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Hurricane Irene’s effect on Vermont STREAM sites
Hypotheses Null
Chemical / Physical parameters unchanged Alternative
Total Phosphorus, E. coli, Total Suspended Solids, and Total Coliform will increase
Bank Full Width, Erosion, Embeddedness will increase Site Assessment and Habitat Assessment score will
decrease
•Total Phosphorus •E. coli •Total Suspended Solids •Total Coliform •Embeddedness •Site Assessment Score
Irene
Stream Information Site Name Catchment
Area (in Acres)
Percent Forestation
Percent Highly Erodible Soils
Stream Order
DR_BeavBrk_1524
4885.78 87% 78% 3rd
DR_NBDrfld_2067
607.2 97% 95.7% 4th
LCD_IndBrk_323
2950.07 56.3% 7.5% 3rd
LCD_PndBrk_179
2424.35 66.2% 26% 3rd
What did we look at? Chemical parameters
Total Phosphorus, E. coli, Total Suspended Solids, Total Coliform
Physical parameters Habitat Assessment, Site Assessment
Embeddedness & Bank Full Width
0
5
10
15
20
25
Embeddedness
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
DR_BeavBrk_1524 DR_NBDrfld_2067 LCD_IndBrk_323 LCD_PndBrk_179
Bank Full Width
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
DR_BeavBrk_1524 DR_NBDrfld_2067 LCD_IndBrk_323 LCD_PndBrk_179
Site Assessment Score
0
500
1000
1500
2000
2500
3000
T. Coliform - DR_BeavBrk_1524
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
T. Coliform - DR_NBDrfld_2067
0
500
1000
1500
2000
2500
3000
T. Coliform – LCD_IndBrk_323
0
500
1000
1500
2000
2500
3000
T. Coliform – LCD_PndBrk_179
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
E. Coli - DR_BeavBrk_1524
0
5
10
15
20
25
E. Coli - DR_NBDrfld_2067
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
E. Coli - LCD_IndBrk_323
0100200300400500600700800
E. Coli - LCD_PndBrk_179
0
5
10
15
20
25
Phosphorus - DR_BeavBrk_1524
0123456789
Phosphorus - DR_NBDrfld_2067
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
Phosphorus - LCD_IndBrk_323
0102030405060708090
Phosphorus - LCD_PndBrk_179
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14TSS - DR_BeavBrk_1524
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
TSS - DR_NBDrfld_2067
0123456789
10
TSS – LCD_IndBrk_323
05
101520253035404550
TSS - LCD_PndBrk_179
Results: No Clear Pattern Embeddedness: 3 out of 4 decrease Site Assessment Score: 3 out of 4 decrease Bank Full Width: 3 out of 4 increase Total Coliform: No clear difference E. coli: Similar patterns to previous year Phosphorus: No clear pattern TSS: 3 out of 4 decrease
Conclusion Small sample size – before/after data was only
available for 4 sites Chemical Parameters
Instantaneous “snapshot”
No clear conclusions can be made on the effect of Hurricane Irene on Vermont streams
Further Research Macro-Invertebrate
Count Diversity EPT
Wider range of data Long term effects Higher order streams
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