What's Up Annapolis

By Dotty Holcomb Doherty

On summer days the South River hums with throngs of pleasure boaters and crab-hunting trot liners. Children splash at community beaches. Osprey young hatch and juvenile fish feed in the shallows. But this carefree scene has a dark side. Recurrent algae blooms suck up dissolved oxygen, bacterial counts soar after rainstorms, and sediment-laden waters prevent growth of underwater grasses.

The South River Federation (SRF) and devoted volunteers are working hard to reverse this trend of degradation. Their goal: to bring the South River back to its former vitality.

Keeping an Eye on the River

South Riverkeeper Diana Muller spends every Thursday and Friday in her white research boat, Remedy, visiting all crannies of the river. To assess the river’s health she collects water quality data at 12 creek sites and four sites on the main stem.

She is well equipped for the job. With a background in chemical and biological oceanography, 20 years’ sampling rivers and estuaries, plus working in environmental management and law, Muller knows how to both test the water and communicate her results. Her thorough monitoring means 10- to 12-hour days on the river and working conditions that can include the extremes of Maryland weather. But she is looking for answers, and this is the best way to get them.


South Riverkeeper Diana Muller holds a Secchi dish, a standard tool used to measure water clarity.
Photo by Michael Land

“We’re doing vertical profiles, which is something different,” says Muller, who began working for the South River Federation last summer and has stepped up its sampling to year-round. Starting near the bottom, she tests temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen, and pH at different depths, giving her a more telling view of what’s happening in the river.

Last summer her vertical profile sampling north of the Riva bridge revealed plummeting levels of dissolved oxygen just ten feet below the surface. At six feet deep, the oxygen was almost gone. She found these low levels common throughout the river. She blames them for last September’s fish kill in Aberdeen Creek, when more than 100,000 juvenile menhaden died. Our creeks are the Bay’s nurseries, and we are suffocating the babies.

Muller wants to keep our children safe, too. Algae blooms, especially the cyanobacteria Mycrocystis, put our little swimmers at risk for nausea, diarrhea, and fever. Runoff after rain can lead to dangerous levels of enterococcus bacteria. As part of Operation Clearwater, a bacteria testing program for public recreational beach areas on the South River that runs from May through Labor Day, she monitors bacteria levels at river beaches each week, posting her results on the federation’s Web site. Muller’s work on and off the river keeps her busy, too busy to test every small creek flowing into South River. That’s where the Riverwatchers come in.

Adding Eyes and Ears

“You are the further reaches of our eyes and ears,” Muller told Riverwatcher volunteers at a training session last fall. Their job? To conduct water quality testing on nontidal creeks. Previously only done in the summer, testing would now run year-round. Jeanne Bellis of Annapolis was thrilled. “It’ll be great to do it all year and see what happens,” Bellis said. Having documented low oxygen levels in the summer, she and her family wanted to know whether their site on Aberdeen Creek would recover. Sons Chris and Nick, 10th and 12th graders at South River High, have been diligent in their testing, finding it satisfying to apply classroom chemistry to fieldwork.

The data Riverwatchers collect alert Muller to hot spots, where she does further testing. Because of Muller’s experience with the legal side of water quality monitoring she makes doubly sure the Riverwatchers follow EPA guidelines. “We don’t have any industry sitting on South River polluting it like the Hudson does,” says Muller. “So where is it coming from? The majority, I guarantee, is coming from storm water runoff.” Another source is leaky septic systems.

"We are poisoning our own river and we need citizens, we need ourselves, to go to the county, to go to the state and say we need to tighten laws to stop this,” she continues. “We need good data to do this—it will prove what’s going on.”

Good data gathered by previous riverkeeper Drew Koslow led to a successful lawsuit settlement with Annapolis Towne Centre at Parole in 2008, over construction sediment flushed into Church Creek. This suit, a Maryland first under the Federal Clean Water Act, set an important precedent for future cases to follow, if and when they arise.

Keeping Storm Water Out of the River

Water surging off roofs, roads, and parking lots after a rain carries with it the detritus of our lives: fertilizers, spilled oil and gas, pet waste—everything we put on the ground. Forests and marshes slow rain naturally, filtering pollutants and allowing the downpour to percolate gradually. In the yards of our homes, businesses, and institutions we can slow storm water by collecting it in rain barrels or rain gardens.

The SRF has built rain gardens throughout the watershed. It added four bioretention ponds on government property along Harry S. Truman Parkway last year to protect Broad Creek and ten residential rain gardens in the Beard’s Creek watershed. Small creeks are the capillaries of the river—keeping them healthy is vital to the health of the river.

“We are pursuing major restoration projects in Church and Beard’s Creeks,” says SRF executive director Erik Michelsen, “as part of our Targeted Watershed Grant from the Chesapeake Bay Trust. Church Creek is one of our most urbanized and degraded subwatersheds. The county has already begun restoration work in that subwatershed, so we hope to build upon that.”

Besides hands-on projects, the federation also seeks legislation to solve the storm water crisis. It has worked for the passage of the Stormwater Management and Restoration of Tributaries (SMART) Fund, a bill introduced by Anne Arundel County Executive John Leopold. The fund would act as “a storm water utility where there would be a fee on impervious surfaces in the county,” says Michelsen. The money would “go to the Department of Public Works budget to repair storm water damage, addressing a billion dollar backlog of these issues.”

Determined to be part of the solution, several communities in the South River watershed are already stepping up to do their part.

Turning Shoreline into Habitat

Lush Spartina grasses wave along the shores of Glebe Bay and Almshouse Creek. Bushy native groundsel, recognized in fall by its cottony sprays, has moved in; blooms of marsh hibiscus, rose mallow, and echinacea beautify summer days.

Returning eroding shorelines to this natural state takes not only a village but vision as well. The London Towne Property Owner’s Association is blessed with both. Moving beyond early opposition to the unmanicured look of living shorelines, the association has, in the last four years, restored more than a half-mile of its shores. And it has more projects planned. The newly created marshes slow and filter storm water from the land and reduce wave action—minimizing erosion, preserving the land, and re-creating lost habitat for aquatic animals. Already the grass shrimp have returned.

The London Towne association owns three miles of shoreline—that’s a lot of maintenance for a community of 2,000 homes. A community assessment tax helps foot the bill. The association needed matching funds for large restorations, and generous grants from the Chesapeake Bay Trust and National Fish and Wildlife Foundation have made dreams reality. Grants from Unity Gardens have sweetened strips of meadow with flowering plants.

Association volunteers partnered with the SRF for the 2004 restoration project on Glebe Bay. Twelve work parties spent two years creating the marsh and extended 15-foot herbaceous buffer. Those hundreds of hours moving 80 tons of stones by hand and planting grasses, shrubs, and flowers have paid off. Now when you visit you leave lawns and pavement behind and enter a more natural setting—one that welcomes bay ducks and loons in winter, egrets and swallows in summer.

When grander stone sills were needed in later projects, the contractor Shoreline Design of Edgewater provided heavy equipment to move hundreds of tons of sand and large rocks. It’s the volunteers, though, that make these idyllic settings possible. Summer days have found community members, SRF volunteers, boy scouts, and Cub Scouts planting thousands of 18-inch grass plugs. Seeing tiny plants turn into a marsh delights everyone, especially the kids. “There are challenges to working with children,” admits Stephen Hult, the grant writer and overseer of the erosion control projects for the association, “but it is definitely worth it. They are so enthusiastic, and their interest brings their parents in. The kids will come up to me later and say ‘I planted those grasses.’ There is a great sense of ownership.”

“We are lucky to have so many communities in the watershed that are mature enough to pursue these projects on their own,” says Michelsen. “We provide a supplementary role to the work they are doing, which really makes us all much more effective.”

Working and Playing Hard

Whether placing oysters on sanctuary reefs (tens of millions in partnership with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation), planting shoreline grasses, collecting streamside trash (seven tons from Church Creek and Bacon Ridge Branch alone), or building rock sills, SRF volunteers are no strangers to hard work. They’ve bushwhacked into tiny creeks to assess the watershed’s health as stream waders, collecting macroinvertebrates for the Maryland Department of Natural Resources. Each April finds them at 50 sites in those same creeks, testing the water in the one-day South River Snapshot.

They gather for fun, too. The Walk for the Woods fund-raiser for the Scenic Rivers Land Trust takes hikers into the springtime beauty of the Bacon Ridge Branch Natural Area. Using Open Space funds, the federation and the county are trying to preserve these mature woods and wetlands as part of the South River Greenway. In the headwaters of the South River beavers swim, herons feed, and migrating songbirds carouse in the lush woods, designated in 2008 as an Important Bird Area by Audubon and BirdLife International.

They celebrate on the South River Sojourn, an annual paddle to enjoy the beauty of the river and visit federation projects. A late summer fish fry salutes their hard work. This November at the annual Maritime Republic of Eastport Tug of War their pullers will seek a tug of war rematch across Annapolis Harbor after a narrow defeat last year to the Severn Riverkeeper team.

Assessing Our Own Stewardship

We need to look at our own yards, our own lifestyles and attitudes. If we want a river that’s safe to swim in—for our children and for the fish, turtles, crabs, and oysters—we need to assess our roles. Are we adding to the problem or helping to clean it up?
If you have an old septic system, consider upgrading to a denitrifying septic system. Convert some of your lawn to gardens. Plant native plants; install rain barrels and rain gardens. State grants and county tax breaks are available. If you need ideas or help, contact the SRF.

“We are a resource for people inside the watershed or even outside the watershed,” says Michelsen, “to explain issues and how they can undertake these projects in their own yards to improve water quality.”

Dotty Holcomb Doherty is a freelance writer living in Annapolis and frequent contributor to What’s Up? Annapolis.

Be Part of the Solution

Support Your Local Watershed Organization
The South River Federation (SRF), whose board of directors is led by Kincey Potter, has three staff members, including the South Riverkeeper. Membership and volunteers are a big part of the SRF’s success. Visit Southriverfederation.net for more information. The Severn and Magothy Rivers have similar programs.

Install Rain Barrels and Rain Gardens
Anne Arundel County offers tax breaks to homeowners who install rain barrels and gardens, from 10 to 50 percent of costs. Contact the county or the SRF for information.

Replace Old Septic Systems with Bay-friendly Denitrifying Septic Systems
State grant money is available from the Maryland Department of the Environment’s septic upgrade program to cover 100 percent of conversion costs, up to $10,000. Learn more at Mde.state.md.us/Water/CBWRF/osds. The SRF can assist with applications and answer questions.

Build Living Shorelines

If you or your community would like to convert bulkhead or eroding hillsides into living shorelines—now mandated by the state—help is nearby. For technical assistance and grant information:

South River Federation, Erik Michelsen: (410) 224-3802; This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

NOAA Restoration Center, Rick Takacs: (410) 267-5672; This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Maryland Department of the Environment, Rick Ayella: (410) 537-3835; This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Chesapeake Bay Trust, Jana Davis: (410) 974-2941; This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Stephen Hult welcomes visitors to view the shoreline restoration in London Towne. He is available to conduct tours, assist with grant writing, and recommend contractors. His advice: start small and involve the kids. Contact him for information or a tour: (410) 956-3392; This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

©2009 What's Up, Inc.