Northeast Creek Streamwatch

Note change of date and location:
The monthly meeting will be in the training room of the Parkwood Volunteer Fire Department, Wednesday, April 29, 2009 at 7 pm.

Three Northeast Creek Streamwatch members attended the Joint Durham City/County Stormwater Citizens Participation Group meeting for the water quality recovery plans for Third Fork Creek and Northeast Creek. Present were soil and water conservation staff, city stormwater staff, representatives from UNC-Chapel Hill, and neighborhood groups interested in the water quality of Northeast Creek and Third Fork Creek.

Some buzzwords and acronyms you might hear

303(d) list - a federally required list of waters that do not meet water quality standards that the state of North Carolina has set for them even after point sources of pollution, such as private, corporate and public sewage treatment plants have installed the minimum required level of technology.

BMP - best management practice, a structure (such as a retention pond) or an activity that is judged as effective in reducing pollutants

POC - pollutant of concern

TMDL - total maximum daily load of pollutants permitted by state and federal law and TMDL plans.

About Northeast Creek

Northeast Creek flows into Jordan Lake and is subject to the Jordan Lake TMDL and management strategy. The Jordan Lake TMDL requires reductions of nitrogen and phosphorus from the Northeast Creek watershed. Previously there was a TMDL specific to Northeast Creek for fecal coliform bacteria. Pollutants on the 2008 draft 303(d) list include turbidity (suspended solid particles), low dissolved oxygen, and nitrates/nitrites. In addition, the City of Durham, the NC Division of Water Quality (NC DWQ), the Upper Cape Fear River Basin Association (UCFRBA), and the US Geological Survey (USGS), which are monitoring Northeast Creek, have found other pollutants; specifically, copper has been found at levels higher than “action level” standards. Another pollutant of concern is polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which often occur from runoffs from parking lots sealed with compounds containing these compounds.

The NC DWQ has issued stormwater permits in the Northeast Creek watershed for Glaxo-Wellcome, National Specialty Gases, and SCM Metal Products.

Best management practice (BMP) structures in the Northeast Creek watershed include wet and dry stormwater detention ponds, bioretention areas, and constructed wetlands. All of these structures provide control of peak stormwater flows.

Non-structural best management practices in the Northeast Creek watershed include watershed-specific public education and outreach, prioritization of illicit discharge detection and elimination, prioritization of industrial inspections, increased frequency of street sweeping, encouraging homeowner and community rain gardens, and encouraging the use of low-impact development techniques. Each of these has the potential to decrease pollution reaching Northeast Creek.

There are two USGS stream guages on Northeast Creek. The first is on SR 1100 (Grandale Road) near Northeast Creek Streamwatch’s monitoring site. The second is on the north prong of Northeast Creek on SR 1182 (Fletcher-Carpenter Road).

The City of Durham is required to identify and map the locations of known major outfalls (stormwater pipes greater than 12 inches in diameter) that have the possibility of discharging pollutants, especially POCs, into impaired waters or tributaries of impaired waters. The City of Durham is currently identifying those outfalls in Northeast Creek. Work began in 2008 and continues into 2010.

The next steps in this process include the creation of a water quality monitoring plan, a conceptual model of the interaction of polluting sources in Northeast Creek and Third Fork Creek, identification of best management practices, and a cost/benefit analysis of the best management practices to determine which the study will recommend for the City and County to pursue.

In the fall, members of Northeast Creek Streamwatch planted lariape (monkey grass) to slow erosion along the side of a building at Parkwood Elementary school.

Recently, Northeast Creek Streamwatch members, Parkwood Elementary teachers and a a group of first graders worked on erosion control of an area that is next to the water-wise garden and just below the water barrel at the Parkwood Elementary School.

Four members monitored at the Grandale Bridge site on March 7, 2009, starting around 3:30 pm.

The weather was warm, probably low humidity, mostly clear, with a few ’soapy’ looking small cirrus clouds and light wind. A lot of chorus frogs were calling along the power line west of Grandale Road. A stream monitor saw a 1-foot large slider turtle in the side slough. There were one or two cricket frogs at the site, along with some flies. At one point a black pickup with some guys in back drove by, then turned and drove in a circle on the west side of Grandale under the powerline, dropping two beer cans, and then drove back north. There wasn’t much other trash around.

The water was seemed to be less than 3″ above the usual level, but there was evidence of some flooding relatively recently. It was easy to slip in in places, but the banks were firm. The water color was brown and a little clear. There did not seem to be any algae. Cover on the banks was around 80%. The water temperature was 60 degrees. The air temperature was 73 degrees.

Test strips: Chlorine ~1, total alkalinity between 80 and 120, phosphate slightly over 15 ppm, nitrite ~15 or slightly higher, nitrate ~2 or slightly less, and pH 7.

Turbidity was less than 15 JTU.

Ammonia 0.1-0.3.

Conductivity was 417 and later 421, and the meter fell in a little. The pH meter gave a reading of 7.5.

Later the air was 72, near 73, and the water temperature was slightly less than 60.

Debris went one foot in 00:07:06, 00:06:84, 00:08:37, and 00:06:90.

Later tests the fixed dissolved oxygen samples read 8.4 and 8.6ppm.

Walking around, the group saw a lot of a carrot-like Corydalis coming up by the bridge. Lots of trout lilies, possibly including some of the later blooming species, are blooming or have buds and along with a few spring beauties, rue anemone, and liver-leaf hepatica at the bottom of the hill). There were female flowers on the hazelnuts. The first buckeye leaves are coming out. An owl called. There were two cricket frogs in a puddle on the gas line. There were unusually large pebbles in the sandstone boulders blocking the gas line. Twenty-seven (27) vultures were in the first powerline pylon west of Grandale, and at least one more was flying in. Spring peepers or perhaps toads called north of the old beaver pond and in the marshy pool west of the road. Upland chorus frogs called in the brush. Pondweed leaves have emerged. An ATV trail cut through. There might be a few mosquitoes. There were some flies around the water and a lot of small wolf spiders on land. Birdfoot violets or blue wild pansies are blooming west of the road.

The Joint City of Durham/Durham County Planning Commission, Environmental Affairs Board, Stormwater Citizens Participation Group meeting will be held March 11, 6:30 pm at City Hall.

Purpose: To provide review and feedback on the City of Durham Stormwater Management Plan and Water Quality Recovery Programs for Northeast and Third Fork Creek Watersheds

Agenda:

• Welcome and Introductions
• North Carolina Approaches to Nutrient Management - John Cox, Stormwater Services
• Jordan and Falls Lake Nutrient Management - John Cox
• Break
• Water Quality Recovery Program - Michelle Woolfolk, Stormwater Services
• Questions
• Adjourn

Tentative Schedule and Future Meeting Topics
Tuesday, April 14 Water Quality Recovery Program: Jordan Lake Nutrient Rules
Tuesday, May 12 Water Quality Recovery Program
No meetings during summer
October 13 or 14, Monitoring objectives; Third Fork Creek Watershed Implementation Plan

For more information, contact Michelle Woolfolk (Michelle.Woolfolk at durhamnc.gov).

There were seven people at the meeting.

Thanks to a donor for the $25 dollar donation to the group for water testing supplies.

Stormwater Citizens Participation Group

Michelle Woolfolk, a Stormwater Engineer from the Durham City Department of Public Works, invited people from the Northeast Creek watershed to come to upcoming meetings concerning the City of Durham’s Stormwater Management Plan and water quality recovery programs for Northeast Creek and Third Fork. A wide range of people attend, and the Northeast Creek watershed needs more representation.

Durham Earth Month - Northeast Creek Week - April 19-25

Tobin Fried, Durham County Sustainability Division Manager reported on the upcoming Durham Earth Month. There will be a number of environmental events during Earth Month in April. The Farmers Market will open its spring season; there will be an environmental Arts Crawl; the Museum of Life and Science is having a Butterfly Bash; Earth Day cleanups are on April 25 in the morning, and an Earth Day festival will take place at the CCB Plaza downtown in the afternoon. Ellerbe Creek stream organization have planned a week. Northeast Creek Streamwatch is planning Northeast Creek Week, April 19-25. The events have been announced in Durham magazine and elsewhere.

Northeast Creek Streamwatch has been invited to have a table at the IBM Earth Day event April 22-23. This will now be part of Northeast Creek Week.

The Northeast Creek annual Earth Day clean-up will be on Saturday, April 25, 9 AM - Noon. Northeast Creek Streamwatch is inviting homeowners associations and other organizations in the Northeast Creek watershed to coordinate with us in setting up clean-ups on April 25.

Signs

The NC Department of Transportation has agreed to put up signs marking the Northeast Creek, like those marking New Hope Creek and Ellerbe Creek.

The City of Durham Stormwater Department got the NC Division of Water Quality Stream Watch program to send us two more Stream Watch signs.

Jordan Lake Survey

Members of Northeast Creek Streamwatch have signed a petition requesting the Durham County Commission to reject the resurvey of Jordan Lake boundaries that was prepared by a developer.

Jordan Lake Rules

Officials from the City of Durham Stormwater Department and the NC Division of Water Quality held a public meeting at the Parkwood Library on February 24 to answer questions about the City of Durham’s position on the NC Division of Water Quality’s Jordan Lake Rules. The meeting was well attended. The Haw River Assembly riverkeeper attended. The City of Durham is concerned about the cost of retrofitting existing developments to reduce nitrogen pollution going into Jordan Lake. The new rules would require 35% reduction in nitrogen pollutants scheduled over 10 years. A lot of the nitrogen compounds are deposited from the air and come from vehicle exhaust. The City has some of the more stringent targets because of the concentration of pollution in lower New Hope Creek, which is obstructed from reaching Jordan Lake by the Fearrington causeway. The City argues that the retrofit actions should be funded regionally and not piecemeal by individual municipalities and counties.

Development Update

Rezoning for a Reconciliation United Methodist Church at the northeast corner of Fayetteville Road and Martin Luther King Parkway. The site is on a ridge, and most present considered it not to present a problem. We will try to get a look at the site plan to confirm that this is the case.

Board of Adjustment hearing for property on Ellis Road near Sohi Road. There will be an administrative hearing March 5th regarding the condos uphill from a branch of Northeast Creek. Colonial Grand has appealed an administrative decision requiring connection between the multifamily residential and office/institutional parts of its property and permitting use other than offices in the office/institutional zone of the property.

Other News about Northeast Creek

Members reported having seen otter droppings at the lower end of Northeast Creek. We are waiting for an otter sighting.

Announcements

Next monthly meeting is March 25 at 7 pm in the Small Conference Room at Parkwood Library.

by Michael Pollock

There have been some complaints about the dead trees in the swamps and beaver ponds around Newhall Village and Parkwood. these trees are mostly at a safe distance from yards and are on the public lands administered by the Army Corps of Engineers and the NC Wildlife Commission around Jordan Lake. Even if they could be cut, this would harm wildlife that the community should value.

Redheaded woodpeckers, bold woodpeckers with black and white wings, white bellies, and brilliant red heads, are one of the species most dependent on the snags. They can be seen in other places, but beaver ponds with tall dead trees echo with the trilling calls of redheads. They nest in snags and stuff acorns into cracks for the winter. Pileated woodpeckers, hawk-sized black and white woodpeckers with red crests, live in the deep woods around Northeast Creek and excavate nest holes in dead trees. Other woodpeckers and nuthatches also use snags. Hawks and ospreys build large stick nests in snags. Herons, such as the great blue herons you can see in Parkwood and elsewhere, also nest in snags and tall trees.

Because of the lack old trees and adequately large forests, there are fewer nesting sites for many species. Snags only last so long. The old beaver pond under the large powerline that crosses Grandale once had redheaded woodpeckers, but most of the snags have fallen and it will be decades before the trees are large enough to start the cycle again. Chimney swifts, the small swallow-like birds that twitter high above Durham all day in the summer, originally lived in large hollow trees, but now there are more chimneys than hollow trees, hence the name. Because the swamp is remote, it also shelters native birds from competition with the non-native starlings and house sparrows for scarce hollow trees. Wasps and feral bees make use of hollows and woodpecker cavities, as do hibernating mourning cloaks, question marks, and other butterflies.

Beyond the snags, these swamps are very valuable. In the spring and summer they bring every night with choruses of frogs and toads, including the cowbell-like call of locally rare green treefrogs, slender green frogs with white side stripes. In the fall and winter salamanders lay eggs in fish-free pools. Without the swamps, nearby communities would not have American and Fowler’s toads to control pests. Fish like bowfin, pickerel, and mosquitofish breed in the beaver ponds and control larval mosquitoes, which prefer puddles, not ponds. Raucous blue and white belted kingfishers dive for fish. There are also crayfish, freshwater shrimp, pill clams, dragonflies, and buttonbushes, a swamp flower that abundantly attracts butterflies and moths in midsummer. Fallen trees become natural planters and walkways for wildlife. The bottomlands are habitat for colorful wood ducks, migrating birds, turkeys, woodcocks, beavers, muskrats, foxes, deer, raccoons, opossums, and possibly occasional otters, mink, bobcats, coyotes, aand bears. At night the swamps echo with the calls of barred owls, which nest in hollow trees, as do nocturnal southern flying squirrels.

Snags that threaten homes should be removed, but there is beauty in a snag and a swamp, and they are both home to many beautiful and interesting species that many would be sad to lose.

Three people met at the Parkwood library

Northeast Creek Basin Archaeology Book

The group discussed producing a book to explain the artifacts found in the Northeast Creek basin.

Earth Day

The group discussed having the usual cleanup on Saturday, April 25th in the afternoon. The group is considering adding the O’Kelly Church Road bridge and also cleaning along Burdens Creek between Audubon Park and Alexander Drive. EPA, which is located in RTP and on Burdens Creek, is planning to do something for Earth Day in RTP; the group discussed the possibility of community cleanups along the North Branch, which runs through Meridian Park and Penrith to the west of NC 55.

IBM invited Northeast Creek Streamwatch to participate in their Earth Day events again. We are looking for volunteers who can help table on April 22 and 23.

The Durham Sustainability Office wants to have a Creek Week that week also, and we discussed possible hikes that we might do on the date of the Earth Day cleanup.

NC Department of Transportation Issues

The group discussed how to get the NC DOT to mark Northeast Creek with a few signs and whether it is possible to adopt roads.

We also discussed the toll road planned for RTP. It is virtually approved, but the economic crisis has delayed it. Stopping it requires lobbying the General Assembly.

Letters on Jordan Lake Survey

On behalf of Northeast Creek Streamwatch, Michael Pollock sent a letter to Julie Ventaloro at the Division of Water Quality and to the County Commissioners; and a version of this letter was printed in the Herald-Sun last week. The Herald-Sun published a letter from the Durham People’s Alliance on Wednesday. The group is continuing to monitor this action that would affect Northeast Creek as well as New Hope Creek.

Development Notices

Reconciliation United Methodist Church has applied for rezoning at the northeast corner of Martin Luther King Parkway and Fayetteville Road. The group discussed whether to comment on this action in the Northeast Creek basin. A decision will be made after the group sees the site plans.

Planning Commission Vacancy

Friday, January 30 is the deadline for people to volunteer for service on the Planning Commission, which has lost its South Durham representative.

Hikes

We are planning wildflower hikes in March, probably in conjunction with stream monitoring.

Next Meeting

The next meeting will be at the Parkwood Library, February 25, at 7 pm.

The following statement reflects the position of the members of Northeast Creek Streamwatch, as expressed at our last meeting.

Northeast Creek Streamwatch (www.northeastcreek.org) is concerned about the County Commissioners’ decision to accept a survey of Jordan Lake’s critical watershed funded by an interested developer.

This is an obvious conflict of interest, and the survey benefits the developer, while putting about 350 other Durham properties into the protected area. The Commissioners, other than Heron and Reckhow, are setting a bad precedent for the creeks around Jordan Lake. The proposed high-density 751 Assemblage will make it harder to improve water quality at that end of the Lake, which has been on the EPA’s Impaired Waters list since 2002, as well as increasing traffic on gridlocked Stagecoach Road and smog, in an otherwise forested rural area.

Northeast Creek Streamwatch supports the Durham County Manager, Planning Director, Attorney, and the Chatham County Commissioners in advocating an independent survey. I think this is coming before the Commissioners again this month and there is still time to ask Julie Ventaloro, at the State Division of Water Quality, to reject the County’s decision. Proponents of the survey argued that this saves money, but what about the future costs of cleaning up Jordan Lake, extra costs for treating drinking water, and the public infrastructure needed for new development on Durham’s periphery?

Michael Pollock
for Northeast Creek Streamwatch

There were five people at the meeting.

Parkwood Christmas Parade

Nine people were in the Northeast Creek Streamwatch unit. The Great Blue Heron walked this year, and we also had the classic car again.

Jordan Lake Normal Pool Boundary Survey

A member reported that Durham County has accepted a re-survey of the Lake Jordan normal pool. The survey was paid for by a developer who wants to build a residential and commercial development at the corner of Highway 751 and Stagecoach Road. If the survey is accepted it will mean the developer can build on more acres of the property, which includes a forested inventory site. The construction will send more sediment into Jordan Lake along New Hope Creek. Although this development is not in the Northeast Creek basin, the re-survey will affect development along Northeast Creek.

The NC Division of Water Quality must review the survey. The group decided to send a letter to the person reviewing the survey for the NC Division of Water Quality. We will also notify groups who were at the State of Our Waterways conference.

Draft Non-Profit Documents

The draft documents for incorporation as a non-profit are complete except for a decision about the initial board and a mailing address for the group.

Upcoming Events

The next business meeting will be Wednesday, January 28th at 7 pm at the Parkwood Library.

Stream monitoring volunteers will leave from the Parkwood Library at 3 pm on Saturday, January 31, and Saturday, February 7.