Upstream-Downstream Connections in the Delaware River Watershed by Jennifer Adkins
1. Jennifer Adkins, Executive Director
Partnership for the Delaware Estuary
Upstream-Downstream
Connections Delaware
River Watershed
in the
Jennifer Adkins
Executive Director
110 S. Poplar St, Suite 202, Wilmington, DE (302)655-4990 Jadkins@DelawareEstuary.org
2. Partnership for the
Delaware Estuary
• Non-profit organization
• Leading science-based and
collaborative efforts to improve the
tidal Delaware River and Bay
• One of 28 National Estuary Programs MOU with EPA, DRBC, PA, NJ, DE,PWD
• Working together for clean water,
thriving fish and wildlife, and
abundant recreational activities in
and around the tidal Delaware River
and Bay to support communities and
a robust economy
4. Sediment is Born Upstream
• Wants to stay in the bossum of the Forest
• Picks up a couple of friends
• Nutrients
• Contaminants
• Others try to get it back
• Schuylkill Action Network
• Christina Basin Partnership
5. Sediment Grows Up
• Gets together with flow
• Forms powerful alliance, attracts new
members from vulnerable areas
• Storm water runoff
• In stream erosion
• But makes new friends
• Freshwater mussels
• Macroinvertibrates
• Forests
8. Sediment & the City
• Makes it to the big city
• Gets into it with the law
• Philadelphia Water Department
• Army Corps of Engineers
• Runs into old friends
• Mussel beds
9. Sediment Has Mid-Life Crisis
• Turbid Middle Age
• Legal issues
• Relationship with flow
• Army Corps of Engineers
• Runs into friends of friends
• Oysters
10. Sediment Retires at the Beach!
• Settles down (by choice or coersion)
• Runs into old friends
• Ribbed mussels
• Finds a good home
• Tidal wetlands
Wish You Were Here!
11. Tidal Wetlands
Status:
•421,137 acres of wetlands
• 39.9% tidal (165,500 acres)
Trends:
• 2.2% loss 1996-2006
• Largest loss in lower
bayshore (NJ 7%!)
