The Baltimore Ecosystem Study

The Baltimore Ecosystem Study. Gwynns Falls Trail. , Metropolitan Baltimore is a human-dominated ecological system. The Baltimore Ecosystem Study (BES), part of the National Science Foundation's Long-Term Ecological Research Network, conducts research to understand how this system changes over time. BES research is centered on the Gwynns Falls watershed, a 64 square mile drainage area with a variety of land uses ranging from Baltimore City's urban core, through older urban and suburban zones, to rapidly suburbanizing areas and a rural/suburban fringe., The Baltimore Ecosystem Study performs weekly stream sampling at several long-term study sites. This sampling network includes for longitudinal sites along the Gwynns Falls, one of which is located here. These sites provide data on the quality and quantity of water in different land use zones of the Gwynns Falls watershed: urban core, older suburban, rapidly suburbanizing and rural-suburban. Four additional sampling sites are in smaller watersheds in or near the Gwynns Falls. These sites provide more focused data on specific land use areas of forest, agricultural, rural-suburban and urban., The stream samples are analyzed for water chemistry: chloride (mostly from road salt); nitrate and total nitrogen (from fertilizers, sewage and air pollution); and phosphate and total phosphorus (from fertilizers and sewage). Other indicators of stream water quality such as sulfate temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, conductivity and turbidity are also tracked., Comparisons are made between the sites within the Gwynns Falls watershed and to reference sites outside the Gwynns Falls watershed. The resulting data have shown that biological processes that improve stream water quality are important, even in very urban areas of the City. These results indicate that efforts to improve and restore urban streams are likely to produce real improvements in water quality and stream ecosystem health. BES data are publicly available at http://beslter.org.