To the editor:

I read with interest the opinion published in your last edition, entitled “Wrong approach for stream restoration.” Bashing Dave Rosgen’s natural stream design and restoration methods is a long-running scientific discussion and will not be resolved in the pages of this newspaper.

It is worth noting, however, that Rosgen’s methods apply to streams and rivers across the country and are not applicable only to “large order streams and rivers, especially the kinds one finds in the American west.” This view is, in fact, one of the major misunderstandings of Rosgen’s method.

The Rosgen method has been applied to many streams in the east and west. Many successful natural stream designs have been completed in eastern states such as North

Carolina, Maryland, Virginia, Florida, West Virginia and Minnesota. It is also worth noting that Rosgen’s methods have also been successfully applied to many headwater and small western streams and rivers which in size and character mirror many eastern streams. Every stream restoration and water quality improvement project is different, but Rosgen’s natural stream design method is a valuable and widely applicable tool for stream restoration in large and small streams in the east and west.

Your readers need to know that the article you published last week is properly labeled as opinion. Many environmental professionals support, defend and utilize Rosgen’s natural stream design methods to improve stream function and aquatic health.

-Don Brady, USEPA retired