Piney Run 07/29

Project Overview

SiteName

Piney Run

Coordinates

39°22’20”N 76°54’34”W

Weather Source + Conditions

Weather Underground

Sensor Location Notes

• Upper sensor: Essentially had little to no water in the stream at this point. Many rocks with ross growing was exhibited at this location so there must be a certain level of wetness for this to happened.
• Middle Sensor: When placed sensor location exhibited moderate water flow, the sensor successfully deposited below water surface. I would characterize this as intermitten after assessing the conditions of the stream
• Lower Sensor: More difficult to get to this sensor location due to the unstable bank. The Sensor was placed in knee deep waters so the graphs should always exhibit wetness at this location. It also drains into the river of the actual Piney run.

Wildlife Observered

• Skunk Cabbages
• Shrubs
• Dragonfly
• Deer

Bank Stability

Become more unstable the lower we went in the stream. Upper sensor was slightly unstable and lined with rocks all throughout. Middle sensor was the same as the upper but the lower sensor had dirt clumps and initially has much sediment getting to it and then dips into a pond.

Flow Speed Estimate

Medium flow speeds. Empties into the run with extremely fast flow.

Table Summary Stats

## # A tibble: 148 × 7
##    date_only  Location      Min_Temp Max_Temp Mean_Temp SD_Temp Range_Temp
##    <date>     <chr>            <dbl>    <dbl>     <dbl>   <dbl>      <dbl>
##  1 2025-06-24 Air               75.4     98.8      84.0    7.78      23.4 
##  2 2025-06-24 Downstream        72.7     95.2      80.4    8.20      22.5 
##  3 2025-06-24 Middle Stream     68.3     97.1      73.7    8.07      28.8 
##  4 2025-06-24 Upstream          64.5     98.7      75.6   12.5       34.2 
##  5 2025-06-25 Air               71.8     82.6      76.1    2.87      10.8 
##  6 2025-06-25 Downstream        70.0     76.3      72.4    1.92       6.30
##  7 2025-06-25 Middle Stream     65.6     71.0      68.0    1.42       5.41
##  8 2025-06-25 Upstream          63.6     69.0      65.0    1.38       5.40
##  9 2025-06-26 Air               71.8     81.7      76.0    3.51       9.90
## 10 2025-06-26 Downstream        69.1     78.1      72.9    2.93       9.00
## # ℹ 138 more rows

Plots

Analysis

The data show that the fluctuation of streams are slower compared to the air temperature, but the results show some suprising information. We’d expect that the water would progressivley get cooler when recording the data from Upstream to downstream, but due to site-specific factors the data tells us the opposite.

• Upstream stays the coolest, probably due to shading, groundwater inputs, and narrower, faster-moving water.

• Downstream is unexpectedly warmer. Instead of depth and flow keeping it cool, i suspect the stagnant pool where the sensor was placed likely absorbed sunlight and retained heat.

This local condition overrode the general rule that deeper water runs cooler. From an ecological perspective, this means organisms downstream are closer to their thermal tolerance thresholds. The dataset highlights a few aspects: There is a obvious buffer exhibited comparing stream to air temperature, but localized stagnation or reduced flow can push sections of the stream past safe thermal thresholds, potentially restricting where sensitive species can thrive.