The Six Ponds and Water Quality
The Six Ponds Area of Plymouth
Being able to view, swim, fish and boat in fresh water ponds are primary reasons why people live in or visit the Six Ponds area of Plymouth. While this website focuses on the Six Ponds area, the same can be said about people residing near many other ponds in the Town of Plymouth.
Ponds and the woodlands around them are beautiful to the eye and refreshing to one's spirit, but they are also vulnerable and fragile resources susceptable to a wide range of environmental threats. Unfortunately, the homes, activities, habits and roadways essential to living and working in this area are sources of threats to the environment. There are also commercial and agricultural sources of threats to the environment.
The vulnerabilities and enviromental threats discussed in this website are in no way unique to the Six Ponds area. There are numerous ponds in Plymouth which are classified as impaired, and the purpose of this website is to discuss what has been learned about this area so that residents here and residents elsewhere in Plymouth can gain a better understanding why water quality is so important to their well-being and their quality of life.
To emphasize the importance of protecting these ponds and woodlands, we want to begin by displaying some of the beauty of this area of Plymouth and some of the ways that people enjoy living near these ponds.
Photographs of the Six Ponds Area(click on a small image to select it then click on a larger image to zoom)
Bloody Pond
Gallows Pond
Halfway Pond
Little Long Pond
Long Pond
Round Pond
Six Ponds Water Quality Testing
Many members of the Six Ponds organization have assisted with water quality testing over the past 20-plus years, and all of that data plus other water and environment related data and information has been stored on websites for the organization. For many of these years, Six Ponds resident Douglas Post maintained a website which he constructed as a repository for water quality data, newsletters, and project information. During several of these same years, Six Ponds resident Leighton Price constructed and maintained a website which focused primarily on describing water quality problems which have been experienced in some of the ponds in this area.
There is a Six Ponds website ( www.sixponds.org ) which provides an overview of the ponds and the activities of the people living in this neighborhood, but most of the water quality data and related information is included in this secondary Six Ponds website. This www.sixpondswaterquality.org website includes water quality data and discussion, related water quality studies, plant surveys, and other Six Ponds projects pertaining to environmental impacts on the Six Ponds area. Basically, it is a record of what the Six Ponds organization has been doing and learning about water quality over the past several decades. It is also testimony to how important it is for people living near ponds to regularly and rigorously assess water quality as well as factors having negative impacts upon it.
There is a Six Ponds website ( www.sixponds.org ) which provides an overview of the ponds and the activities of the people living in this neighborhood, but most of the water quality data and related information is included in this secondary Six Ponds website. This www.sixpondswaterquality.org website includes water quality data and discussion, related water quality studies, plant surveys, and other Six Ponds projects pertaining to environmental impacts on the Six Ponds area. Basically, it is a record of what the Six Ponds organization has been doing and learning about water quality over the past several decades. It is also testimony to how important it is for people living near ponds to regularly and rigorously assess water quality as well as factors having negative impacts upon it.
Residents of the Six Ponds area, and of Plymouth more generally, can participate in learning more about the condition of their water resources. Your help and observations are needed to identify possible problems, to understand how and why the health of ponds differ, and to seek solutions to existing problems. Water bodies which are having problems can be brought to the attention of neighborhood associations as well as to the attention of Town officials and state agencies.
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The Organization of this website
This website is divided into different time periods for several reasons:
1. awareness of water quality problems has evolved over the years,
2. water quality testing protocols and the intensity of the testing has varied greatly over several decades, and
3. Town of Plymouth involvement in the assessment of water quality has changed over time.
On the other hand, there are a number of concerns and findings which are common to all of these time periods, and these will be highlighted in the discussion of each time period.
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