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Our Water: Raindrop and Splash Go Their Separate Waysby Lois B. Robbins It was hard saying goodbye to Splash as he bounced off the leaves and tumbled down the ridge to the southeast. I heard him call “Bye, Raindrop” as we rolled away from each other. We never know which way we’ll go till we hit the ground. As luck would have it, I landed in the Flint River Watershed, which flows northwest; and Splash landed on the other side of the ridge, just a few feet away, in the Clinton River Watershed, where all the water goes east and south. So he went his way and I went mine. He’ll either roll directly into the Clinton River after his travels downhill, or into Paint Creek, a tributary of the Clinton. Either way, he’ll end up in the Clinton River and, ultimately, Lake St. Clair. If he does roll into Paint Creek first, he will have landed in the Stony-Paint Creek Subwatershed, nestled like a Chinese box into the Clinton River Watershed. As for me, I’m definitely in the Kearsley Creek sub-watershed. All the raindrops that landed on this side of the ridge are heading northwest, as fast as we can go, to Kearsley Creek, which is the beginning, (headwaters) of the Flint River. From Kearsley Creek, it’s a free ride till the Creek flows into the Flint River in Goodrich. With Flint River waters ending up in Saginaw Bay and Lake Huron, and the Clinton River ending up in Lake St. Clair, Splash and I are unlikely ever to meet again. Parting with friends is a hazard of transpiring in this Jackson Interlobate area where two glaciers collided, carving out hills, ridges, ponds, wetlands, lakes, and rivers. Each tributary and lake has its own sub-watershed, and each sub-watershed is part of a larger watershed. And each watershed in Michigan is part of an even larger watershed called the Great Lakes Basin. Brandon Township is in two watersheds, the Flint River and the Clinton River. In each of these are at least two sub-watersheds, - the Kearsley and the Farmer’s Creek within the Flint River Watershed, and the Paint and the Upper Clinton within the Clinton River Watershed. Is that clear as mud? Well, I can tell you that all these watersheds used to be a lot cleaner than they are now, and today most watersheds are clear as mud. That’s because with all the new roads, driveways, roofs and lawns, we raindrops don’t have a chance to soak into the ground where we land. Instead, we have to go rushing, swirling, and silting along the surface, picking up pollutants as we go, till we find the lowest point, which is always a lake or stream. So, yes, it is clear as mud, except in areas where people are planting stream and shoreline buffers to filter the silt and pollutants we pick up before we reach the lake or stream. But that’s a topic for another installment. Stay tuned. Next: Raindrop Experiences the January Thaw
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