Our Work Plan: Conserve, Educate, and Advocate

Our mission is to work on protecting the health of the Black River and Paw Paw River watersheds through conservation, education, and advocacy.

Conservation includes not only protecting ecologically valuable lands but also stewarding them.

Education is all about improving our understanding of the watersheds and sharing this knowledge broadly through community outreach.

Advocacy is simply the active support of this cause. When done right, it educates and raises awareness about the issues impacting our waterways, influences decision makers and can create real change.

This page with its menu items on the left is our efforts to meet this mission. The TRC Watershed map shows waypoints where some of this work is occurring and where other important activities we want to highlight. Below the map are some key project summaries.

Summary Spotlight:

TRC's Prothonotary Warbler Partnership entered into its 4th year in 2024.

We are still figuring out what we need to do to get the warblers to accept our nest boxes but had several successful nests this year. We had a successful paddling event in June seeing several pairs of prothonotary warblers during the event. We also surveyed several new stretches of the Paw Paw River finding prothonotary warblers in some areas but not others. 

We are asking volunteers to use EBird and record sightings of the prothonotary warblers in our watersheds. This data will help us understand their distribution in our watersheds and help indicate where the best floodplain forest exists. Check out our web page for more information.

Prothonotary Warbler Partnership (tworiverscoalition.org) 

Volunteer Stream Monitoring - 2025 Details to come! 

Stream monitoring is one of the most rewarding and fun community science projects TRC takes part in each year in partnership with VanBuren Conservation District.

There is nothing like getting into the water and/or picking out the aquatic insects captured to really learn about our waterways. We have been collecting data since 2015 and follow the protocols developed by MiCorps which are used across the state to monitor the health of our waterways. Check out the VBCD Story Map to learn more.

Join us as we play in our waterways while adding community science data that is used to measure our rivers health. My Calendar – Van Buren Conservation District (vanburencd.org)

Volunteer Stream Monitoring - MiCorps (tworiverscoalition.org)

E.Coli Monitoring: 2023 Update

The Black River Watershed (BRW) drains 287 square miles of Van Buren and Allegan counties before emptying into Lake Michigan at South Haven. The project goals were to determine the source of consistently high levels of E. coli in the BRW measured by Two Rivers Coalition (TRC) since 2017 and determine whether the source was primarily human, cow, or a combination. 

The 2022 data was still unconclusive but points to an issue with E.coli in our watersheds. A Fact Sheet summarizing the findings was completed.

Learn more and support the statewide septic code at: E.coli Monitoring in the Black and Paw Paw River Watersheds (tworiverscoalition.org)