By Darby Stipe, AmeriCorps Western Region Water Quality and Habitat Restoration Associate

Part of MountainTrue’s mission is to protect and restore local waterways here in the Southern Blue Ridge. Watersheds are essential to this mission, though they are often not well understood. Learning about local watersheds is an important first step toward improving water quality and preserving ecosystems in your area. 

So, what is a watershed? A watershed is an area of land that channels rainfall, snowmelt, and groundwater into streams and rivers that flow into common points, like lakes or oceans. Watersheds can be small, such as the area around a single creek, or they can encompass hundreds of miles; the Mississippi River Watershed drains the water from 31 different U.S. states. Every body of water has a watershed, and you likely live in more than one.

Healthy watersheds contain a variety of landscapes, native flora and fauna, and intact natural communities. Water can pick up sediment, pollutants, or harmful bacteria as it flows into larger rivers or lakes, which can lead to increased negative impacts on water quality further downstream. Healthy watersheds provide critical services; the condition of our local watersheds directly impacts our health and well-being. Elevated pollutants can result in unsafe drinking water, fish and aquatic species becoming unfit for human consumption, and swimming waters that can make us sick. 

Watershed Pollution

There are two major types of pollution: point-source and nonpoint-source. The first is relatively easy to identify, as these contaminants tend to come from a pinpointed source, and their emissions are often highly regulated. Point-source pollution can come from factories or power plants with smokestacks, drainage ditches, or discharge pipes. While still a significant source of pollution in the U.S., the impact of point-source pollution has dropped dramatically since the inception of the Clean Air Act (1970) and the Clean Water Act (1972).

Of greater concern today is nonpoint-source pollution, which comes from multiple sources simultaneously. A major example of nonpoint-source pollution is stormwater runoff containing pollutants washed by heavy rainfall from impervious surfaces like parking lots, roofs, and streets into sewers or directly into bodies of water. These pollutants include car oil, tire scraps, pet waste, litter, and other types of garbage. Agriculture runoff is also an issue where the soil in the fields no longer has the capacity to hold as much water after years of intensive use without adequate ground cover. Animal waste, pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers can all get washed away in the rain and drain into local waterways. Nonpoint-source pollution can be tricky to prevent because the pollutants come from so many different sources and activities. 

Watershed Management 

Managing our watersheds can be a complex task. Managers need to identify and implement sustainable land and water use practices so people can utilize natural resources in a given area without harming the existing plants, animals, and ecosystems. MountainTrue’s Clean Waters Program works to restore and support healthy waterways through collaboration with our organizational partners and communities. Our four Riverkeepers and Clean Waters staff continuously monitor point-source pollution, test for bacteria levels in waterways during the summer months, host volunteer cleanups to raise awareness about the problems our waterways face, and so much more.

Making a difference

Here are some steps you can take to support the health of your local waterways:

• Be mindful of water usage.
• Minimize or eliminate personal use of chemical herbicides and fertilizers. Need product recommendations? Contact our Western Region Program Coordinator, Tony Ward!
• Avoid pouring toxic chemicals down the drain; take them to a hazardous waste center instead. Click here to learn more about disposing of hazardous waste on the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality website. 
• Use porous surfaces like wood, brick, or gravel on the walkways around your house to minimize water runoff. 
• Consider installing a rain garden in the low areas on your property.

To check out which watershed you are a part of, visit the EPA’s How’s My Waterway tool. After typing in your address, you can also see if there are any identified problems in your local watershed. 

From May to September, MountainTrue’s Riverkeepers and volunteers collect weekly water samples from the Broad, French Broad, Elk, Green, Hiwassee, New, Notterly, and Watauga river watersheds as part of our Swim Guide Program. We process and analyze each sample and post the results to the Swim Guide website and mobile app before the weekend so you know where it’s safe to swim.

Want to get involved? Join us on a volunteer workday! Our dedicated volunteers help to collect water samples for E. coli and microplastic testing, eradicate nonnative invasive plants along waterways, plant native trees along stream banks, clean local rivers and shorelines, and more. Feel free to contact us for more information about how you can get involved. 

Geese, ducks, and swans may seem like a beautiful and natural part of a lakeside environment. You may enjoy them so much that you spend time feeding them or otherwise encouraging them to spend time on your property or in local parks. But overly large waterfowl populations can actually cause several problems for humans, water quality, and the birds themselves.

The Canada goose (Branta canadensis) has been present in North Carolina and Georgia historically in both migratory and residential populations. During the 1970s, the number of migratory geese coming to these states declined drastically. In response, in the early 1980s, state wildlife agencies introduced populations of a goose sub-species with weak migrating skills that quickly adapted to the suburban lakes and rivers of Georgia and North Carolina. This new population of resident geese exploded into 45,000 birds in Georgia and 100,000 birds in North Carolina, but generations later, they now have next to no migrating skills.

These large waterfowl populations leave a lot of droppings behind. According to Clear Choices Clean Water Indiana, a single Canada goose eats three to four pounds of grass and can create as much as two to three pounds of waste per day. These droppings are unsightly and odorous and can also make people sick. Goose feces carries similar bacterial strains to those present in mammal waste. Research has shown that goose poop contains a wide variety of pathogens capable of infecting humans. Parasites that cause gastrointestinal problems (particularly Cryptosporidium and Giardia) have also been found in waterfowl feces. And feces from geese, ducks, and swans commonly act as hosts for the parasite that causes swimmer’s itch.

A large population of migratory birds staying in Georgia and North Carolina during the winter does not drastically raise the bacterial count of a waterbody, thanks to the low seasonal temperatures. Intestinal strains of bacteria do not reproduce in cold or freezing temperatures. However, with a large geese population now residing in our lakes during the summer months, warmer water temperatures promote the growth of potentially harmful pathogens. Additionally, bird waste is high in phosphorus, a nutrient that increases algae growth in mountain lakes. 

As a general rule, try to stay away from areas that are heavily contaminated with waterfowl droppings. If you come into contact with poo, wash your hands thoroughly before touching your face or other people. Thoroughly wash any shoes, feet, or clothes that come into contact with droppings as well. It is especially important that parents be vigilant about keeping children away from areas heavily covered in droppings.

Pictured above: Goose droppings on a public swimming beach in the Southern Blue Ridge Mountains. 

How can you help?

Do not feed geese. Handouts of bread or other human food items have little nutritional value to geese, artificially satisfy their hunger, and make them reliant on nesting in parks and residential communities. Geese are herbivores, and green plants, including sedges and grasses, make up the bulk of their diet.

Make it difficult for geese to find an ideal nesting location. Lush green turf grass planted right up to the edges of our lakes, ponds, and rivers has created the perfect habitat for goose populations to explode. If you typically keep your grass cut short, try letting it grow tall around the edges of the shoreline or plant some native moisture-tolerant shrubs such as buttonbush, arrowwood viburnum, and others — this makes it more difficult for geese to walk from the water to the land and back, making your property less inhabitable. You can also identify places where you’ve seen geese nest previously and place an object there to prevent geese from nesting there in the future — this object must be large and heavy enough that the goose can’t move it. 

Get (or adopt!) and train a dog to chase geese away from your property. Border collies and similar herding breeds are exceptionally capable of chasing unwanted waterfowl away. Training your pup(s) to chase away the geese in the mornings and evenings is one of the most effective methods to deter the birds from spending time on your property. The geese perceive the dogs to be predators and decide to find somewhere else to live.

Hunt residential goose communities. The Canada goose is not an endangered species and hunting is permitted. All of Western North Carolina is classified as a residential population hunting zone with three seasons in the fall and winter. Georgia has four seasons beginning in September. Visit wncwildlife.org or georgiawildlife.org to learn more.