Green Brook Cleanest Yet After 5th Annual Multi-Site Clean-Up

June 10, 2025 Danielle Bongiovanni

By Danielle Bongiovanni, LRWP 2025 Science Communication Intern

On Saturday, May 10, dozens of volunteers worked together to fill nearly 100 garbage bags with litter removed from the Green Brook. The Lower Raritan Watershed Partnership (LRWP) led the fifth annual multi-site clean-up alongside the Americorps New Jersey Watershed Ambassadors (NJWA), the Union & Somerset County Clean Communities Programs, the Mayor’s Alliance for a Cleaner Green Brook Waterway, and the Central Jersey Stream Team. The sites stretched across eight participating municipalities: Dunellen, Green Brook, Middlesex Township, Plainfield, South Plainfield, Watchung, Scotch Plains, and Bound Brook.

Volunteers originated from beyond those municipalities’ borders, inspired by how all watersheds are connected and impact each other. Piscataway resident David Dunham has participated in clean-ups with his son for nearly a decade, several of which focused on the Green Brook. Repeat visits have yielded visible progress.

“In general, [the Green Brook] was in much better shape than some of the other times we’ve been over here. It’s nice to come back to the same spot and be able to compare,” Dunham said. “It’s a good sign, we’re heading in the right direction.”

Still, volunteers picked up plenty of trash. Dunham recounted collecting “small bottles, cans, wrappers that had come off of some bottle at some point. Nothing too out of the ordinary until we got to the very end, and then we found a kitchen sink.”

Other notable items collected throughout the day included tires, stereo equipment, mattresses, and a wheelbarrow. The majority of trash present consisted of everyday litter such as plastic bottles, beer cans, and broken glass — little items discarded without thought for how quickly they pile up.

Volunteers found a variety of macroinvertebrates amidst the trash, and the seven Watershed Ambassadors in attendance eagerly provided identification. At McCoy Park in Dunellen, Kaitlyn Pinto and Emilie Wigchers, who normally cover Watershed Management Areas #7 (Arthur Kill) and #4 (Lower Passaic, Saddle) respectively, pointed out clam shells, worms, snail eggs, and midge fly larvae.

The Green Brook’s ecosystem is dominated by pollution-tolerant organisms. Pinto and Wigchers note their presence to determine the brook could be healthier. Watershed Ambassadors promote environmental stewardship with the hope of making areas like the Green Brook suitable for pollution-sensitive macroinvertebrates like gilled snails or mayflies.

“This is a great partnership between Watershed Ambassadors and LRWP, and it’s not just the clean-up. They do a bunch of other stuff too, and we do fun stuff like the litter trap monitoring and the eel monitoring and all these cool things. It all ties into that theme of protecting water quality in the state, so it’s a really good connection to have,” Pinto said.

The theme of collaboration in pursuit of healthier watersheds was strong, with members of organizations with similar missions coming out to support the LRWP. Mark Lesko, founder of the Highland Park Ecology and Environmental Group (HPEEG), made time to participate despite running clean-ups for the HPEEG on the first and third Saturdays of each month.

Lesko reflected on the impromptu clean-up that cemented his dedication to environmental stewardship. “My first one was more than a decade ago. My daughter and I were in Johnson park looking for salamanders in a stream, and she said, ‘Daddy, look at all the trash…’ So we started cleaning it and all these kids that were at picnics came down and started cleaning it with us, and that day, I started my group,” he said.

The Green Brook clean-up ran from 9:30am – 12:00pm and was followed by a public demonstration of the Bandalong Bandit Litter Trap and the final eel monitoring session of the migratory season. Dunellen Mayor Jason F. Cilento, who participated in the clean-up, thanked the Dunellen Department of Public Works for routinely emptying the litter trap.

Like Dunham, Cilento noted how less trash is collected at each clean-up, indicating a cultural shift away from littering and toward respecting natural spaces. Cilento praised the other participating municipalities and organizations for their roles in making visible progress protecting a watershed dear to his childhood. “I grew up playing in these woods and this water and everything,” he said.

Although no glass eels or elvers were observed at the monitoring session, the crowd witnessed a tessellated darter and a variety of macroinvertebrates emerge from the eel mop. Volunteers went home tired and in need of showers, but satisfied from a day of good hard work.