LIVONIA, Mich. (WXYZ) — When we met Edric Morris, he was walking along a pathway near Livonia's Nankin Lake with his physical therapist.
“They got a nice place for fishing, a nice place for walking, I really do enjoy being here, I really do,” said Edric Morris, a Livonia resident.
Morris said he walks this path as part of his physical therapy.
“I was in a car car accident, I almost died,” He revealed. “It took a long time to walk like this, so I’m really very happy that God gave me a chance to walk again.”
So, preserving this path and the nature surrounding it means so much to Edric.
“I… care about this path. It gives me a peace and solitude… and I really enjoy walking this path,” he said.
Luckily, the people who work at Friends of the Rouge are helping take care of the pathway. That means so much to Edric and others.
7 Action News tagged along with them to run some tests.
“You are putting this into the water and once you put this into the water this is going to pick up how much chloride is in the water,” 7 Action News asked Sarah Avery, an intern with Friends of the Rouge.
“Yes, essentially,” she said.
Chloride is found in salt.
Multiple tests are being done, include a salt strip test.
“I’ll let you do the honors. Would you pull out one of those for me, and you are going to stick it in the cup?” Avery said.
As it turns out you don’t have to be a scientist to run a salt strip test.
Volunteers for Friends of the Rouge have already been doing so.
“The goal of this project is kind of compare different methods of analyzing and collecting chloride data,” said Lauren Eaton, monitoring manager at Friends of the Rouge.
This project will also help find problem areas within the Rouge Watershed.
“Whatever you guys find here in this study could impact how we treat the roads in the future?” said Jack Cotrone, environmental quality analyst. “Well, this is the first step before we can begin looking and where we need to implement solutions, we need to know where the problems are.”
Jack Cotrone works as an environmental quality analyst for Michigan’s Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy or EGLE.
They are providing the grant needed for Friends of the Rouge to do this study.
He says in more urban areas, road salt is the biggest contributor to chloride pollution.
He says chloride can be toxic to both plants and fish.
“At lower concentrations we start to see impacts to the behavior, the growth, and the reproductions of these organisms, at high concentrations it can even been fatal,” Cotrone said.
Here’s what we found when we did our own tests.
“So, even just the testing that we did briefly today what was found is there are some dangerous levels on salt here,” 7 Action News asked Eaton. “Yes, yes,” she said.
“Are you happy that there is going to be some sort of testing being done?” 7 Action News asked Morris.
“Yes, I think so, because you know for the wild life, as well as the fish, everything needs to be tested,” Morris said.
There are also ways you can help.
Salt by WXYZ-TV Channel 7 Detroit on Scribd
Remember “shovel, scatter, sweep, switch.”
Shovel snow first, scatter salt so there is space between the grains, sweep excess salt up, and switch methods if it is too cold for salt to work.
You can also do your own salt strip tests.
By taking the Salt Watch Pledge, you can receive a free testing kit to see if road salt pollution is a problem in your local stream. To order a kit, click here.
