Brief Descriptions of Potential Stream Team Projects
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Protection and Restoration Projects
Fish Habitat Protection or Restoration: Fish require a variety of quality habitat types to thrive. Fish habitat in many Maine streams has been degraded because of human disturbances. Help protect or restore these areas to provide more suitable habitat areas for the fish in your stream. (Note: These activities would require MSTP consultation with the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife before any of these types of training could ever be offered.)
Litter-Pickup Days: All sorts of trash end up in your stream. This fouls the water and hides the beauty of your stream. Organize a litter pick-up to clean your stream and prevent further pollution. (Note: Not all types of debris in streams is bad. For example, trees, logs, branches, and leaves tath have fallen into streams can both be a source of food for some stream animals and help create habitat diversity in streams.)
Obtain Funding: Some projects might need some money to get stream projects done. Attend workshops that teach you where to look for and how to obtain funding.
Restore Degraded Stream Sites: Some reaches of streams are in definite need of repair because of human impacts to those areas. Some examples of stream habitat restoration include streamside buffer plantings, streambank stabilizations, and returning channelized (ditches, straightened channels, etc) reaches of stream to their natural shape to improve stability and ecological integrity.
Streamside Buffer Planting: Trees and shrubs adjacent to streams can help slow water runoff, stabilize streambanks, prevent soil erosion, cool stream water temperatures, and remove sediment, nutrient, pesticide, and pathogen pollution. They also are a source of food, nesting cover, and shelter for many wildlife (terrestrial and aquatic) species and they act as connecting corridors that enable wildlife to move safely from one habitat area to another. Organize a vegetation planting along the sides of your stream.
Trail / Greenway Development: Recreational trails or designated "greenways" help protect streams by preventing development of areas along the edges of streams. They provide opportunities for local residents to recreate outdoors and explore their local natural resources. Careful planning also may result in the establishment of streamside vegetation buffers that provide many benefits (see Streamside Buffer Planting).
Write a Watershed Management Plan: Work together with local citizens, town officials, and state and federal agencies to develop a plan than guides the short-term and long-term protection efforts for your stream, the organisms that live in your stream, and the watershed which drains into your stream.
- Education & Outreach - Monitoring - Survey -
