 Introduction 1.1 Rationale The West River Watershed Alliance (WRWA), a non-profit organization formed in 2001, recognized the importance of water quality monitoring on the West River. Since 2003 they have created and overseen a volunteer based program to perform long term water quality monitoring in the watersheds of the West, Williams and Saxtons Rivers, that form Basin 11. The data from this program has been incorporated into the Basin 11 Management Plan. The Basin 11 Management Plan is part of the rationale for the pursuance of long term water quality monitoring in the watersheds within Basin 11, and the data collected by the volunteer monitoring program plays an integral part of the Plan’s implementation. Data gathered by the WRWA volunteer monitors is currently being used by the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation (VTDEC) Watershed Coordinator to designate Water Management Types to many of the rivers and streams in all three watersheds of Basin 11. The Water Quality Monitoring Program monitors a number of streams that the State does not have data on so the results reported to WRWA are the only source of information for those streams. The program also monitors many more sites, on a more regular schedule, than the State is able to. The data gathered serves to fill in a number of gaps in the VTDEC information database and allows Water Management Type recommendations to be made on quality data as well as observations. The volunteers have also brought