National Park College (NPC) students from Dr. George Maxey’s Physical Geology class
gathered data from Bull Bayou Creek earlier this month. This is the seventh year of
the ongoing study to measure the total estimated annual discharge into Lake Hamilton.
Students selected a location on Bull Bayou Creek east of the NPC campus to gather
GPS location, water temperature, pH of the water, width of the stream, average depth
of the stream, and average velocity. Upon returning to the classroom, students entered
their data into a spreadsheet for final calculations.
Results of the project indicated that Bull Bayou’s contribution of water flowing into
Lake Hamilton was approximately 848,634,508.02 cubic foot per year. Based on data
collected from 2017 through 2022, discharge calculations for 2023 were approximately
52% higher than the average for 2017, 2018, 2019, (no data for 2020), 2021, and 2022.
The increase in discharge rate is most likely a result of the recent spring rain.
Students participating in the data collection included Katie Deloera, John Satterfield,
Luke Hindman, Eli Hutcherson, Isaac House, Ty Thomerson, and Landon Williams.
Pictured are Eli Hutcherson and Landon Williams measuring the Width of Bull Bayou
Creek. Katie Deloera (not pictured) recorded data.
