Stream Assessment Shows Improvements in Red Clay Creek Water Quality
July 2025
For decades the Brandywine Red Clay Alliance (BRC) has strategically implemented projects on both public and private land to improve the water quality in the Red Clay Creek, and a recent study showed that those projects have paid off and resulted in some measurable benefits.
In 2010 BRC (then called the Red Clay Valley Association) partnered with Clauser Environmental, LLC to complete a watershed assessment and restoration plan of the Upper East Branch of the Red Clay Creek. As part of the study, they sampled water quality in 2010 before restoration projects were implemented at five sites and found that the number and diversity of macroinvertebrates (insects whose presence indicates good water quality and a healthy food chain) was low, and habitat conditions were poor across the sites.
Since then, BRC has completed seven restoration projects on 2.2 miles of the Upper East Branch Red Clay Creek. These projects included: streambank restoration, in-stream erosion controls, riparian buffer tree plantings and agricultural best management practices to prevent manure run-off to the stream. In 2025 BRC worked with the same environmental firm to replicate the 2010 study to analyze the water quality to see if water quality had improved.
The study found that the stream restoration projects contributed to the improvement of the health of the macroinvertebrate community and habitat quality of the streams. Although all of the stream segments studied remain categorized as "impaired" by the PA Department of Environmental Protection, all five of these sites showed significant improvement in habitat quality as well as the diversity of the macroinvertebrate community. Two projects were completed in the fall of 2024 and winter of 2025, so continued water quality improvements are expected.
What's next for the Brandywine Red Clay Alliance? Replicating the stream restoration practices in the Lower West Branch Red Clay Creek and Pocopson Creek Watersheds where BRC has recently completed watershed assessments and restoration plans.