Cacapon Institute - From the Cacapon to the Potomac to the Chesapeake Bay, we protect rivers and watersheds using science and education. 

As Fact Finders, we conduct research to gain insight into watershed issues of local and regional importance.

As Educators,  we work to create a future where a stream without a buffer looks as out of place as a smoker in a conference room looks today.  To foster that vision, our environmental education efforts focus on students first and, through them, the larger community.

As Problem Solvers, we seek innovative solutions to environmental problems.

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 New!  Cacapon Institute has long been engaged in forestry for the purpose of improving watershed health.  We now have a forestry section on our website.  As one component of our forestry program, we are working with the WVDOF, WVCA, and WVDOH on the WV CommuniTree Program.  CommuniTree Applications for tree grants for planting in the Spring 2012 now being accepted.

 

Cacapon Institute is also the Coordinator of the Potomac Watershed Partnership.  The PWP focuses on forest conservation and expansion for watershed health throughout the Potomac Watershed.

 

Environmental Forums The Stream Cleaner Environmental Forum will run from March 12 through April 20, 2012.  Participating classes will work together to find a consensus approach to the challenging problem of restoring the Chesapeake Bay and rivers and streams throughout its 64,000 square mile watershed.  You can take a look at the eForum by clicking on the phone in the High School.  Click here to learn more about eForums or sign up. Take a look at the archives to see past eForums exactly as they happened.  Participating schools also have a chance to receive technical and financial support to design and implement their own real-world best management practice projects - like these.

 

Deckers Creek is the second stream simulated in A Virtual Stream Sampler, the eSchool's realistic simulation of volunteer stream assessments with water quality measurements, habitat assessments, and benthic macroinvertebrate collections.  Deckers Creek runs through Morgantown, WV, and has issues with Acid Mine Drainage.    Just click on the BMI Poster in any classroom to enter the Benthic Portal, then click on the Virtual Stream Sampler icon.  This activity completes the suite of eSchool lessons on stream sampling and benthic macroinvertebrates.

 

Riparian Forest Plantings
	Deer exclusion fencing experiment is testing a relatively low cost method to protect riparian forest plantings from severe damage from deer browsing. Read about the WV PTS Forested Riparian Buffer Demonstration Project.  2nd & 3rd year results posted.   At left see slide show of a new riparian tree planting and deer fence construction project at the Prospect Hall facility near Middleway, WV.

Cacapon Institute - From the Cacapon to the Potomac to the Chesapeake Bay, we protect rivers and watersheds using science and education.

Website  made possible by funding from The Norcross Wildlife Foundation,  the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Virginia Environmental Endowment, NOAA-BWET, USEPA, The MARPAT Foundation, and our generous members.