Mahler Park's Neuwaukum Creek Needs Soil Improvement, Water Quality Healthy, Students Find

For every 300 feet of creek, there needs to be 100 pieces of wood debris in order to sustain a healthy ecosystem and vibrant aquatic life.

Students from , in their presentation to the Enumclaw Park Board Thursday night about their inventory findings on the largely undeveloped Mahler Park, threaded that insight across all of their areas of expertise including soil, water quality, plant life and wildlife.

It came from stream biologist Martin Fox of the Muckleshoot Tribe who has helped guide the five middle schoolers in their project to learn about the ecosystem of Mahler Park and Neuwaukum Creek and then come up with a plan to develop the park.

The project, according to teacher Marie Riley, originated from conversations with Enumclaw Mayor Liz Reynolds and community development director Erika Shook when school administrators approached the city seeking a long-term project for its students.

As Shook reviewed the environmental studies material the students had already mastered, she suggested they propose concepts for the development of Mahler Park. (.) She has become an advisor of sorts for the project and suggested the students in this first phase (of three), take inventory of the park's wildlife, plant life, water and geology.

Wood in Water

Wood, be it in the form of branches, twigs or fallen trees, when sitting in the creek forms a lattice structure that serves as habitat for a variety of the wildlife and aquatic life in Neuwaukum Creek, the students said.

The wood helps to increase the level of nitrogen in the water, which is important for salmon life, said Shelby Porter, who focused on water quality in her studies.

Jose Garcia said in his studies of the wildlife in the park, the number of salmon redds have been decreasing and advocated increasing salmon spawning in the creek.

Garcia also shared what he learned about carbon dioxide levels in the water and how it affects the aquatic life: at 30 mg/L of carbon dioxide, most fish would be killed, including salmon. At levels greater than 50 mg/L, trout eggs won't hatch, further throwing the ecosystem off kilter. There are salmon, trout and salamanders that live in the creek, he said.

Healthy, But Could Use Improvement

Clint Larrea, who presented his inventory findings on the geology of the park, told the board while the pH levels of the soil in the park was all right (6.5 was the optimum pH for maximum nutrient content), the soil was in bad condition.

There weren't enough nutrients in the soil, he said, identifying nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus as needing remediation.

Porter supported her classmate's assertion that things were OK. The creek is healthy but could use improvement, she said.

She told the board that she had identified macroinvertebrates, organisms that live in the water and found that they were in a category known as non-tolerant, meaning they didn't tolerate toxins. This means the water is healthy, she said. If the organisms found were tolerant of toxins, the creek would likely be polluted at some level.

In answering public works director Chris Searcy's question about how often she tests the water, she said she tests it every time she visits the park, which Riley says is about once a week.

When the creek is at low flow later in the year, it'll be easier for Porter to get in the water and do her studies, Riley said.

Porter found that the optimum pH level for the creek water was between 6 and 8 to support its aquatic life. The optimal dissolved oxygen level was between 6 and 12 mg/L and the best temperature range to support the water life was between 50 and 60 degrees.

In looking forward to development, Porter said she wouldn't develop in the buffer zone along the creek and, as stated above, increase the wood content in the water.

She'd also remove invasive species choking native growth.

English Ivy Tops Invasive Plants List

Clara Gerken, who compiled the plant inventory, identified the Himalayan blackberry, reed canary grass and English ivy as the three invasive plant species in the park. The blackberry was allelopathic, meaning it secreted chemicals that were toxic to native plants. Gerken also found that the ivy, which chokes nutrients from the trees it grow on, grew the fastest of both invasive and native species.

Those natives are the red alder, the western red cedar and Douglas fir trees, Gerken said. The red alder can extract nitrogen from the atmosphere to support plant life while conifer trees help provide shade for fish.

Fallen or dead trees, known as snags, also provide food and shelter for the various wildlife in the park, so Gerken said she advocated building a trail system that keeps pedestrians away from the fragile ecosystem while given them access to the park. Additional signage could also be erected to educate the public about the importance of this environment, she said.

The fifth student, Atticus Chous, couldn't make the presentation but was pre-filmed in a video clip, demonstrating a river model he and Larrea had built to simulate stream flow in order to study the effects of sediment flow and erosion.

Sediment builds up in wider sections of the creek, he said. The creek is sensitive to the seasons, flooding and changes with sediment build-up. Building and using the model has been "a helpful and enjoyable experience," he said in the video.

Just Getting Started

Riley said that though the project timeline as it stands right now consists of three phases -- developing goals for Mahler Park and then developing park site plans being the next two phases -- school administrators hope there'll be "lots more after these three phases."

The idea is to allow these students to continue to own their respective areas of study while introducing next year's sixth graders to the project and keeping it afloat for perhaps several years.

"We've really just immersed ourselves into the process," Riley said.

Board chairman Tom Hassenhauer congratulated the students, "It's pretty remarkable the amount of work that went into this."

The students' professional presentations didn't surprise Cedar River Academy founder Roger Franklin, however. "I think they did really really well. I can't imagine most 11- and 12-year olds can muster the courage that they did to present in front of an audience like that. They were confident, self-assured and I'm very proud of them."

Their ownership of the project and their areas of study in particular made an impression. Hassenhauer said that there is a disconnect in society today when the citizens don't feel ownership of their town and subsequently don't care and don't vote. Cautioning the students against this type of apathy, he said, "You have to have ownership of the place that you live. Nicely done."

The students next return to the board at its April 19 meeting to share their development goals for the park.