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The Impact of Winter Road Maintenance on Ashwaubenon Creek’s CONDUCTIVITY

The Impact of Winter Road Maintenance on Ashwaubenon Creek’s CONDUCTIVITY . Watershed Symposium 2012. March 2012. Historically, our conductivity has noticeably exceeded that of the other streams in the project. The ASHWAUBENON CREEK WATERSHED. Creamery Road site. Little Rapids Rd site.

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The Impact of Winter Road Maintenance on Ashwaubenon Creek’s CONDUCTIVITY

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  1. The Impact of Winter Road Maintenance on Ashwaubenon Creek’s CONDUCTIVITY Watershed Symposium 2012

  2. March 2012 Historically, our conductivity has noticeably exceeded that of the other streams in the project

  3. The ASHWAUBENON CREEK WATERSHED Creamery Road site Little Rapids Rd site We attributed this to it’s unique proximity to heavily travelled roads, exploding development, & subsequent salting practices.

  4. Fall Monitoring 2011 Teams became “experts” at their parameter & had to work with the data from many angles: explaining patterns and trends to the other peer teams

  5. Creamery Road Why is Fall consistently highest? Constant influx of salt through groundwater CONDUCTIVITY Seasonal Trends Little Rapids RR Spring lows due to dilution (high flows) Why is Spring consistently low? But what’s been happening here?

  6. Creamery Road 600-900 lbs per LANE MILE Historical De Pere salting practices CONDUCTIVITY Seasonal Trends Little Rapids RR That’s roughly 2.25 to 3.4 TONS of salt each winter on only 12 miles of road into 3 miles of stream What does that really mean?

  7. Something changes here…..what? Creamery Road Winter 2008 De Pere changes salting practices CONDUCTIVITY Seasonal Trends Little Rapids RR Now just spreading at most 300 lbsper lane mile

  8. Relationship Between Conductivity and Spring (mid-May) Stream Flow Little Rapids Road Conductivity (microSiemens per cm) Spring Stream Flow (cubic feet/sec) What a difference! High flow meant high conductivity Whoa..what’s up with that?

  9. Freakish winter= Research Opportunity!!! March 8 2008 (typical winter conditions) Extra Monitoring 2012 March 9 Nighttime thunderstorms & rain Sudden 6’ worth of snowmelt (Prime spring runoff!) March 20 No precipitation Temps in the 60s & 70s “Normal” flow conditions (for MAY not March)

  10. So, how did varying spring flows affect the other water quality parameters? Conductivity Conclusion: flow rate “trumps” site characteristics Conductivity (microSiemens per cm) Ditto for turbidity and dissolved oxygen

  11. Environmental Science 3rdHr 2012

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