Rushing Rivers Blog

Members of the Rushing Rivers Institute have recently returned from teaching a five day course on SimStream and the MesoHABSIM approach at the College of Engineering: Montes which is part of the Universidad Politecnica de Madrid, Spain. The course drew a dozen participants from Austria, Poland, England and Spain. The schedule included courses on MesoHABSIM theory, fieldwork approach (in the Manzanares River upstream of Madrid center), and computer training using our SimStream software. This was our first course offered in Europe and its success along with enthusiastic networking may lead to additional courses throughout Europe in the future. You can review the course evaluation below and make sure to check out the slideshow.
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EVALUATION

Were the instructors easy to understand?

- The instructors were easy to understand.

- Yes. They were pretty focusing on the lack of non-native English speakers.

- Yes, all presentations were easy to follow.

- For me, yes. Perhaps they assumed that everybody knows some technical words, that some people don’t know.

- Yes, they were. Everything was clear, even for Spaniards!!

- Yes, and it became easier everyday (it was a long time without talking any English). They made the MesoHABSIM look easier than it really is, I think.

- Yes they were, but I had some problems with the American accent.

- The instructors were easy to understand.

- Yes, sometimes I had little problems with the some words (language barrier). Generally, I understood everything.

- They both have a quite good English level J , they were absolutely clear.

Was the material presented in an organized and easey to comprehend manner?

- Sometimes I was a little confused because the practice was before the theory, but I know it was because of the lab computer availability.

- Yes

- Good structure to the course and computer class timing problems were easily handled.

- Yes

- Yes, it was tidy and on time.

- I didn’t read all the material you gave out, but I think it will be useful as a complete userguide of Simstream software.

- I think so, but sometimes it was presented in a confusing order (not chronological).

- Yes, it was presented in a very logical way from easier to more complex with several helpful revisions.

- Yes

- Yes, it was nice to have short summaries of the process from time to time.

Did the visuals in the powerpoint effectively contribute to the lecture?

- Yes, the visuals contributed a lot to the lecture.

- The slides were easy to follow along with the content, but sometimes presented too fast.

- Mostly very clear on the screen, but often blurred in hand out by the colored background.

- Yes

- Yes they did

- Yes, but it was hard to take notes, listen to you, and understand the course points at the same time (language problems I guess).

- Yes they did, although I think it would be a good idea to develop more text for explanation.

- Yes, but the paper copies were not very good quality.

- Yes

- Of course, but the printed ones were too small.

Was too much or too little time devoted to each topic?

- Most of the time it was enough, not too much, not too little.

- For me, the logistic regression tool was presented too little, but this is very subjective!

- First session on reconstructing physical templates and the time series was maybe too fast.

- It’s correct

- Except for the UCUT curves (maybe a little more time to better understand would have been needed), the rest of the topics were presented in a good rhythm.

- For one week you spent the right time for each issue, but I think more time is needed to understand the whole process.

- I think too little, but it’s normal because the course was just a week.

- The time was necessary.

- I think there was too little time for modeling and the computer process.

- Maybe for the last part of the process a little more time would have been necessary.

Other Comments:

- Great course all in all

- A very good course and very interesting tool, and all technical problems were handled well.

- The best way to understand the last part of the process (UCUT curves, ACTograms, interpretation) is to work on it. It would be good to invest more time in analyzing and interpreting different cases.

- I liked the course.

- Just wanted to thank you a lot for teaching us a completely new view of the process of evaluating river habitat (at least for me), and I hope to be able to develop it, or something similar in the future.

- I think it would have to be more practical and less theoretical. Doing the whole process is the better way to understand everything.

- It was great to have you in Spain!

Overall impression of the course: rate between 1 (confused and disappointed) and 5 (good understanding and enjoyed the course)

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1)      Fort River Canoe Trip.

You are cordially invited on Saturday May 10, 2008 to join Rushing Rivers Institute on a canoe trip to the mouth of the Fort River. In collaboration with the Ocean River Institute, Mass Riverways, Berkshire Environmental Action Team, the Hitchcock Center for the Environment, and the Kestrel Trust, Rushing Rivers Institute is sponsoring the trip to draw attention to the Fort River and to showcase its ideal location as a research, education, and monitoring center. The trip will begin at Kiwanis Park in Amherst at 10:00 AM, and will continue until reaching Groff Park. Here we will have a break from 12:00-2:00 PM for lunch and a short presentation by Rushing Rivers’ staff. After lunch, participants can choose to leave or continue on to the mouth of the river which we should reach by 6:00 PM. Lunch and transportation back to Kiwanis Park to pick up your vehicles will be provided. Some canoes are available on a first come first serve basis. Please RSVP, and send questions to canoe4t@rushingrivers.org by May 1

2)      MesoHABSIM signed into water quality standard in New Hampshire

The habitat simulation model MesoHABSIM developed by our scientists and promoted by Rushing Rivers Institute became a tool for the development of water quality standards in New Hampshire. Our model was applied to establish Protected Instream Flows on the Souhegan River, which were recently signed into law by the commissioner (http://www.des.state.nh.us/rivers/instream/souhegan/documents/pisf_signed.pdf ). The second application on the Lamprey River is underway.

3)      MesoHABSIM course in Ottawa

The MesoHABSIM summary course has been approved by American Fisheries Society as a continuous education course offered during the annual meeting of the Society in Ottawa on August 15 and 16^th. This will be a two day course. The registration should be available soon through the symposium web page http://www.fisheries.org/afs08/index.html.

Meanwhile, Joe and I are up for Spain. Hola!

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1) Rushing Rivers Institute is opening a new office in Cambridge.

We are opening a new office on 12 Elliot Street in Cambridge, MA (just a few blocks from Harvard Square). The purpose is for us to get more actively involved in river activities in Eastern Mass. We will share the office with Ocean Rivers Institute and collaborate on providing scientific support to non-profits, resource agencies and legislators on issues involving river and ocean management. We would like to form a research network that will offer advice and information to the people who may need it for better decision making.

2) Fort River Canoe Trip

Mark your calendar, please! On Saturday May 10^th, 2008, we are organizing a canoe trip on the Fort River to draw attention to this wonderful resource. The Fort River, flowing through the Towns of Hadley and Amherst, is the longest un-dammed tributary of the Connecticut River in Massachusetts. With heavily forested uplands, and a relatively high degree of land protection in the watershed, water quality is sufficiently good that the Fort provides core habitat for native fish (including species of special concern such as bridle shiner), invertebrates such as the federally listed endangered dwarf wedgemussel, and at least four other state-listed mussels species. However, last year we observed very low flows and high phosphorus levels. The event will focus on the Fort River Monitoring, Research and Education Site that is planned as a collaborative effort between Rushing Rivers, scientists from UMass, Mt. Holyoke, Hampshire, Amherst and Smith Colleges and other local organizations.

3) MesoHABSIM courses

This is the last chance to register for the spring session of MesoHABSIM classes which start on March 12^th, 2008 (http://www.rushingrivers.org/Courses/Courses.htm).
This session is purposely organized in three 2-day blocks (March 12^th, April 2^nd and June 6^th) to serve local professionals, non-profit employees, and students who can not afford missing an entire week from the office. Like last year, we are offering a non-profit discount. Please contact MesoHABSIM@RushingRivers.org for details.

With best wishes,

Piotr

The January issue of science magazine has an excellent article documenting profound impact of milldams on the shape and status of east coast, piedmont streams. The paper may cause rewriting many river restoration manuals. The article confirms with solid evidence what has been already suspected;  that human footprint in early industrial times was very dramatic and we need to remember about it in planning for the future. This work underscores the need for a comprehensive model of natural reference conditions (including historical data) as a first requirement for any river restoration or management action.  To understand what we need to do we have to look back far beyond 20th century. Although some generalizations by the authors, such as for example projected morphology of pre-colonial rivers may be arguable, I believe that  the paper will have a profound effect on river management worldwide.  It should be read by anyone working on river conservation and restoration.

Kudos to the authors!

Link to the abstract is below.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/319/5861/299
Piotr

Dear Friends of Rushing Rivers,

Last week was the first anniversary of the inauguration of the Rushing Rivers Institute. It is a good moment to reflect on where we are now and summarize the accomplishments of this first year. The creation of Rushing Rivers Institute was received with great enthusiasm and we were strongly encouraged by many local environmentalist and resource management groups. Some, like Eleanor Tillinghast, Rob Moir or Kirt Mayland actively helped us to establish an advisory board and get a small initial funding.

This year was dedicated to establishing institutional and funding framework for the Institute. Following has been accomplished:

1. In May, Rushing Rivers Institute received fiscal sponsorship though the Third Sector New England and thereby became a non-profit organization.
2. With help of my teenage son Christian, we established our web presence. Rushing Rivers Institute website is listed on the top of the search engines and has over 2000 visits a month.
3. With help of Hampshire College students, two promotional short movies have been prepared and posted on the webpage.
4. Promotional materials such as brochures and T-shirts have also been produced and widely distributed.
5. With the help of the Massachusetts Ocean Coalition we co-organized “Rivers to the Sea”, an informational event in Boston and participated in Massachusetts Ocean Day in the State House.
6. We took the opportunity to visit with our local State representatives and senators as well as with congressmen John Olver, and informed them about Rushing Rivers and requested support for our projects.
7. We prepared and delivered two position papers to Massachusetts Water and Stream Flow Policy.
8. Currently 5 undergraduate students (Umass and Hampshire) and one graduate student (UMass), one volunteer and 2 part-time staff are involved in the activities of the Rushing Rivers Institute.
9. The number of researchers registered as associates of Rushing Rivers raised from 3 to 8, broadening the pool of our expertise and credentials.
10. Two research projects on the Fort River in Amherst have been conducted with the help of volunteers and student interns. As a result we documented unexpected phosphorus pollution and tested scientific instruments.
11. Fort River research collaborative including scientists from UMass, Hampshire, Mt. Holyoke, Smith and Amherst Colleges has been established and UMass scientists are currently getting ready to install underwater cameras in early summer.
12. Local newspapers reported three times on the activities of Rushing Rivers and we established a great working relationship with the Town of Amherst. Together, we are planning to initiate Fort and Mill River Watershed Coalition and sponsor the Fort River Festival in 2008.
13. Rushing Rivers Institute taught four MesoHABSIM courses in Amherst and held a half-day workshop at the American Fisheries Society symposium in San Francisco. The course participants came to Amherst not only from Massachusetts, but also from Texas, Colorado and Missouri. Five courses and three workshops at conferences are planned for 2008.
14. We contracted two research projects to continue our work on the Lamprey River in New Hampshire and prepared 13 proposals for funding from foundations, state and federal agencies. Eleven proposals were submitted and 4 of those are still pending. Four project proposals and three collaborative research papers are currently in preparation, to be submitted this spring.
15. We prepared four project proposals that were posted in November with the Social Markets. No substantial funding has been received so far.

I am very thankful to everyone who helped us in any way. We started out with very limited resources, nothing but our knowledge and volunteerism. We have shown that we can accomplish a lot with very little and our service is important and valuable for society. We can do much, much more and offer great returns but, like in everything, our progress needs a solid foundation of resources. Please spread the word about the needs of projects posted on Social Markets (listings.socialmarkets.org), or maybe even consider donating directly to Rushing Rivers (www.RushiongRivers.org/Support/Support.htm).

Even the smallest contributions count. With the help of conscientious individuals, we can make a difference in protecting and restoring fisheries habitats to as close to natural conditions as possible.

With all best wishes.

Piotr

Here are two news stories on the catastrophe in New York over the Hinckley Reservior:

News 10 Now Story

New York Government Press Release

And here is a story on the water shortage crisis around the country:

The Times and Government Story

1) First news related to severe drought in New England. I realized that it started to rain some, however my fear is that the catastrophic drought duration during late summer and early fall may have created a damage to the fauna of our rivers and streams. Please check out our webpage for Habitat Meter from the Pomperaug River and comments. We are hoping to find funding for next year to investigate that.

We tried to publicize the drought-duration message and had quite a success. The information included in our recent press release made the front page of our local Hampshire Gazette, inspired Hartford Courant journalist to write a piece about the drought and, with the strong push from Pomperaug River Watershed Coalition, was included in series of articles as well as TV interviews in Waterbury, CT . A nice contrast to the national media reports on drought, which focus more on the availability of water for humans rather than on damages to the inhabitants of rivers and streams. I hope that we made a small dent and will succeed over time to draw more attention to fish et al. They are first to suffer and by this means do us great service of providing warning signals. Would we only listen.

2) Rushing Rivers has been selected as an environmental program promoted by the Social Markets http://socialmarkets.org/.

This new organization aims to provide quantifiable returns to donors by capturing the social value of non-profit actions. Within a week or two our project proposals will be available on-line (including social returns such as reduction of project costs or number of course participants) for on-line bids. We propose development of sensor network and field lab on the Fort River, free training courses for non-profits, development of Sim-stream software and film projects. This Friday evening (around 6 pm) NPR will air on Marketplace an interview with the people who started Social Markets. This is promising to be next U-Tube.

3) The next MesoHABSIM course will be offered at Madrid Polytechnic in December 10-14. With this we hope to share our model with colleagues in Europe.

4) You can view a short video from our field course in Amherst offered last spring on our web page. It is still under development and updated version will be uploaded soon.

http://www.rushingrivers.org/Courses/mesoHABSIMfilm.html

More courses will be offered in Amherst in spring (in two day blocks: March 12-13, 26-27 and June 5-6) and next summer. Info on will be posted soon our web page.