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NONPOINT SOURCE SUCCESS STORY

Conservation Practices Reduce Bacteria in Crooked Creek (Beaver
County)
Waterbody Improved
High bacteria levels resulted in the impairment of Crooked Creek
and placement on Oklahoma's Clean Water Act (CWA) section
303(d) list of impaired waters in 2004. Pollution from grazing lands contributed to this impairment.
Implementing conservation practice systems (CPs) to promote better agricultural land management
decreased Escherichia coli (E. coli) levels in the creek. As a result, Oklahoma removed lower Crooked
Creek from its 2014 CWA section 303(d) list for E. coli. Crooked Creek remains listed as impaired for
Enterococcus, although levels have declined. Crooked Creek now partially supports its primary body
contact (PBC) designated beneficial use.
Problem
Crooked Creek is a 39.8-mile stream flowing through
Meade County, Kansas, into Beaver County, Oklahoma,
before it joins the Cimarron River (Figure 1). Land use
in the 90,443-acre watershed is predominantly range-
land (approximately 87 percent) with only 7 percent
cropland. Challenges with rangeland management con-
tributed to listing the Oklahoma portion of the stream
as impaired for E. coli and Enterococcus in 2004 when
the geomean of samples collected during the recre-
ation season was 272 colony-forming units E. coli per
100 milliters (CFU/100 ml.) and 525 CFU/100 mi_ for
Enterococcus. The PBC designated use is considered
impaired if the recreation season geometric mean
exceeds 126 CFU/100 mL for £ coli and/or 33 CFU/100
mLfor Enterococcus. Oklahoma added a 6.4-mile
segment of Crooked Creek (OK620930000100_00) to
the 2004 CWA section 303(d) list for nonattalnment of
its PBC designated beneficial use. Although it was later
determined that the 2004 iisting had been in error due
to an insufficient number of samples, the assessments
in 2006 through 2010 confirmed the impaired status of
Crooked Creek.
Story Highlights
Improvements in the watershed are linked to manage-
ment changes by both Kansas and Oklahoma land
managers in partnership with local conservation
districts, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural
Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and Farm
Services Agency (FSA), and other agencies in both
Figure 1. Crooked Creek is in northwestern Oklahoma.
states. In the 7,200-acre Oklahoma portion of the
watershed, agricultural producers worked with the
Beaver County Conservation District, the NRCS, and
the Oklahoma Conservation Commission (OCC) to
implement CPs through NRCS's Environmental Quality
incentives Program (EQIP), Wildlife Habitat Incentives
Program (WHIP), Conservation Stewardship Program
(CStwP), and general conservation technical assistance
program, FSA's Conservation Reserve Program and
Oklahoma's Locally Led Cost Share Program (I..LCP). CPs
installed between 2002 and 2017 focused on reducing
erosion and pollutant runoff from rangeland in the
watershed, and included access control (2,734 acres
[ac]), brush management (392 ac), cover crop (409
ac), restoration of rare and declining natural habitat
(221 ac), four water wells, conservation crop rotation
Monitoring Site
Impaired Crooked Creek Segment
Crooked Creek
Summarized Watershed Implementation Area
Crooked Creek Watershed HUC 12s
Counties

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Crooked Creek E. coli
geomean: 272	126 114	150 124	84	72	87
1,
~ [
III
3 B
2004	2006	2008	2010	2012	2014	2016	2018
Geomean: 52
Crooked Creek Enterococcus
5 145 106 73
71
1600
1400
a-1200
E
1
1000
3
S 800
1 600
400
200

¦
3 E
3 ^
a

20
04 2006 20
08 2010
2014
Figure 2. Crooked Creek E. coli concentrations now
meet standards.
(480 ac), fence (16,478 feet), upland wildlife habitat
management (4,447 ac), forage harvest manage-
ment (1,655 ac), integrated pest management (2,398
ac), prescribed grazing (6,090 ac), livestock pipeline
(36,249 feet), no-till (406 ac), four livestock pumping
plants, no-till/strip-till (76 ac), wetland wildlife habitat
management (268 ac), 16 watering facilities, herba-
ceous weed treatment (182 ac), and rotation of supple-
ment and feeding areas (218 ac).
Results
The OCC documented improved water quality in
Crooked Creek due to the installation of CPs. The
installed CPs worked to decrease runoff of fecal
bacteria to downstream waterbodies. Monitoring
data compiled for the 2006 integrated report showed
that the geomean of Crooked Creek recreation season
E. coli was 127 CFU/100 ml_, which violated the
standard of 126 CFU/100 mL (Figure 2). However, by
the 2012 assessment, bacteria levels had dropped,
and the E. coli geometric mean was 124 CFU/100 mL.
Levels continue to drop over time. Likewise, the 2006
assessment indicated a geomean of 145 CFU/100 mL.
for Enterococcus, which also decreased over time
(Figure 3). Based on these data, Oklahoma removed
Crooked Creek from the CWA section 303(d) list for
E. coli in 2012. Although the stream remains listed for
Enterococcus and is, therefore, only partially support-
ing its PBC beneficial use, concentrations are decreas-
ing; all other assessed beneficial uses are now fully
supported.
Figure 3. Enterococcus levels have declined but do not
yet meet standards in Crooked Creek.
Partners and Funding
The OCC monitoring program is supported by U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) CWA section
319 funding at an average annual statewide cost of
$1 million. Approximately $500,000 in EPA section 319
funds support statewide water quality educational
efforts through Blue Thumb. Approximately $153,000
of these federal and matching state funds have been
devoted to Crooked Creek. From 2002 to 2015, NRCS
and OCC supplied approximately $42,000 for imple-
mentation of CPs in the watershed through NRCS EQIP
and the LLCP. Additional funds were provided through
NRCS and FSA for WHIP, CStwP and CRP. In addition,
many practices were funded by landowners based on
recommendations through NRCS general technical
assistance and conservation planning.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of Water
Washington, DC
W .1
^ EPA 841-F-18-001HH
pR0*t^° November 2018
For additional information contact:
Shanon Phillips
Oklahoma Conservation Commission
405-522-4728 • shanon.phillips@conservation.ok.gov

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