In a mere 400 years, changes to the ecosystem by humans have damaged 7,100 miles of the watershed’s 36,000 miles of streams, according to the report, “Waters at Risk: Sources and Solutions — Pollution in the Susquehanna River Watershed.”

The key problems, according to the report released today: sediment and manure runoff; metals; acid mine drainage; physical alterations to waterways by dams; and loss of protective forests and fields to development.

The pathways to making the river and its thousands of feeder streams healthy: adjusting feed rations to livestock to bring down the amount of phosphorus and nitrogen in manure; updating aging and inefficient sewage-treatment plants; better storm-water management techniques in housing and business developments; and passive limestone-based treatment systems for acid draining from abandoned mines.

As an example of solutions in the making, the report singles out Scott Kreider of Kreider Farms near Manheim.

The farm operation is using “precision feeding” for its dairy herd. Feeding adjustments, Kreider says, “are saving us money and the cows are doing better.” It’s also reducing the amount of nutrients in the cows’ manure.

All the solutions needed to bring back the Susquehanna are proven and doable, the report says.

“As surely as we had the brawn to degrade the river’s carefully balanced system, we have the brains to repair it,” the report concludes. “All that is required is the political will and leadership to fully fund and implement those solutions.

“What is needed now is the persistent leadership to fully fund and implement those solutions. Only then can Pennsylvania restore and protect this critical system from further degradation, ensuring a thriving agricultural industry and vibrant communities with clean water and healthy fisheries for the benefit of all.”

There is so much attention paid to the Susquehanna in the Chesapeake Bay restoration effort because it supplies nearly half its fresh water and is the source of much of its nutrient pollution.

Though there’s hope, the Susquehanna’s ills are “massive,” the report says.

One example is the fact that almost every stream in Pennsylvania once supported native brook trout. Yet, today, more than 70 percent of state streams cannot support cold-water fish or could harbor many more than they do.

The Susquehanna itself has some of the best smallmouth bass fishing in the world, but a mysterious fish kill last spring sent an alarming number of the fish belly-up.

The report calls Lancaster County a manure hot spot because it represents only 1.5 percent of the area in the Chesapeake Bay watershed but produces about 12 percent of all nitrogen from manure in the watershed.

The amount of livestock has grown as farm fields to absorb nutrients in manure has shrunk.

The excess nutrients flow into streams, into the Susquehanna and eventually into the Chesapeake Bay, where it causes blooms of algae that deprive the bay of oxygen and blocks sunlight from reaching underwater grasses.

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