Water Quality Index Score: 53, Marginal

If we’re going to call Los Penasquitos the average watershed example of San Diego County, we’re going to call Otay Watershed the most consistent watershed in the county. Its consistently high numbers showed:

• Consistently high bacteria levels – Every sample collected exceeded healthy standards for Enterococcus.
• Consistently high Nitrate levels – almost every sample exceeded standards

This also means that this wasteshed runs consistent with our theory that the region’s drought has affected water quality in addition to water quantify. At no point in 2014 did the data from Otay Watershed put it into healthy ranges for fecal indicator bacteria or nitrates. But, consistent with all the watershed scores in December, Otay Watershed’s scores did worsen after the rain event.

We loved hearing that our volunteers in this watershed also consistently spotted dragonflies, crawfish, and herons while sampling.