THE NORTHEAST STREAM QUALITY ASSESSMENT

In 2016, the USGS National Water-Quality Assessment Program (NAWQA) will be assessing stream quality in the Northeastern United States. The goal of the Northeast Stream Quality Assessment (NESQA) is to evaluate the quality of streams in the region by characterizing multiple water-quality constituents that are potential stressors to aquatic life, and to evaluate the relation between these stressors and biological communities. Objectives are to determine the status of stream quality (contaminants, nutrients, toxicity, sediment, flow, habitat, ecological communities) across the region, evaluate relations between stressors and ecological condition at sampled locations, evaluate relations between environmental settings and both measured stressors and ecological condition, and develop regional models and management tools to make spatially-explicit predictions of stressors and ecological responses. NESQA is the fourth Regional Stream Quality Assessment to be conducted since 2013. Sampling will begin in June, 2016.

In total, 97 sites have been selected to span urban and agricultural gradients across the region. Each site is either gaged or will have a pressure transducer installed, and will have hourly water temperature recorded by a thermistor. Water samples, collected weekly four to nine times, will be analyzed for pesticides, pharmaceuticals, organic waste indicators, nutrients, mercury, suspended sediment, and other constituents. Time-integrating Polar Organic Integrated Samplers (POCIS) will be deployed at most sites. Benthic algal and macroinvertebrate community sampling, fish community surveys, habitat assessment, fish collection for mercury analysis, and bed sediment collection for contaminant analysis and toxicity testing will be conducted once at each site in August. Special studies (at selected sites) include automated pesticide sampling, continuous nutrient monitoring, passive suspended sediment sampling, bed sediment polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons studies, and fish mercury isotope analysis.

Findings will provide the public and policymakers with information regarding which human and environmental factors are the most critical in affecting stream quality and, thus, provide insights about possible approaches to protect or improve stream health across the region.