Photo Credit: Rick Darke

Do you hike, bike, or fish along the White Clay Creek and its tributaries? or enjoy its scenic vistas as you drive through Chester or New Castle County? The watershed is one of only a few relatively unspoiled river systems remaining in our highly congested region. To promote its long-term protection the White Clay Wild and Scenic Program conducted two outreach projects: homeowner backyard stewardship and watershed education for schools.

SMARTYARDS, a homeowner backyard stewardship project, was piloted in the Hills of Sullivan, just outside of Avondale, Pennsylvania and at the Fred S. Engle Middle School in Avon Grove, Pennsylvania, and the Shue-Medill Middle School in Newark, Delaware. SMARTYARDS motivates homeowners to become better watershed stewards by explaining how landscapes affect watershed health and providing plants, materials, and tools to create a landscape with positive watershed benefits. Tiring of the expense and hassle of mowing, fertilizing, and applying pesticides, more people are eager to convert a part of their lawn to an attractive landscape feature. These native trees, shrubs, wildflowers, and groundcovers help reduce stormwater runoff and water pollution, and require less water, fertilizer, pesticides, and maintenance than lawns or exotic plants. They also attract birds and butterflies. Individually SMARTYARDS are a visible reminder of the landscape's connection to the watershed; collectively they can make a difference. Funding for this project came from the National Park Service Partnership Wild and Scenic Rivers Program and the E. Kneale Dockstader Foundation; it was administered by the White Clay Creek Watershed Management Committee in partnership with the Watershed Stewardship program of the Delaware Nature Society.

The school outreach project consisted of classroom programs and a field trip for selected seventh grade classes from the Engle and Shue Schools. Students became better acquainted with the watershed's boundaries, characteristics, and ecology and investigated the creek's water quality using water-testing kits. The highlight of the program was a trip to the protected headwaters of the East Branch at Stroud Water Research Center above Avondale. The field studies program was free of charge thanks to support of the National Park Service Partnership Wild and Scenic Rivers Program and the Chichester du Pont Foundation and was being administered by the White Clay Creek Watershed Management Committee in partnership with the Stroud Water Research Center.

SMARTYARDS and the school outreach program further the goals of the White Clay Wild and Scenic River's Watershed Management Plan (and Chester County's Watersheds) to balance human activities with the preservation of the watershed resources. LOOK for further news about other White Clay Creek Wild and Scenic Program projects and plan to visit the public demonstration SMARTYARDS at the Fred S. Engle and Shue-Medill Middle Schools.