Ge Sun AWRA Presentation

Forest buffers or Streamside Management Zones (SMZ) are widely used in forest management practices to offer the last defense line to reduce sediment loading, cleansing upland pollutants, and shading forest streams. A collaborative hydrologic study between SGCP and North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources’ Forestry Division has been implemented since 2006. Johnny Boggs presents water quantity quality data collected from 6 small watersheds during the pre-treatment period of this long-term ‘paired watershed’ study.

In the same meeting, Ge Sun reports a 3-year comparative study on shallow groundwater hydrology variations in a mountain watershed at the Coweeta Hydrological Lab in western North Carolina and a coastal watershed at the Santee Experimental Forest in South Carolina. This paper implies that headwater watersheds on the coastal plain should have a much wider buffer than uplands.