Parks and a Pedal-Paddle Trail in PA

Hey, guys! I made it to Pennsylvania and I've been checking out everything that's going on with Evergreen Conservancy and the Crooked Creek Watershed Association. I even got to help out around the Indiana County Conservation District office as they were getting ready for the Indiana County Envirothon that's coming up in May.

My new friend and I made sure the walkie talkies were working.

Check out ICCD's AMD orange shirts they got for the  Envirothon!

Kelly brought me along to a meeting about a grant Evergreen is submitting for Homer City Borough, located just a few miles down the road from Indiana. Evergreen and the Borough built a canoe launch last year along the creek that passes through town, and they want to turn the site into a park with community gardens, rain gardens, a nice pavilion, and a Pedal-Paddle Trail. A local walking/biking trail passes close to the park, so trail users would be able to leave their bikes at the take-out point down the creek, put their kayak or canoe in at the Homer City launch, then paddle down the creek, pick up their bikes and pedal back up the trail to their car, then drive to pick up their kayaks. Sounds like it would be pretty cool (and maybe a little confusing to describe) if they can make it happen! I would keep my fingers crossed for them, but they don't really move that way... They were working down to the wire to get everything ready to submit, but they did it! I was even there to witness the triumphant clicking of the submit button and the ensuing celebration. What a rush!

Evergreen board member John and I love parks!

After all that office work, I was glad to get out in the field. We visited Bear Run, a major tributary of the Susquehanna that eventually empties into the Chesapeake Bay. This was Kelly's first time visiting the site, so we both learned quite a bit. There are 25 acres of abandoned mine land and 2000 ft of impacted stream channels at the site along with two major abandoned mine discharges that contribute about 63% of the iron loading in the Bear Run Watershed. To address this, Evergreen partnered with several organizations a few years ago to construct a passive treatment system. We went out with a couple of  Evergreen volunteers to install a datalogger so they can monitor and compile water quality data from the stream. Evergreen now has 32 dataloggers installed in streams throughout the county with plans for more! 

Hard at work installing the datalogger.

Abandoned by the abandoned mine discharge.

Now it's back to West Virginia! I can't wait to see what's in store for me down there!