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Neuse Riverkeeper Samantha Krop, Pamlico-Tar Riverkeeper Katey Zimmerman and Water Quality Specialist Taylor Register were in the Upper Tar watershed this week, counting mussel populations on Deep Creek.

“Mussels, in general, are good indicators of water quality in terms of turbidity,” Katey said. “We’ve been wanting to do a mussel survey to determine the species and the populations there to see if those populations have been impacted by sediment from the Moriah Energy Center construction site.”

In 2024, Dominion Energy began construction on a liquified natural gas facility on 480 acres of land near Moriah. Two streams that run through the site are tributaries of Deep Creek, which flows into the Flat River. Deep Creek is home to such threatened and endangered aquatic species as the Neuse River Waterdog, Roanoke Bass, Carolina Ladle Crayfish and several species of mussels. After construction began, the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality confirmed that sediment from construction was elevating turbidity above state standards.

The Riverkeeping team met up with Aaron Ellis from Carolina Wetlands Association and Kim Morgan, a freshwater mussel biologist, for the mussel survey.

“We met up on farmland that backs up to Deep Creek, just downstream of the Moriah Energy Center, then took a couple of turbidity and other water-quality readings upstream,” Katey said. “We walked in line upstream for a couple hundred feet, using scopes, to get a sense of the populations and the number of mussels present.”

The predominant species found was the eastern elliptio.

“We were hoping to find some of the Atlantic pigtoe, which is an endangered species,” Katey said.

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