Some of Charlottetown's ponds in poor health, study finds

A study by local environmental groups has found the health of some of Charlottetown's ponds are poor or fairly poor.

The Ellen's Creek Watershed Committee and students in Holland College's environmental science program collected samples from 11 ponds in the city limits, including Governor's, Dead Man's and Andrew's ponds.

Watershed co-ordinator Norman Dewar says all the ponds showed high levels of salinity, and some had higher chemical levels in surface water than federal environmental guidelines recommend.

Dewar said that's because of runoff going into these waterways. But he also isn't sure if this isn't a one year "blip."

"Whether this year the results we got were just kind of a blip because it was such a dry year or whether these chemicals are increasing or decreasing that's the problem because we've never done this monitoring before. We really don't have a baseline to go by."

Dewar said the group hopes to continue sampling this summer. They will include rural ponds, as well, to see if there is a difference in waterways outside of town.

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