Delaware Watersheds

The Red Lion watershed is located south of the city of New Castle and north of the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal. It flows eastward to the Delaware River. The stream is free flowing but has a tidegate at the mouth which only allows discharges to the Delaware River at low tides. Thus, there is no tidal influence on the Red Lion Creek.

The watershed is dominated by urban land uses.

DNREC's Wetland Monitoring and Assessment Program (WMAP) has been developing scientifically robust methods to monitor and evaluate wetlands in Delaware on a watershed basis. Learn more about the health of the wetlands in this watershed from the DNREC Wetlands Monitoring and Assessment Program.

There are nutrient and bacteria TMDLs in the Red Lion Creek watershed that require 40% reductions in phosphorus, nitrogen and bacteria. There are several point source facilities in the watershed but because of the outfall locations that do not discharge to Red Lion Creek, there are only nonpoint sources of pollution in this watershed.

The designated uses set for the Red Lion Creek watershed include primary recreation, secondary recreation, fish, aquatic life, and wildlife, industrial water supply, agricultural water supply and public water supply sources in the freshwater segments.

This watershed has sites sampled for a consistent suite of environmental contaminants. These contaminants are broadly classified as Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), Semi-Volatile Organic Compounds (SVOCs), Pesticides, Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCBs) and Metals as listed using USEPA and DNREC defined standards. When sites are adjacent to water bodies sediment samples are collected to assess potential impact from a site on the health of the waters. Learn more information specific to this watershed from the DNREC Advanced Facility Search Tool.

Delaware's Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC), Division of Fish and Wildlife conducts on-going inventories of natural communities as well as rare and declining species, (e.g., state and globally-rare plants, birds, insects, mussels, reptiles, and amphibians). It maintains a database, both electronic and manual, of its findings throughout the state. Learn more about the wildlife and plant communities in this watershed from the DNREC Division of Fish and Wildlife Conservation Programs.

In addition, the Division of Fish and Wildlife, working with the University of Delaware's Institute for Public Administration - Water Resources Center, maintains online databases about plants and plant communities in Delaware. Learn more about the plant communities in this watershed from the DNREC Division of Fish and Wildlife.

For more detailed information on this watershed, its water quality and resources, check out the following resources:

Delaware TMDLs

Delaware Whole Basin Reports

CCMP for the Delaware Estuary

View of Red Lion Creek meandering through the forest
Photo credit: DNREC's Wetland Monitoring and Assessment Program