KENT — The state and the South Kent School will partner to study the water quality of Hatch Pond.
The Department of Energy and Environmental Protection has awarded a $80,000 grant to the independent school to study the water quality of the 71.5 acre pond off South Kent Road.
Chuck Lee III, an environmental analyst in the Lakes Management Division of DEEP, said this is the third grant the state has awarded for studying the health of the pond. The state maintains a boat launch on the southern end of the pond and it is a popular fishing area in both the summer and winter with ice fishing.
"This will help the school and help us with the monitoring of the water quality," Lee said. He said the funding is through a federal program of the Clean Water Act Section 319 non-point source pollution.
The school will be required to provide a 40 percent match of $53,000, but this may be partially provided as in-kind work.
The results of a study of water samples over an initial two-year period in 2004-06 and then a followup in 2010 were released in June by George Knoecklein of Northeast Aquatic Research. Knoeklin was hired by the Kent Land Trust, also through a state grant, to study the water quality.
Knoecklein discovered that the water quality has stabilized. However, it is not clear that is the water quality has stabilized. However, it is not clear that is actually improving because the former dairy farm operated by the Arno family at the northern end of the pond ceased operation several years ago.
The health of the pond has been in decline since the state began investigating the water quality in 1990. In 2004, Hatch Pond had been given the worst label of a pond, "highly eutrophic," which means it was filling in with sediment and water clarity was very poor.
Michael Benjamin is South Kent School's director of sustainability and teaches environmental science and ecology. He is leading the effort on this third phase of water quality monitoring of the pond.
Benjamin has already had his students at the independent high school out taking water samples. This new program will allow the science students to conduct water sampling with some of the same tools used by professionals.
Ponds naturally progress toward a "more eutrophic state," Benjamin said. But it usually takes 500 to 10,000 years for a pond to decline into a meadow or swamp. Residents of the area have seen Hatch Pond go downhill in the last 50 years.
"Hatch Pond had relatively clear water and not much growth around the perimeter," Benjamin said from what people have told him and others. "People could swim in it and they could boat all the way up to the bridge. Clearly it has been progressing much more rapidly than you'd expect in a natural circumstance."
The recent report indicates there may be hope for improvement.
"It seems like the pond is stabilizing and maybe showing some improvement in chemistry indicators," Benjamin said. "Very likely this is because there is no longer a farm with animal wastes getting into the water."
The question of whether the pond can be brought back is still to be determined. Benjamin finds it hopeful that the water quality has stabilized, rather than continuing to decline. However, he said measures are probably going to still be needed to make improvements.
"There is a rapid cycle of growth and decay in the summer and the oxygen content in the water can disappear. That can kill all the fish," he said. That has not happened yet, but it could with the right weather conditions in the summer, Benjamin said.
Benjamin and his students will study the water quality for the next two years and then a determination of the next step will happen. The data collected will help the DEEP determine what steps could be taken on the pond, Lee said.
↧