Newsletter Index
(16KB, PDF file) If you're interested in any articles in the index, just email us and we'll try
to send you a hard copy of the article.
Back to top
Research Reports
Potomac Headwaters Stream Flow Restoration Project. 2007 VA/WV Water
Research Symposium paper is
here.
The Effects of Pollution Reduction on a Wild Trout Stream.
2007 VA/WV Water Research Symposium paper is
here.
Learning From Life on the Bottom:
Streambed creatures provide clues to the Cacapon's health. An
addendum to Portrait of a River: The Ecological Baseline of the Cacapon River.
Cacapon Volume 8 No. 2 (163 KB, PDF)
Portrait of a
River: The Ecological Baseline of the Cacapon River (2.5 mb,
PDF)
Petite Beef by
Headwater Farms: Marketing Beef Using a Land Stewardship and Clean Water
Label. Neil Gillies. Presented at the Missouri
Forage and Grassland Council 2001 Annual Conference on November 6, 2001
(47 KB, PDF)
Final Report to the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service on Water Quality Studies in the Cacapon River’s Lost
and North River Watersheds in West Virginia. June 18, 2002 (130 KB, PDF)
A Comparison of Professional and Volunteer
Methods for Assessing Stream Health, Including Discussion of an Improved
Volunteer Method. Click here for a summary
version in html format.
Water Quality Studies in a Watershed Dominated by Integrated Poultry
Agriculture. W. Neil Gillies. PROCEEDINGS, NONPOINT
SOURCE "The Hidden Challenge," West Virginia NPS Conference October 1,
2, 3, 1998 (69 KB, PDF)
Cacapon River Monitoring Study 1999 State of the River Summary
Tables and Graphs (See March 2000 newsletter for State of the River
Report).
Land Use and Water Quality at three
sites in the Lost River Watershed-Short Summary (13 KB, PDF file)
Summary Report
on Water Quality Studies in the Lost River, North River and South Branch of the
Potomac River Watersheds of West Virginia-June 1999. (139KB,
PDF)
Introduction: Poultry production in the Potomac
Headwaters region of WV has more than doubled since the early 1990s. The
waste byproducts of this industry are typically land applied and concerns over
potential water quality impacts are widespread. The purpose of this
interim report is to provide an overview of data from Cacapon Institute's
multiyear study of land use influences on nutrient and bacteria concentrations
in the Lost, North and South Branch of the Potomac river watersheds, three West
Virginia basins with varying densities of integrated poultry agriculture.
Report
on Results of Well Water Testing in the Cacapon Watershed (8
KB, PDF file)
Back to top
Science and Society
Cacapon Institute recently initiated a series of papers with
the goal of "seeking a more definitive understanding of water quality
issues in the Potomac watershed." We are interested in your thoughts or
comments. Email us at pcrel@mountain.net.
With your permission, we would like to share your responses with our readers
1. The first paper in the series is "Farmer Participation in
Riparian Buffer Zone Programs." Well vegetated riparian zones, the
strip of land bordering rivers, can trap a large proportion of bacteria,
nutrients ands sediment that might otherwise flow into rivers from agricultural
lands. Outreach Coordinator Peter Maille interviewed eight farmers
and five extension/conservation professionals to determine the strengths and
weaknesses of government programs that support riparian zone conservation on
farms in the Potomac Headwaters. For results, some discussion and a
"modest" proposal, Click
Here (33 KB, PDF file).
2. "A Comparison of Professional and Volunteer
Methods for Assessing Stream Health, Including Discussion of an Improved
Volunteer Method". In recent years, the science of using animals to
assess stream health has gone public. The Izaak Walton League's Save Our Streams
(SOS) program and other volunteer methods are similar in general design to the
methods used by professional biologists, but tailored to the capabilities of
non-professionals. Cacapon Institute compared results from WV’s volunteer SOS
monitoring and the more scientifically rigorous stream assessment methods used
by WV’s Division of Environmental Protection. We found that SOS Stream Scores
as currently calculated often overestimate the health of a stream in comparison
to professional assessments. We propose a modified volunteer method that
generates results that compare favorably to professional assessments, and
utilizes the same collection technique and the same level of identification
skill currently required of SOS volunteers. To learn more, Click
Here (100 KB, PDF file).
3. Understanding
Science. Pick up the morning newspaper these days and you
are likely to come across phrases like “the research does not prove a
cause-and-effect relationship...just an association.” Such language
might sound like it was lifted directly from a scientific journal. Increasingly,
however, technical jargon is becoming routine. But, while the topics touch us
all, we do not always understand ideas like "degree of scientific
certainty," or the difference between "cause-and-effect
relationship" and "association." Luckily, one need not be a
scientist. Click here for a few tips you can use to make sense of science-based
discussions and for a characteristic set of objections often used to obscure a
debate on "just the facts."
4.
The
Future of Our Rivers:
Interviews with selected
decision-makers and stakeholders.
How will the coming years change
our rivers? This question is at the
intersection of economic development and environmental conservation.
In “The Environmental Costs of Economic Growth” Professor Barry
Commoner says, “This is a complex issue …,
it therefore suffers somewhat from a high ratio of concern to fact.
In addition, the issue is one which happens not to coincide with the
domain of an established academic discipline.”
The question is also open to a dynamic stakeholder debate with unforeseen
issues surely coming to bear.
How to shed light on such a fluid
question? Our answer is “The
Future of Our Rivers.” This
interview series presents the opinions of people on questions like “How will
our rivers fare over the next 20 years?” “What ought to be done to protect
our rivers?” and “Are you optimistic?”
We think that these opinions represent the personal reality of the
interviewees, and that conservation depends on a real appreciation of different
perspectives.
To read the interviews we have collected thus far, or to answer the same set
of questions and add your viewpoints to this discussion, click
here.
Back to top
Readings in Sustainable
Agriculture
In
November 2001,
Cacapon Institute gave a presentation on Marketing
Beef Using a Land Stewardship and Clean Water Label at
the Missouri
Forage and Grassland Council 2001 Annual Conference.
We're pleased to offer the following essays on issues concerning sustainable
agriculture. These provide background information on the need for programs
such as Petite
Beef by Headwater Farms and on the societal choices that must be made if the
small farm producing high quality food is to survive. Cacapon Institute is involved in
these issues because they advance our goal to help move this
region's agriculture into a model that will provide farmers a better livelihood,
conserve the rural aspect of our community and protect our streams.
We find the following essays by Dr.
John Ikerd, Professor Emeritus
of Agricultural Economics, University of Missouri, Columbia to be particularly
well-reasoned and well-written.
SUSTAINABLE
AGRICULTURE AS A RURAL ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY
Sustainable rural development must conserve non-renewable resources, protect
the physical and social environment, provide an acceptable level of economic
returns, and enhance the quality of life of those who work and live in rural
communities
. Sustainable agriculture may help
reverse past rural population trends by supporting more, rather than fewer,
people in rural communities.
THE
ROLE OF MARKETING IN SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE
Sustainable systems also need to be market specific. Unique sets of
production resources, both natural and human, need to be matched with unique
groups of consumers -- unique markets -- if systems are to be sustainable...Differentiation
creates a more or less unique market for a product, taking it out of direct
competition with other products. The greater the differentiation, the greater
the potential for profits...Tailoring products to desires of specific customers
is replacing low price as the source of value.
SOCIAL,
ECONOMIC, AND CULTURAL IMPACTS OF LARGE-SCALE, CONFINEMENT ANIMAL FEEDING
OPERATIONS (CAFOS) ON RURAL COMMUNITIES.
More
papers by Dr. Ikerd
Back to top
