The Maiden Creek watershed is one of the largest drainage basins in Berks County. This tributary of the Schuylkill River spans an area over 20 miles in length and joins the Schuylkill River north of the City of Reading, in Ontelaunee Township.
Maiden Creek directly feeds into Lake Ontelaunee, the second largest lake in Berks County and a critical reservoir for the City of Reading’s drinking water. However, within the very same watershed is another stream that deserves recognition. That stream is Willow Creek.
Maiden Creek, one of the largest watersheds in Berks County, may be the source of fresh, clean, potable waters for the City of Reading, but these cool and clean waters only flow by the allowance of the Maiden Creek’s smaller tributary streams.
It is apt to say that the quality of the waters found in the parent watershed are derived from the sum of its constituent parts. The Willow Creek is one of ten named tributary streams which lends its outstanding quality to its parent, the Maiden Creek.
The Willow Creek is a 9-mile-long stream, originating in the hills south of Fleetwood borough. Its waters spill forth from a multitude of small but ecologically vital forested springs. The clean and pure waters which flow from these humble springs (and their aquifers) have served as the drinking water source of Fleetwood Borough since 1891.
In recognition of these headwaters’ importance, the Borough purchased the woods harboring the springs later naming the property: the Fleetwood Reservoir Woodland. In 2024, to further commemorate and protect the historic, cultural, and environmental significance of these resources, the Borough placed this property under conservation easement with Berks Nature.
As Willow Creek winds its way down the hillsides, flowing west through Fleetwood Borough and across Maidencreek Township, it navigates past suburban developments, glides alongside major highways, and snakes through agricultural lands; quite the change of scenery from its shaded, woodland beginnings.
Leaving the shelter of its natal forests could be disastrous for a stream like the Willow Creek. Without proper infrastructure – natural or otherwise – our streams become degraded, incapable of supporting any habitat for wildlife or clean drinking water for people.
There’s a reason that these things are doing the things they do, so why do I think I know better than these natural systems?
– Deanne Boyer, owner of Willow Run Farmstead.
Degraded streams incur environmental and economic costs which we are not prepared to pay, yet we come to know them intimately. Nature has painstakingly engineered its systems, the culmination of millions of years of evolution, to operate indefinitely. While Nature often reinvents itself and adapts to novel conditions slowly, its finely calibrated systems cannot keep pace with the fervor of humanity’s ambitions and growth.
So it is that, whether by ignorance or intent, we can easily and swiftly disrupt Nature’s grand yet delicate machine.
Consider a stream like the Willow Creek.
These small, even humble waterways are our first line of defense against the prolonged drought periods and high-volume rainfall events our County increasingly faces, year-by-year. The rock formations, soils, and vegetation of a creek and the surrounding floodplain are naturally designed to disrupt storm surges by absorbing and retaining excess runoff, thus reducing the velocity and volume of water coursing downstream. So critical are these three factors that should any one of them fail, the stream suffers and its natural functionality to mitigate drought and floods declines.
All life inexorably depends upon water. From the City of Reading to rural villages like those of Moselem Springs to the vast acres of farmland in the Maiden Creek’s drainage basin, flowing water sustains our settlements and farms. In a way, we chase water. It guides how we interact with our soils, tend our livestock, cultivate our crops, and build our communities. The question becomes, then:
How do we best protect our investment in nature?
Thankfully, successful strategies are pleasingly simple and are, themselves, prepared for us by Nature.
Trees are the mightiest vanguards for air and water quality available to us. According to the US Forest Service, 100 mature trees remove 53 tons of carbon dioxide from Earth’s atmosphere and can absorb up to 139,000 gallons of rainwater per year. When planted alongside waterways – known as riparian buffers – trees and shrubs armor streambanks against erosion and act much like a filter, absorbing excess water and contaminants.
When Berks Nature vows to protect access to Nature for All, we vow to protect the services rendered by our forests and waterways. To live this pledge, we work with farms, municipalities, and school districts to implement Best Management Practices (BMPs), and this often involves the planting (and growing) of trees.
Many such projects are underway in the Willow Creek watershed. Across public green spaces and community parks across the greater Fleetwood area, Berks Nature and our community partners have successfully planted over 500 native trees and shrubs along the banks and floodplains of the Willow Creek.
The Fleetwood Middle School is one shining example of this work. To date, Berks Nature has planted over 40 trees (number growing!) along the school’s athletic fields and the campus’ retention pond with the help of students and faculty. Beyond the benefits to air and water quality for the Borough, these young trees will grow, providing shade for future generations of students that seek refuge from summer heat and seasonal winds.
Elsewhere, at Maier’s Grove Park in Blandon, Berks Nature and volunteers from the Maiden Creek Watershed Association have planted more than 30 trees and shrubs, including mighty shade trees like swamp and white oaks and sycamores as well as swift-growing honey locusts, tulip poplars, and silky dogwoods.
This segment of Willow Creek suffered severe damage following Tropical Storm Ophelia in 2023. Our community efforts will revegetate the bare banks of this battered reach, beautifying the space at Maier’s Grove Park and providing merciful shade to the waters. Even the effects of large rainfall events such as tropical storms can largely be mitigated by proper foliage cover.
Willow Creek flows with waters clean, clear, and cold thanks to the full community support of the watershed’s townships, farms, students, and people – beneficiaries all to this life-giving resource. It winds down from forested hills, and across suburban developments, and rich farmlands to join the Maiden Creek, ostensibly its parent stream. Yet the parent is healed, helped, and made more resilient by the Willow Creek.
Water connects all life, and the Willow Creek is a clear strand that connects and unites the communities within the southern Maiden Creek basin.
A student of Fleetwood Area Middle School assists with the native tree planting effort occurring on their campus with the help of Berks Nature.
Volunteers plant trees along the stretch of Willow Creek that flows through Maier’s Grove Park in Blandon.