The water quality coming from the spring source is very well oxygenated. In fact, during the hatchery days the headwaters (ditch) was classified as exceptional value cold water (maybe not the exact name, but it had the highest cold water quality designation that can be given to a stream in PA), yet the water just below the ditch outlet was classified as significantly impaired water so simultaneously the stream was on the PADEP list of EV water and significantly impaired water. And the reason for the lack of oxygen below the ditch was solely due to the heavy oxygen demanding nutrient load that was being discharged from the hatchery not the absence of plunge pools or other artificial oxygenators. Essentially this nutrient load stripped the water of all its dissolved oxygen by the time it discharged from the ditch and that was one of the contributing factors as to why the stream was biologically dead below the ditch (along with the discharge of diquat and formaldehyde).
Once the nutrient load was removed (i.e., the hatchery shut down), you still had the EV highly oxygenated water coming from the spring source and this water flowed the length of the stream and over time, the stream cleansed itself and rebounded back stronger than anyone could have imagined – much to the dismay of the PFBC administrators and CVTU who wanted to turn it into a stocked fishing park when the hatchery was shut down. And those same people also said the brooks would not come back as the citizens predicted but guess what, they did.
So the reality is a group of concerned citizens and scientists proved the “experts” wrong by demonstrating that the hatchery was the cause of the problem (not habitat problems as promoted by the PFBC administrators) and after the hatchery was shutdown, the stream came back just as they predicted it would if left on its own. In fact it recovered better than ever expected and now the same people who (1) screwed it up in the first place, (2) lied about it and covered it up, (3) operated a hatchery that was illegally discharging poisons and herbicides into the stream, (4) denied the hatchery was the cause of the problem and stated the cause was loss of habitat for unknown reasons, (5) claimed if the hatchery was shut down the stream wouldn’t recover and (5) wished to turn it into a stocked fishing park because it wouldn’t recover if left on its own, are now the ones in charge of restoring the stream after the model of “leave it alone” worked so well for 9 years? The PFBC own electroshocking data from 2001 – 2007 clearly demonstrates the trout were coming back in strong numbers throughout the FFO section and you know what, they never even surveyed the better sections of the stream.
Come on, doesn’t anyone see a problem with that. Kind of like letting the fox guard the hen house.
And people keep saying only GreenWeenie knows what’s best and you know what, I know what the citizens and scientists said was best for the stream (leave it alone) and guess what, they were 100% right because I watched the stream recover in real time from 2006 through August 2010 going from a marginal stream in 2006 to a world class brook and bow factory by August 2010 so yes, I believe these non-experts more than the idiot experts now in charge of this stream who screwed it up in the first place and whose predictions and theories were proved wrong time and time again. And yes, they are idiots. The proof is in the pudding and it isn’t what I think is best, the stream followed a model that the so called experts said wouldn’t work and it did so what the so called experts have done is fooled everyone into believing that the stream had problems, never recovered, and they are now going to save it. And people now go there and see large amounts of fish and believe it is because of the restoration efforts – IT’S NOT – what is there now has nothing to do with the restoration work it was there before the work and in fact, it was substantially better before the work was done.
I wish you and others could have seen what was there post restoration.
As for oxygen levels way down in the stream, well, by August 2010 there were massive numbers of pollution intolerant and oxygen demanding insects including stoneflies and sulfurs because I saw them, I fished these hatches. And they weren’t limited to the upper reaches, as some of the heaviest hatches occurred well below the 1.1 mile FFO section, which is the first 1.1 miles of the stream. In addition the stream also had extremely good populations of olives, caddis, tricos (in isolated areas), and more midges than you can imagine – again, I fished them, I saw them. So given the fact that the stream held lots of pollution intolerant and oxygen demanding insects from the headwaters down to probably 3.5 miles below, call me stupid but it certainly appears to me that oxygen levels weren’t a problem in the lower sections. And there were also healthy populations of wild bows and brooks well below the cement arch bridge, which is probably 3.5 miles below the spring source and 2.5 miles into the ATW section. In fact, in many places within the ATW section there were sections that held healthy pods of wild bows and even wild brooks – mostly bows but there were wild brooks as well. Sounds to me the stream was in pretty excellent shape throughout. So as for creating plunge pools to increase oxygen levels, there was no need because the water coming from the spring source is exceptional value highly oxygenated water, the source of the oxygen demanding nutrient load that caused the problem is no longer there, and the stream had healthy populations of pollution intolerant and oxygen demanding insects and also healthy populations of wild trout over 3.5 miles below the headwaters. Doesn’t sound to me like the stream had problems. The only problems it had was it didn’t “look nice,” and the trout weren’t easy to catch. And limestone spring creeks are not freestone streams, they are low gradient, slow moving bodies of water and that’s what makes a spring creek a spring creek and a freestone stream a freestone stream.
As for the FFO zone, the place was loaded with fish – there were thousands of them all over – and big ones too. Seriously, the bows in the stream were bigger and more abundant than the mighty Delaware bows, but nobody knew that and those who did hid the data because that wasn’t supposed to happen. There was no reason to do what they did to the upper half in the fall 2010 and that’s not just me saying it, that’s the PFBC own biologists, folks from the US Wish and Wildlife Department, other independent scientists but CVTU goes out and hires their own consultant (the expert) and this company comes to the conclusion work needs to be done (that they get PAID TO DO) so they are now the undisputed expert and everyone else who disagrees with what they say should be done is wrong.