NEWS FROM THE STROUD WATER RESEARCH CENTER
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Summer 1999
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Research Update
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The effect of forest buffers on stream life
The National Science Foundation and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency awarded the Stroud Center a three-year, $940,000 grant for an innovative interdisciplinary project to study the differences between forested and meadow reaches of small streams. The project is notable both for its science and because it entails two distinct levels of collaboration. The basic research, which seeks to assess the impact on stream life of changes in sunlight, temperature and water flow, is a joint effort that involves all six senior staff scientists at the Stroud Center, as well as two colleagues from the Academy of Natural Sciences. The scientific findings are in turn being integrated with sociological data on landowner views, preferences and prejudices concerning streamside forests. This information, which is being compiled by social scientists at Penn State University and the University of Delaware, seeks to understand the social, political and historical pressures on streamside planting and deforestation. The combination of these two distinct but interdependent sets of data should provide a unique perspective on the scientific, social and ecological dimensions of a critical public policy issue.
Some of the questions this collaborative study hopes to answer are:
- Do pesticides break down faster in forested reaches, where stream-based microbes operate more efficiently, or in meadow reaches, where direct sunlight helps break down the active ingredients?
- Which environment facilitates greater fish diversity and production?
- Where are there likely to be more varieties and higher densities of insects, worms and crayfish to support larger aquatic life, such as fish?
- Where is dissolved organic matter processed faster and more efficiently?
- What impact do the different conditions have on the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus being exported downstream to our estuaries?
- What role do political and social factors play in streamside planting and reforestation?
- What are the public policy implications of this research?
- How do the different levels of shade and direct sunlight affect the kinds and amount of aquatic plant life in the stream?
Sponsors: National Science Foundation; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
