Hudson Valley Stream Conservancy

05/04/2026

I am pleased to report that the Sing Sing Kill (also known as Kill Brook) in Ossining was once again successfully cleared of trash as part of the 2026 Riverkeeper Sweep.

Hudson Valley Stream Conservancy (HVSC) and Green Ossining partnered with Riverkeeper for the 15th consecutive year, restoring different sections of this important stream each year.

We are deeply grateful to the many volunteers who came out—getting wet and dirty—to remove debris from the reach beneath the historic Double Arches along the Sing Sing Kill Greenway. We also thank Melrose Lumber, Union FG (Union Ornamental Iron Works), and the Ossining Department of Public Works for their generous support.

For those who have not yet visited the Greenway, it offers a peaceful—and now even more beautiful—walk through a dramatic gorge, recognized beyond our community, including its appearance in the Spike Lee film BlacKkKlansman. The trail can be accessed from the Ossining Recreation Center parking lot.

Thank you to all who help care for this local treasure.

Sincerely,
Gareth Hougham, Ph.D.
Pres. Hudson Valley Stream Conservancy
.savethesound ; ;

04/27/2026

Earthday, 2026. Cold, raining and wonderful. Lots of people came out and stayed despite the harsh conditions. We made some new contacts, caught up with many and got some new volunteers lined up for our summer water quality projects!
Thanks for coming out!

.savethesound ; ;

12/29/2025

Hi Everyone: This is our new QR code that takes you directly to our website www.streamconservancy.org . The spring migration season is coming up quickly so we'll be posting about our ongoing efforts to get river herring and American eel past barriers to spawning habitat! Stay tuned! If you are interested in volunteering for in stream work, cleanups and monitoring, please send us an email. We'd love to hear from you.
(Please consider making a donation from the website, we rely on your support!) See you in the stream!
.org .savethesound .m.Feldman

12/13/2025

HVSC is thrilled to announce that we are expanding our impact on clean water by joining the Westchester Coalition for Clean Water (WCCW), cofounded and championed by Riverkeeper, as a member of the steering committee!

WCCW works for cleaner, healthier, sewage-free, and flood-resilient waterways in Westchester County, NY, by uniting local groups like Riverkeeper, Federated Conservationists of Westchester, the Bronx River Alliance, Groundwork Hudson Valley, Sarah Lawrence College (CURB) and us, HVSC! This coalition, launched in mid-2024, aims to hold local governments accountable for improving water infrastructure and protecting rivers and sounds from pollution and climate impacts.

WCCW creates a unified voice for water protection in Westchester. Not just the Hudson River and its tributaries, but for the Long Island Sound and every thing in between including inland lakes and streams.

WCCW advocates for faster clean-up of trash, sewage, and infrastructure upgrades to tackle flooding, pollution, hazardous algal blooms and more. A major goal of WCCW is to have sewage-free, and flood-resilient waterways within a decade.

This is a great fit for HVSC as we have worked extensively on Hutchinson River Dams for fish passage and water quality and on the Blind Brook which empties into the L.I. Sound, even though neither are technically in the 'Hudson Valley'.

Please help support our work by donating, 100% tax exempt at Http://www.streamconservancy.org
Or by using the attached QR code.

THANK YOU and Happy Holidays!

‘Huds .savethesound ;

10/29/2025

TEST LAUNCH of the 2nd iteration of the Autonomous Floating Trackers (AFT's). These weighted and keeled floats carry real-time GPS trackers to map the Hudson River currents experienced at the mouths' of tributaries.

The purpose is to try to understand where the sewage-bearing stream waters travel to both up and down the Hudson River, depending on the phase of the tide, among other factors. We plan to do traditional non-toxic dye injection testing next spring, but wanted to get some initial mapping to guide those efforts.

Our first model travelled from the Croton River test zone into the big river and two days later got stuck on a beach in Nyack. Why are there two GPS trackers on each float? One is set to give updates every minute and the other to give updates only every hour to save battery life and ensure we can find it once the data-rich one consumes its battery within about 1 or 2 days.

We'll be launching it from a stream in Ossining soon, stay tuned!

Oh, before I forget, please help us stay afloat (haha). We rely on your generous donations and volunteer time and energy. To make a 100% tax deductible donation, go to our website at www.streamconservancy.org and click donate. We greatly appreciate your help trying to clean up Hudson River tributaries, make Hudson River beaches swimmable and the tribs passable for migrating fish! PS. Our one company car, our trusty Subaru Outback, finally bit the dust. We are looking for any car donation or great deal. Thank you!!!
.savethesound villageofossining ; ;

10/25/2025

Poster presentation of Sewage Bacteria in Sparta Brook, Ossining, NY.

Briarcliff High School student intern Sinduja Narayanan, working with HVSC on a competitive grant she obtained from the Hudson River Environmental Society, studied sewage bacteria concentrations as a function of location, weather and time-of-day. She identified approximately eight illegal outpours from pipes which resulted in enterococcus values higher than 24,000! The NYSDEC standard for recreational contact is only 35. More than 600 TIMES higher than the standard. These results will be reported formally to the Village of Ossining Board of Trustees with the hope that the Village will respond by planning for rapid mitigation, and if appropriate, holding private polluters accountable.

HVSC congratulates our intern Sinduja on her poster presentation to NY State authorities and regional nonprofits attending the Hudson River Environmental Society annual conference in Staatsburg, NY on Oct. 23, 2025. If you'd like a full resolution copy, please email us at [email protected].

PS. Hudson Valley Stream Conservancy is a 501(c)(3) tax exempt nonprofit, and we rely on your help and participation. Please consider an end of year donation by going to our website www.streamconservancy.org . We are also operating minus our company Subaru that finally died after many years of trusty service. We are very much in need of a donated car or a discounted sale. Thank you for your help!!!
.savethesound villageofossining ; ;

08/18/2025

A beautiful rolling fog on the Croton River in the Town of Ossining. Rare for the evening hours! @

08/18/2025

Yesterday, 04/11/2019 we photographed an alewife (river herring) below the Wilsons Woods dam in Pelham. The first verified sighting in perhaps 300 years. We are working on a NYS Dept. of Env. Conservation grant to design a fish ladder over the dam for alewife. They swim into fresh water streams to spawn in the spring and then go back out into the ocean. Their population has plummeted due to a combination of dams, over fishing and pollution. We're trying to get them back to their historic breeding grounds to rebound. Shown is an underwater image of the alewife, contrast and color enhanced to get the silhouette in very murky water.

08/18/2025

08/15/2025

Buoyed by indications of improved water quality in the Sing Sing Kill tributary to the Hudson, we are continuing to work toward clean enough water at Ossining's Hudson River beach for legal swimming!

Remember the NYSDEC grant we applied for last summer, well, we got it and have been sampling all summer long looking, and finding, more sewage inputs! We've focused this summer on the Sparta Brook tributary and have found around 5 pipes spewing raw sewage even in dry weather and another 5 or so that do so during rain events. The water standard is 35 enterococcus colonies per 100ml, and several of the pipe outputs measured at >24,000. The > symbol, because the test reached its max.

Also on the Sparta, we've used our favorite, home grown, methodology: an early morning time series. Sample from like 5AM to 9AM every 15 minutes. Graph the results and you resolve the background bacteria levels (slow leaking septic systems) from the direct sewage inputs evident from the spikes occurring at typical wake up times. These 6:00, 6:30 and 7:00 AM spikes are pretty dramatic.

Okay, TMI. Suffice it to say that we are tracking down the exact locations of sewage inputs to the Sparta Brook, just like we did in the Sing Sing Kill which then led to (some) mitigation. We'll be submitting a report to the State, County and the Village of Ossining at the end of the sampling season so they can get started planning the fixes.

Our dedicated team goes the extra mile, in waders. Thank you!

.savethesound sierraclub villageofossining ; ;