Potomac Watershed Partnership

Location:
Maryland, Delaware and metro-Washington, DC area

What is fostering progress?

Ray Johnston explains his perception of the success of the Potomac Watershed Partnership: “one of the partnership’s greatest accomplishments is bringing a disparate group of people interested in conservation to the table in one place and providing the focus. The focus, of course, is the restoration of the Potomac watershed. [This partnership] has taken a bunch of disparate efforts—where everyone is doing their thing and doing what we all think is right—and has helped us get focused in terms of where we can—all of these people working together—where we can get the most out of the bit of money that we do have.” He explains that the group has moved from “random acts of excellence” to something more strategically focused: “This is a real success as all of the agencies and conservation groups have different missions, different funding processes, and different customers. The Potomac Watershed project has provided a common focus for all.”

Each partner brings different skill sets to the PWP. These include urban and rural forest stewardship, fire risk reduction, landowner guidance and outreach, wetland and riparian restoration technical expertise, pollution prevention, public education and awareness, and permanent land protection. Together, these skill sets have enabled several collaborative projects. In 2001-2002, the group launched its flagship program, Growing Native, a watershed-wide educational and restoration event in which families work with foresters to collect native hardwood acorns and seeds. The seeds are sent to state nurseries and grown into seedlings for use in future restoration projects. The project is now sponsored by the Ford Motor Company and the PWP is talking about how it might spin-off this effort to other cities like Atlanta in urban-suburban watersheds. As another example, in June 2002, the Potomac Conservancy opened its Shenandoah Resource Center, and together with Ducks Unlimited and the Virginia Department of Forestry, the center is providing landowner services like finding resources for riparian and stream bank restoration, establishing rain gardens, and taking advantage of tax tools for permanent land protection.

Accomplishments cited in the Partnership’s 2002 Annual Report include restoring 265 riparian miles in 2002 (420 miles since its inception); installing nine rain gardens (13 in total); increasing the number of groups participating in its Growing Native program from 108 in its first year to 225 in its second; and establishing 16 baseline monitoring sites in year one and 13 in year two. In addition to tracking indicators to measure environmental impacts of their work, the Partnership is investing in research to answer questions like, ‘how do we know our riparian plantings are improving water quality?’ As suggested above, they have established 30 monitoring sites and are in the second year of monitoring with the expectation that by year three, they will be able to use the data gathered and extrapolate to make conclusions about the efficacy of riparian plantings for improving water quality.

The PWP has also fostered its progress by drawing on the expertise in watershed monitoring of many of its partners to target priority areas for protection and restoration. Dr. Anne Hairston-Strang and her colleagues in the Maryland Department of Natural Resources-Forest Service are collecting and analyzing information to inform decisions about where to focus restoration and protection efforts. The scientists are compiling a report summarizing existing knowledge on watershed condition, likely stress factors in the near future, and areas with the greatest potential for restoration or protection within the Upper and Lower Monocacy and Antietam watersheds, two of the Partnership’s three focus areas within the Potomac watershed. In their analysis, the scientists are using a combination of “lag indicators” like impervious surfaces, population density, point source pollution, and nonpoint source pollution, which measure existing conditions that reflect past pressures and “lead indicators” like projected loss of forest land, which may predict or cause future conditions in order to help predict where protection, prevention, or future restoration may be most effective.

 

This site was developed by the Ecosystem Management Initiative through a partnership with the US Forest Service and the US Department of Interior. Read more.