Anacostia River receives failing grade, but hope remains for its future

Caretakers of the Anacostia River have set a goal of ensuring the river is clean enough to swim and fish in by 2025. But, in their annual river report card, the Anacostia Watershed Society gave the river a failing grade.

Still, the river’s condition should be taken in context.

For thousands of years, the Nocochtank tribe relied on the Anacostia River for sustenance, harvesting fish from its runs and wild rice from the rifles. 

When the English explorer John Smith sailed on those waters in the 1600s, he wrote of being able to see the river’s bottom. Later in colonial America, up until the 1830s, sea-going vessels could sail all the way to the busy port town of Bladensburg.

The tall ships have long since been replaced by smaller craft. The river bottom is now obscured by silt and runoff from deforestation and development, and the river rolls along. 

But it hasn’t been the smoothest of sailing. The latest annual report from the Anacostia Watershed Society gives the river a score of 52%, a 3-point drop from last year’s score. 

According to the organization, this is the third time in six years that the river receives a failing grade. 

James Stewart, who fishes the river for the peace and the sport of it, said he’s “not surprised at all.”

“We throw ‘em back. Ain’t eatin’ nothing coming out of here. I love my belly,” he said.  

So on Sunday’s trip to the river, Stewart brought his own food. But he does remember a time when you could smell the water before you could see it, which actually speaks to a positive change. In other words, the river’s failing grade should be taken in context. Read the full report here.

“It’s a disappointment, but it’s not a three-alarm fire for the river,” Christopher Williams, president and CEO of the Anacostia Watershed Society, said. 

He said there’s been lots of obvious improvements along the Anacostia, and long-term trends are positive.

“We’re seeing the return of mussels in the river. We’re seeing healthy fish populations. We’re seeing bald eagles and osprey,” he said. 

Even “animals that are very sensitive to water quality,” like beavers and otters, are coming back, Williams added. One river otter was seen in Hyattsville along one of the Anacostia’s tributaries.

So, why does his organization give the river a failing grade?

“The indicator that’s really dragged the whole aggregate score down has been a precipitous drop in submerged aquatic vegetation,” he explained. 

That vegetation helps filter the water, and is another indicator of its health.

The drop in the acreage of that vegetation could be a natural occurrence due to weather trends, or it could be due to climate change, or something else.

Still, on the positive side, a fleet of skimmers could be seen taking tons of litter and flotsam from the river, proof of new infrastructure to reduce storm and sewer overflow making a huge difference, too. 

“Toxics Remediation and Trash Reduction, the scorecard’s qualitative measures, stayed steady and improved its score respectively thanks to progress on the Anacostia Sediment Project and Anacostia River Tunnels Project,” the report details. 

But as the city struggles with problems on dry land, some may wonder why the Anacostia River is so important.

“It divides the eastern part of the city, wards 7 and 8, from the rest of the city, and a cleaner, healthier river will have the opposite effect,” Williams said. 

Swimming may not be an option for quite a while, however, if overall trends continue, the report is hopeful: “Though this year's failing grade is a setback, long-term trends going back 30 years still point to slowly and steadily improving water quality and ecosystem health. In our assessment, the goal of swimmable and fishable by 2025 remains within reach.”