Coastwatch 



Senior Editors 

 Daun Daemon 

 Ann Green 

 Jeannie Fans Norris 

 Renee Wolcott Shannon 



Designer 

 Linda Noble 



Circulation Manager 

 Sandra Harris 



The North Carolina Sea Grant College 

 Program is a federal/state program that 

 promotes the wise use of our coastal and 

 marine resources through research, extension 

 and education. It joined the National Sea Grant 

 College Network in 1970 as an institutional 

 program. Six years later, it was designated a 

 Sea Grant College. Today, North Carolina Sea 

 Grant supports several research projects, 

 a 1 2-member extension program and a 

 communications staff. Ron Hodson is director. 

 The program is funded by the U.S. Department 

 of Commerce's National Oceanic and 

 Atmospheric Administration and the state 

 through the University of North Carolina. 

 Coastwatch (ISSN 1068-784X) is published 

 bimonthly, six times a year, for $15 by the 

 North Carolina Sea Grant College Program, 

 Box 8605, North Carolina State University, 

 Raleigh, North Carolina 27695-8605. 

 Telephone: 919/515-2454. Fax: 919/515-7095. 

 E-mail: faris@unity.ncsu.edu or 

 kmosher@unity.ncsu.edu. 

 World Wide Web address: 

 http://www2.ncsu.edu/sea_grant/seagrant.html. 

 Periodical Postage paid at Raleigh, N.C. 



POSTMASTER: Send address changes to 



Coastwatch, North Carolina Sea Grant, 

 Box 8605, North Carolina State University, 

 Raleigh, NC 27695-8605. 



Front cover photo of a stained glass 

 window in the chapel of New Hanover 

 Regional Medical Center by Erin Wall. 



Table of contents photo of a 

 stained glass window at Church of the 

 Servant in Wilmington by Erin Wall. 



Printed on recycled paper. ® 



COASTAL 



TIDINGS 



Granted: One Clean Stream 



The Clean 

 Water Manage- 

 ment Trust Fund 

 has awarded 

 North Carolina 

 State University a 

 $1.1 million grant 

 to continue the 

 repair of Rocky 

 Branch Creek, a 

 stream that flows 

 through the 

 Raleigh campus, 

 and to install stormwater filtration systems 

 to treat runoff that drains into the creek. 

 Barbara Doll, water quality specialist for 

 North Carolina Sea Grant, is a co- 

 investigator for the grant. In recent years 

 she has raised awareness of the creek, 

 which is polluted by oil, sediment and 

 nutrients from campus parking lots and 

 fertilized playing fields. 



Like many urban creeks, Rocky 

 Branch was forced into concrete ducts and 

 squeezed between buildings, causing it to 

 cut a deep, eroding ravine disconnected 

 from its traditional floodplains. The creek 

 will be returned to a more natural form 

 with morphologically correct meanders in 

 its course, a raised creekbed to reconnect it 

 with floodplains, and new riffles and pools 

 (areas where shallow water ripples over a 



Rocky Branch Creek after improvements in 1995 



ridge before 

 flowing into a 

 deeper pool). 

 Where the water 

 course has been 

 constricted 

 between steep 

 banks, the 

 improved stream 

 also will feature 

 artificial plunge 

 pools, or water- 

 falls, which will 

 dissipate the force of the water and prevent 

 erosion. The entire project will take three 

 years to complete. 



The new funds complement Doll's 

 recently awarded Environmental Protection 

 Agency grant, which provides North 

 Carolina Sea Grant with $55,700 to repair 

 the upstream portion of Rocky Branch 

 Creek, add an educational campus 

 greenway beside the stream and survey the 

 stream's invertebrate inhabitants. The grant 

 brings together many NC State University 

 departments, including the School of 

 Design for landscape architecture of the 

 greenway; Marine, Earth and Atmospheric 

 Sciences for the stream's geomorphological 

 classification; and the Zoology Department 

 for surveys of aquatic organisms in the 

 stream. □ — R.W.S. 



In the Next Issue of Coastwatch 



n the next issue of Coastwatch, T. Edward Nickens takes you for a ride on 

 the Intracoastal Waterway, a 3,000-mile channel that runs inland of the nation's 

 eastern shore. Along the way, Nickens chronicles startling contrasts in the 

 waterway's passage through areas both urban and remote, and its colorful 

 history as the East Coast's commercial and cultural corridor. 



The boating theme continues asjulie Ann Powers takes a lesson in 

 boatbuilding. She describes the frustrations and epiphanies of constructing her 

 own 9-foot 6-inch sailboat and the rewards of taking the tiller for the first time. 



And Ann Green introduces you to Harkers Island boatbuilders who practice 

 a craft passed down by generations. They build a variety of boats — from work 

 boats carved out of sweet juniper to luxury, custom-made sportfishing boats. □ 



2 HOLIDAY 1998 



