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Watershed Report Card 2023

Watershed Report Card Interactive Map

Click below for the report card (published in 2023) for your local subwatershed community.

You may click on the map below, or click on the links, for your current subwatershed report card:

watershed map

New, updated Watershed Report Cards (2023) released on World Water Day

Ausable Bayfield Conservation prepares Watershed Report Cards every five years as a summary of the state of your forests and water resources. 

The new, updated Watershed Report Card (2023), and subwatershed report cards, were posted by March 22, 2023 for World Water Day (March 22).

The pieces of the Watershed Report Card (2023) are posted below as separate PDF files.

The complete Watershed Report Card has three parts:

  1. Summary Brochure
  2. Report Card (Full Report)
  3. Report Cards for 16 Subwatersheds

Summary Brochure - 2023 Ausable Bayfield Watershed Report Card

Full Report - Ausable Bayfield Watershed Report Card 2023

The following file is the full report of the Ausable Bayfield Watershed Report Card 2023, except for the subwatershed report cards for the 16 subwatersheds in the Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA) area.

(The 16 subwatershed report cards are listed as separate links after this file):

Chapter 3: Watershed Report Cards (2023) – for 16 Subwatersheds of the Ausable Bayfield Area (please go to links below):

The following are the Watershed Report Cards for the 16 local watersheds, or subwatersheds, of the Ausable Bayfield area. Each of these 16 files is a large PDF file, most between 1 MB and 2 MB each:

Ausable Bayfield Watershed Report Card 2023 – Separate Sections (Smaller Files)

As files of smaller size, the full report of the Ausable Bayfield Watershed Report Card 2023, is separated into sections as follows.

These are medium-sized and large-sized PDF files:

Here are the links to the Ausable Bayfield Watershed Report Card current web pages and PDF document:

The most recent report card has been published in 2023.
 
The previous watershed report cards are from 2018; 2013; and 2007.
 
For comparison purposes, here are the links to the past Ausable Bayfield Watershed Report Card web pages (2018; 2013; and 2007):

About Watershed Report Cards

Report cards give residents information to protect and enhance watershed resources. Report card standards were developed for consistent reporting across Ontario.

Report cards are based on forest, surface water quality, and groundwater quality conditions in 16 subwatersheds in watersheds of the Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA) area. These include three Bayfield River subwatersheds, eight Ausable River subwatersheds, two Parkhill Creek subwatersheds, Mud Creek, and two smaller Lake Huron subwatersheds.

Watershed Report Cards tell you about your watershed - where more work is needed and where work has been achieving positive results.

They also provide you with things you, your community, and local agencies can do to help protect and improve watershed health.

They offer 'Thumbs Up' congratulations to watershed community partners creating awareness and taking positive action - they also offer a 'top action' that is needed in each of 16 local subwatersheds.

What is a watershed?

A watershed is an area of land drained by a creek or stream into a river which then drains into a body of water such as a lake or pond. Everything in a watershed is connected. Our actions upstream affect conditions downstream.

Why measure? Measuring helps us to better understand this watershed. We can target our work where it is needed and track progress.

We measured:

  • Forest conditions
  • Wetland cover
  • Surface water quality
  • Groundwater quality
  • Overwinter vegetative cover
How healthy are Ontario's watersheds? Visit Conservation Ontario's Watershed Checkup site to find out more: