Waterways Comparison
Differences Betweeen a Healthy and an Unhealthy Waterway
Can you spot the differences between these two waterways? Which do you think is the healthiest?
To find out how healthy a waterway is, we look at a number of things.
One of the most important things is habitat. Habitat is the term that we give to the area where an animal lives If you were an animal, like a platypus, fish or frog, which of these two creeks would you like to live in and why?
The creek on the left has lots of habitat. It has logs and other snags in the water, as well as trees that grow on the banks. There are big deep pools and shallow areas called riffles, where the water runs over the rocks. The spaces under the rocks are great hiding places for many different types of water bugs.
The trees growing on the banks help to make the water shady, which keeps the water nice and cool. This is very important for animals living in the water. Sometimes a branch will fall in off the tree and into the water. This creates more snags and hiding places. There are also a lot of different types of plants and most of the plants are native. Native animals prefer native plants.
The water is also clear, which means that plants will be able to grow in the water because they will get enough sunlight. Lots of bugs like to live in these plants and the bugs are food for animals like fish and platypus.
The creek on the right looks very different. Most of it has been turned into a concrete drain.
What would be some problems be for you if you were an animal living in this type of environment? Would you have lots of places to hide from predators? Are there lots of places for you to search for food?
In this photo you can see that there aren’t many different types of plants around the waterway. There is mainly grass and this grass isn’t a native type of grass.
This area is also close to factories and houses and so it might also have pollution and rubbish running off the roads and into the drains and the creek when it rains. You can see in the picture that a drain is running into the creek with some very dirty water as well, and this could affect any animals living in there because they might find it hard to breathe and find food.
We can all make a difference to our waterways by doing some very simple things, like making sure that we put litter in the bins and picking up after our dog.
