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Delaware River Watershed Initiative

750 971 Stroud Water Research Center

Since 2016, Stroud Water Research Center has been a part the Delaware River Watershed Initiative (DRWI), a groundbreaking, multi-year project to monitor, protect, and restore critical freshwater sources for 15 million people from New York to the mouth of the Delaware Bay. The Stroud Center helps guide community science volunteer monitoring of water quality in eight regional subwatersheds in the Delaware River basin.

Deforestation and runoff from farms, cities, and suburbs threatens the health of the Delaware River watershed. With funding from the William Penn Foundation, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, the Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection, USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, and others, the Stroud Center’s Robin L. Vannote Watershed Restoration Program is helping Berks and Chester County farmers implement pollution reduction practices and riparian forested buffers.

The wide-ranging initiative features eight ecologically significant “sub-watershed clusters” — about 25 percent of the total Delaware River Basin — across four states. Of these, the Stroud Center is collaborating with over 14 organizations in the Brandywine-Christina, Middle Schuylkill and Schuylkill Highlands cluster groups. As this effort progresses, we will be using a variety of techniques to measure the ecological responses to these restoration efforts.

DRWI News

Rachel Johnson and Dave Arscott at the Watershed Heroes event.
Stronger Together: A Nonprofit Partnership Raises Road Salt Awareness
Stroud Water Research Center is honored to have received the Watershed Heroes Nonprofit Steward award from Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed Partnership.
Entomologists collect freshwater insects for a project that examines the impact of streamside restoration on water quality.
Breaking the Fall
How the Clean Water Act changed the trajectory of America’s waterways and became a beacon for freshwater science.
River with riparian forest
Protecting Forests, Clean Water Amid Changing Remote-Work Landscape
To make the case for preserving open space amid the demand for new development, it’s important to measure impact. Now scientists are doing just that.
A deicer truck spreading brine on an Oregon highway.
The Trouble With Road Salt
Take a look at the effects of road salt on our streams and rivers and learn how volunteers and organizations are working to monitor what’s happening to their freshwater resources.
Map showing forested stream buffers in the west branch of Red Clay Creek with a photo overlay of brook trout fingerlings.
Landowners Partner With Stroud Center on Stream Restoration Across Watershed
Something wonderful is happening on the west branch of Red Clay Creek. It is getting its trees back — and perhaps its native brook trout, too.
Bud Miller with his young riparian buffer, showing abundant growth of trees and wildflowers.
A Family’s Restoration Adventure, Four Years In
In 2017, Bud and Marilyn Miller were the proud overseers of a new riparian buffer. Since then, a beautiful transformation has unfolded on their property.

DRWI Projects and Publications