Breton Bay Stream
Corridor Assessment Survey


The first step in developing a Restoration Action Strategy for the Breton Bay Watershed is to do an overall assessment of the condition of the watershed and the streams within it. This initial step is being accomplished using two approaches. First, a watershed characterization is done to compile and analyze existing water quality, land use, and living resources data about the Breton Bay Watershed. While the watershed characterization provides good overall information on environmental conditions within the Breton Bay Watershed, for the most part, information on the location of specific environmental problems is limited. To provide specific information on the location of environmental problems and restoration opportunities, a synoptic water quality survey and a Stream Corridor Assessment (SCA) survey of the Breton Bay Watershed were also done. The synoptic survey was done in the spring of 2002 and results of the survey can be found at http://www.dnr.state.md.us/watersheds/surf/proj/wras.html.

The Stream Corridor Assessment survey is a new survey that has been developed by DNR’s Watershed Restoration Division as a watershed management tool to identify environmental problems and helps prioritize restoration opportunities on a watershed basis. As part of the survey, specially trained personnel walk the watershed’s entire stream network and record information on a variety of environmental problems that can be easily observed within the stream corridor. Field surveys were done from April 2002 through September 2002.

Note: (Documents are in PDF format and require Adobe Acrobat Reader which can be downloaded free from http://www.adobe.com)