Triad commuters may be familiar with Silas or Peters Creek Parkways, but what about the creeks that flow by them? WFDD’s David Ford wades into why they matter, from the health of the environment to the quality of drinking water, in this week’s Carolina Curious.
Standing alongside Peter’s Creek, it's nice and cool in the shade of some tall brush along the banks of this slow-moving stream that’s about six feet wide. After a seven-mile journey, this water will eventually flow into Salem Creek, a major tributary in Winston-Salem.
Wildlife Resources Commission biologist Joe Folta says creeks like this one are important, and to understand why, first, we need to consider the habitats that surround them.
"You've got, certainly the source of water for wildlife there, but it also is a place of haven for a lot of these species to escape the hot weather," says Folta. "You've got the water there. You've got the humidity from the water and then the shade from the forest that is around those creeks that are very, very important. And these waterways and the associated forest that goes along with them, they create these travel corridors for wildlife."
Some species use them to move from one place to another to reduce their exposure to predators. Migratory birds use creek corridors as a sort of pit stop to fuel up with food before continuing on their journey.
Folta says, although some streams may not look like much, there’s often a lot of life going on below the surface — underneath the stones at the creek bottom, in the undercut of the banks — tiny creatures the average passerby may not see.
"And that's just one little snapshot," he says. "You're looking at one small location at a small part in time. Some of these wildlife species might use that particular spot that you are observing a different time of the day, a different time of the year, or just the fact that you're there has spooked those animals away to someplace where they're hiding. And as soon as you walk away and things calm down a little bit, those animals will come back again."
And they come in lots of shapes and sizes — frogs, fish, crayfish, salamanders, hellbenders — and they provide an important food source for predators like raccoons and foxes. Folta says these creek dwellers form a huge segment of the ecology, so keeping their home clean is crucial for the environment.
Gauging the health of creeks and streams is job one for Rebecca Craps. She’s a Natural Resources Agent with the North Carolina Cooperative Extension in Forsyth County. She and her colleagues review two years’ worth of data. Then, using a program established under the Clean Water Act, they identify which waterways are officially considered impaired.
"And that can be based on nutrients, where we're seeing levels of nutrients that are unsafe in creeks and streams," says Craps. "It could also be biological impairments, where maybe we're seeing mercury in, you know, fish that are being caught in those creeks, or a very low number of aquatic invertebrates, which is typically lets us know that something's going on in that creek or stream that shouldn't be."
Craps says that sections of two major creek systems in Forsyth County are considered by the State Department of Environmental Quality to be impaired. Salem Creek, where the amount of aquatic life is at unhealthy levels, and Muddy Creek. And that she says is big.
"Seventy-six percent of the county falls under the Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin," she says. "And of that 76%, 76% of that is the Muddy Creek watershed. And so when you think about, you know, the shape of Forsyth County, where the high points are, where the low points are, all of that developed —you know, it's an urban county —all of that development is draining into mostly the Muddy Creek watershed."
So, when it rains, any chemicals or debris left on roofs, paved roads, and parking lots get dragged by the water into storm drain systems. Left untreated, it continues directly into small stream tributaries that feed into Muddy Creek. The water eventually winds up at the Muddy Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant, which processes up to 21 million gallons of residential and industrial wastewater each day before discharging it into the Yadkin River, Forsyth County’s largest water source.
Craps says there are things you can do to help, like preventing your yard waste from winding up in storm drains, doing a soil test before applying fertilizer, and making sure rain — that can wash it all away down the street and into storm drains— is not in the immediate forecast.
And, if you live near a creek, Craps says, please don’t plant turf grass right up to the edge of the water.
"We want to see native grasses, native shrubs, woody vegetation, growing along there, because those root systems are basically acting like a straw, drawing that water into the soil before it gets to the water body, which helps to filter it out," she says. "A lot of the pollutants of concern are going to bind to those soil particles, and they're never going to make their way into the creeks and streams if they're passing through these vegetative buffers."
And she says native grasses also help filter out the number one pollutant of creeks and streams in North Carolina: soil and sediment.
If you have a creek near your property and you’d like to improve the water quality, you’ll find help at the state Wildlife Resources Commission and the North Carolina Cooperative Extension.
And Forsyth Creek Week kicks off this Saturday with a week’s worth of opportunities to explore local waterways and more.