Water quality monitoring at Roosevelt-Vanderbilt National Historic Sites: Northeast Temperate Network 2014 summary report

Gawley, William; Dieffenbach, Fred

This report on the water quality of Roosevelt-Vanderbilt National Historic Sites (ROVA) generated by the Northeast Temperate Network (NETN) Water Quality Monitoring Program includes data gathered in the 2014 monitoring season and displays these results in graphic form, accompanied by a brief interpretation. The data address the NETN objective to detect change in the status of physical, chemical, or biological attributes of park freshwater bodies. The NETN Freshwater Monitoring Protocol calls for a total of six park streams to be sampled monthly from May through October at ROVA. Staff measured physical and in-situ water chemistry parameters each month and periodically collected water samples for analysis at the University of Maine’s Sawyer Environmental Chemistry Research Laboratory. Monthly sampling parameters included in-situ water quality measures (pH, specific conductance, temperature, dissolved oxygen, and turbidity), weather, stream flow (discharge), and stream stage. In May and August, water samples were obtained and analyzed for acid neutralizing capacity (ANC), color, nutrients, dissolved organic carbon (DOC), chloride, and sulfate. All water quality parameters for the monitored streams were within state standards, but generally exceeded the range of the non-regulatory EPA criteria. Other than some high temperature and turbidity measurements, all values were within the ranges of the historic NETN monitoring data from ROVA. Some metrics that lack regulatory standards were high at ROVA, especially total nitrogen and sulfate at the two FDR Brook sites, and chloride at all sites. ANC measurements showed that all streams had sufficient buffering to avoid severely depressed pH values from spring snowmelt and runoff that can contribute acidity to the stream water. Test results for TN and NO3 were moderate in all but the FDR Brook samples, which were high. Results for NO2 were low at all sites, and most ammonia (NH3) test results were below the method reporting limit of 0.08 mg/L. All total phosphorus results for 2014 were moderate, but most of the values were above the EPA Region 7 criterion of 33µg/L. There is no numeric New York state TP standard.

Water quality monitoring at Roosevelt-Vanderbilt National Historic Sites: Northeast Temperate Network 2014 summary report

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