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Cy Stober
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Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin Priority Watershed Atlas
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Pee Dee River |
The Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin is the second-largest river basin in North Carolina, covering twenty counties totaling 7,213 square miles and 5,946 linear river miles. The river basin covers a diverse landscape from Blue Ridge Mountain headwaters to the expansive Charlotte metropolitan area, crossing much of the Piedmont region and including parts of the unusual ecology of the sandy Uwharrie Mountains. The topography, geology, and land use throughout the Yadkin River basin are diverse, presenting a patchwork of land uses, aquatic habitats (including trout-sensitive waters), and urban growth, and challenging the development of a uniform management strategy. To view the full report, click here.
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Sixty-seven (67%) of all rivers and streams, and thirty-six percent (36%) of all lakes and reservoirs within the Yadkin River basin are listed as “impaired” by the NC Division of Water Quality (NC DWQ), meaning they fail to meet water quality standards established by the US Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) and the NC DWQ. Kerr Scott Reservoir, High Rock Lake, Tuckertown Reservoir, Badin Lake, Lake Tillery, and Blewett Falls Lake were all formed by dams erected on the Yadkin-Pee Dee River during the twentieth century. Dam construction and adjacent industrial use and land development fundamentally altered water quality and water use of the river, affecting hydrology and ecology historically found within the river basin. However, the Yadkin River is also known for its outstanding resource waters, primarily found in the Uwharrie National Forest in Montgomery County and the headwater tributaries of Wilkes and Surry Counties.
The NC DWQ Basinwide Planning Unit exhaustively reviews the water quality, land uses, and growth patterns within each river basin every five years, documenting river basin conditions and notable improvements or degradations. The last Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basinwide Assessment was published by NC DWQ in 2008. It is a synthesis of the best-available data characterizing the Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin, but offers little guidance in regard to basinwide water quality priorities, or developing a strategy to improve or protect water quality. There is a need for locally-informed and focused watershed plans reflecting the diversity present within the Yadkin-Pee Dee River basin in order to improve its impaired waters and protects its pristine waters.
This basinwide priorities assessment ranks the 232 watersheds within the North Carolina portion of the Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin both for their conservation potential and their stress vulnerability. A mega-regional planning partnership amongst the staffs of four Councils of Governments (COGs) predominantly occupying this river basin worked in concert to analyze the entire river basin and objectively rate its restoration and conservation needs based upon publicly-available data. Land use and land cover (LULC) and water quality data were used to predict stressful or relatively pristine watershed conditions throughout the river basin using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology. Details on the methods used to determine these priorities are available in the full Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin Priority Watersheds Atlas. Please contact your regional Council of Governments representative for a copy (Appendix A).
The Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin Priority Watershed Atlas features the top 10% most-stressed and best-conserved watersheds within the river basin. 46 watersheds are featured as priorities: twenty-three priority stress and twenty-three priority conservation watersheds, as determined by a GIS-based assessment of river basin conditions (Figure 1). These watersheds are profiled individually in the Atlas, and briefly described in terms of their area, land use, current water quality and ecological habitat conditions, and, any land use regulations that address the local water quality needs.
The four Councils of Governments involved in this project offer this Atlas to you as an opportunity for partnership, planning, and funding leverage to restore and protect our most valuable natural, recreational, and public resource – water. Immediate initiation of local watershed planning relying upon the US EPA’s Nine Elements of Local Watershed Planning and the Center for Watershed Protection’s research, literature, and watershed planning tools (i.e. the Codes and Ordinance Worksheet) is uniformly recommended for every priority watershed identified within this Atlas.
The goal of the Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin Priority Watersheds Atlas is intended as a bird’s-eye view of river basin conditions and give stakeholders guidance. It also a document intended for use in leveraging resources and funding from state, federal, and private entities to support concentrated watershed planning and implementation efforts. It should be used to make initial determinations regarding basinwide water quality priorities, but not as an accurate depiction of conditions on the ground – it is just a first step of recognizing our priorities.
Please contact your COG for more information on what you may do to most effectively address your priority watershed needs. To view the full report, please click here.
