News Release
Date: December 1, 2005Contact: Sarah Phillips
City of Lake Forest Park 206/368-5440
Update on the State of Our Streams (part one)
You may have seen them early on a Saturday morning, a collection of folks of all ages outfitted in boots or waders gathering on the lower level of the mall near the library. Lake Forest Park StreamKeepers is a group of 20-30 volunteers, co-led by Don Fiene and Mark Phillips, who work with the City to monitor the quality of our two streams – Lyon and McAleer Creeks. What they found this year is: there’s good news and not such good news.
Four times a year the Stream- Keepers measure 12 locations for basic chemical/environmental characteristics necessary for fish and other stream life. They measure dissolved oxygen, pH (acidity), temperature, and turbidity. The results for 2005 were again in the good to excellent range, as they have been generally, since testing began over 10 years ago. This is the good news.
In 2005, StreamKeepers worked with the City to initiate a new program to measure fecal coliform (FC) levels. FC is a bacteria associated with feces from warmblooded animals. StreamKeepers collected water samples on McAleer and Lyon Creeks in April and September. Unfortunately, when Everett Environmental Lab analyzed the samples, they found levels consistently higher than the standard level established by Washington State for streams like ours. In addition, there were two incidents of Mountlake Terrace sewer system malfunctions during the year that resulted in high spikes of fecal coliform levels in Lyon Creek.
The September testing—two weeks after the second Mountlake Terrace sewer incident—showed some FC levels on Lyon Creek that were 4 – 5 times higher than State standards. The fecal coliform levels we have do not seem to impair fish or other stream inhabitants, but people should avoid direct contact with stream water.
Please visit the StreamKeepers’ website at www.lfp streamkeepers.org for more information about stream status and test results. A future Town Crier will include Part 2 of this report that will cover the most important and telling indicator of stream health – the biological “profile” - based upon the kinds of small animals (insects, worms, mollusks, etc.) that actually live in the streambeds. Part 2 will explain the new “BIBI” testing procedure and what the results say about the quality of our streams.
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Documents on this page may require Adobe Acrobat® reader, which is available without charge by selecting the icon on the left. CITY OF LAKE FOREST PARK
City Hall 17425 Ballinger Way NE
Lake Forest Park, WA 98155
206 368-5440, FAX 206 364-6521
E-mail: cityhall@ci.lake-forest-park.wa.us
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