River foundation hosts lecture, monitor training

Neuse River overview

Wednesday, noon

Pamlico Community College

Speaker: Lower Neuse Riverkeeper Larry Baldwin

Volunteer training

Nov. 11, 1 to 4 p.m.

RiverWatch and Muddy Water Watch projects.

Speaker: Brian Westcott, Neuse Riverkeeper Foundation program coordinator

There are lots of eyes watching the Neuse River.

Hundreds of volunteers help the Neuse Riverkeeper Foundation monitor the river, and the foundation says it needs more.

A Nov. 11 training course at Pamlico Community College will cover the RiverWatch and Muddy Water Watch projects.

Brian Westcott, the foundation’s program coordinator, said he is no longer surprised by things that are dumped into the water.

He said reports have ranged from cases of doughnuts to deer carcasses.

Westcott said discarded deer were a major problem, with two sources. Hunters, he said, remove the head for a trophy and toss the body in the river. A second source is farmers who kill deer eating their crops and also dispose of them in the Neuse.

Westcott has some graphic photos to back up both claims.

He said there are alternatives to the dumping.

“What I would like to see done is if people don’t want the deer, give the deer to different organizations in the community and let’s get them donated to feed the hungry,” he said.

He has a list of meat processing companies that participate in a program to supply food banks and other hunger organizations.

“We know there is a deer overpopulation here which is a major problem,” Westcott. “But then it’s a win-win situation where they (hunters) are actually helping with the deer population and we’re feeding the hungry.”

Westcott said the primary job of volunteer citizens monitoring the river is to look for anything unusual.

A separate lecture program is scheduled at noon Wednesday at the Pamlico College, with Lower Neuse Riverkeeper Larry Baldwin giving an overview of the foundation’s work, the health of the river and a review of a recent multi-million fish kills.

“I’ll talk about some of the challenges the river faces, and what the organization does about those challenges,” Baldwin said.

He recently requested public information from several state agencies about the fish kill.

He said Monday he had just received them in the mail and would begin reviewing the documents, which he described as “about three inches thick.”

Ironically, Baldwin’s Wednesday talk was originally scheduled in early September, but cancelled on the day the fish kill began.

Charlie Hall can be reached at 252-635-5667 or chall@freedomenc.com.