Plymouth-wide Testing in 2002 and 2003
On National Water Quality Monitoring Day in 2002 and 2003 volunteers took
bottle samples of water from some of the ponds in Plymouth.
The purpose of the sampling was to assess the condition of selected ponds
throughout the town. Analysis of the samples was funded by the Town of Plymouth.
The ponds sampled in this study are listed below.
|
Big
Sandy
|
Jenny
|
|
Billington Sea
|
Little
|
|
Bloody
|
Little
Herring
|
|
Boot
|
Little
Long
|
|
Gallows
|
Long
|
|
Great
Herring
|
Round
|
|
Great
South
|
Savery
|
|
Halfway
|
Triangle
|
|
Island
|
White
Island
|
|
Jakes
|
|
Note:
Nutrients - Phosphate
Six of the 19 ponds exceeded the 0.03mg/l eutrophic
threshold.
The highest, Billington Sea exceeded the critical
level by more than 7 times. The other 5 exceeded the eutrophic
level by an average of nearly 2.5 times.
Other parameters
Four of the 19 ponds stood out from the rest with regard to 7 parameters
which may be signs of road runoff problems. The ponds which stand out are Billington Sea,
Fresh Pond, Jenny Pond and Micajah Pond. The
parameters involved are Specific Conductance, Sodium, Calcium, Magnesium,
Hardness, Alkalinity and Chloride.
See Highway, Road and Driveway Runoff
section of this web site for a more comprehensive discussion of this pattern of
problems in the Six Ponds area. Also, note that all 4 of the ponds mentioned
above have higher levels of these 7 parameters than the worst of the ponds
where the pattern was identified.