Broke the record, and water's going down...

Broke the record, and water\'s going down...

5/9/2011

For the first time in almost ten days we can walk out to our flats without waders. For a few days there you could make it out in regular knee-high rubber boots, but the river kept coming up. We're not totally out of the woods--we're still more than a foot above flood stage according to the NWS--but compared to what it's looked like for the last week, things seem great.

The National Weather Service says we broke a record--the river in Schuylerville hit 98 feet above flood stage; the previous record was only 96.1 feet, set back in 1938. In some places, the river exceeded the 100 year flood line significantly!

Flood Warning calling for 8 feet above flood stage!

The river's still up out of the ditches in places, and the high water table is slowing drainage, but with a week of forecasted sunny weather we might be alright. Heck of a way to get introduced to a farm, though!

Jeannie

5/11/2011 10:55:43 am

Just wondering about the Hudson waters.. by the way enjoying watching your farm grow... but as far as the waters are concerned does the PCBs and other pollutants in the Hudson affect your soil and other farmers soils in that area? On the map you are pretty close to the GE plant. Do you have to do soil testig etc?

Quincy Farm

5/12/2011 04:48:06 am

The PCB thing was our first concern when we found this property, and we researched it long and hard. We read everything inside out, then talked about our particular property with the relevant people at Ag & Markets, EPA, Soil & Water, DEC, the NYS Canal Corp (because, technically, the Hudson is the Champlain Canal north of Waterford/Troy), Cornell, GE, and I'm sure others.

Prior to the dredging project, GE/EPA took soil core samples of a ton of properties along the Hudson to understand how far up into the flats the PCB contamination went, as well as riverbed samples. They're not labeled by property, but the maps are very detailed and it's easy to locate a parcel by adjacent roads, ditches and streams. Our farm had 3 samples taken, all in the lowest, most flood-prone part of the fields (parts of the fields that Cara and I might consider wetland and take out of production). All three tested clean. It seems the location of the PCB deposits depends a lot on the river's character in a particular spot, and this farm is in a spot where sediment was not carried up into the ditches much. This year as an obvious exception, our fields almost never go under water, just the ditches back up, which means the crop fields are even cleaner than the wetlands.

Our second concern was for irrigation water. It turns out that PCB molecules are much, much larger than a plant can take up, so the only risk they present would be from overhead irrigation and bits of dirt clinging to the produce. The Hudson is currently reasonably clean water--the town of Stillwater has a drinking water intake just downriver of us (treated, of course)--it's just the sediment at the bottom and the fish who've eaten it at issue. Fortunately, an irrigation intake is just below the surface, sucking the cleanest water possible (to protect the pump and gun if nothing else). We also only run irrigation when it hasn't rained in a while, which means the river is also reasonably calm. So there's very little risk from overhead irrigation as well. We were also concerned about the long-term effect of overhead irrigation on the PCB concentrations--would irrigating for years with the tiny background PCB level build up? They've tested farms that have been pumping overhead for decades, back when the river glowed at night (joke), and their fields are still clean, because of the factors mentioned above. At the end of the day, regular old bacteria--present on ALL crops, even chemical-fed hydroponic greenhouse whatever--is a much larger risk, and is why you should wash all produce in potable water before consuming. We farmers often eat food right off the plant, but really, you ought to wash it.

Our last concern was about dredging, and its impact on the water quality and our ability to irrigate. Phase II of the dredging project is underway, though they won't be near us for several years. We consulted a map of the dredging points, researched a bunch, and ultimately had a conference with EPA and the dredgers. The rule they're operating under is that the river must pass EPA PCB drinking water standards 1 mile downriver from the dredging operation or they have to stop until it clears. The next dredge point upriver of us is more than a mile, which means our intake will always be sucking water clean enough to drink (from a PCB standpoint). There is an additional dredge point adjacent to the farm at the downriver edge... We've been told this is a small spot and they won't dredge there more than a couple days, and that we could run the pump from the upstream side anyway... but to be safe we'll not irrigate when that's happening.

I tend to be somewhat cynical of government assurance that everything will be ok, but we really researched the heck out of this one and feel confident it's not an issue. I have my own opinions about GE and what seems like blatant corporate weaseling as they try to get out of cleaning up this mess, but we're comfortable with the cleanliness of our particular fields and the quality of our produce.

If you have any other questions, please ask! I did all this research almost a year ago, but I really turned over every stone to make sure this wasn't a risk for our farm.

Now if representative Chris Gibson would back off his efforts to stick a nuke plant here in rural Easton, we could go back to farming. But that's another issue!

Jeannie

5/12/2011 04:50:04 am

I never even thought about the land itself I was just thinking about the flooding and even wondering about it in the Intervale area of Burlington as the Champlain has had very high level of pollutants. I have lived on the Hudson my entire life in this area. One thing that concerned me back in 2000 when I was working with a college organization on the dredging project was the extremely high cancer rates I seem to remember breast cancer being the highest on the banks of the Hudson in this area but I also remember that research was done from swimming in the Hudson River from Troy area up to Fort Edward plant and mothers nursing their infants after swimming and passing PCBs and other toxins to the infant. This was info given by the EPA at some local meetings in Hudson Falls so now you have me curious. As far as the EPA stating you can drink the water one mile from the dredging I am def. interested in that as well because they have long been telling us not to swim in the area. I have never heard a local say the river is relatively clean except for those who dared to make headlines a couple of years back and drank the water, I thought the biggest argument was the river is not cleanning itself and the PCBs etc are not staying at the bottom of the river and being buried etc. This is all off the top of my head though. You seem thoroughly researched. I will go dig through all my old club paperwork and see if I can find some info. Nuke plant aside which I understand is a big aside and def. one I would write to him about your concerns---but he has been a voice to Ag in this area and continues to be so. Not always bad having a conservative on your side being such a high taxed and depressed area. You might hear more social talk from some in Greenwich or some in Saratoga but the voting records show this is a conservative area. I def. do not agree with all his ways nor his parties way..but anyways really good conversation! :)

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Quincy Farm is a family-scale vegetable farm run by Luke Deikis and Cara Fraver in Easton, NY. We use organic methods to grow the most delicious veggies ever for the well-being of our family, our community, and the flora and fauna that make it all possible.

Broke the record, and water\'s going down...

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