BirdTrout
Birch Creek, New York
7.3 mapped river miles, draining 8 square miles, in the Middle Hudson basin watershed. No gauge stands in it; the nearest is 3.2 miles away, and what this page knows about its temperature is NYSDEC's classification of the water itself.
50°F and colder is cold, through cold-transitional and cool, to warm above 70°F — the same four bands, breaking at 58, 64 and 70°F, that the app paints. Grey is water nobody has measured.
The nearest live reading
The nearest gauge is 3.2 miles away, at Esopus Creek — not a reading of this water, but of what the region is doing today.
Thermal classification
NYSDEC's classification of this water, reach by reach. A class, not a temperature — no July mean, because none was measured here.
| Reach | Typed miles | Band | NYSDEC type |
|---|---|---|---|
| RM 7.2–0.0 | 7.2 | cold | — |
NYSDEC has classified 7.2 of the 7.3 miles NHD carries for this stream — 98% of it. Every typed reach carries the same class, cold. The untyped reaches are not warm water — they are water NYSDEC's inventory does not reach, and the mile ranges above span only the reaches it does.
Questions about this river
- Birch Creek fishing report — what it reads right now
- How to get to Birch Creek — access, parking and public land
- Birch Creek fishing regulations — season, size and gear by reach
NYSDEC classification
NYSDEC classifies this water as Class B — swimming and contact recreation. On those reaches DEC also designates it trout spawning waters — which is the half of the classification that is about temperature, and the half this map paints by. The class is a designation of best usage under 6 NYCRR — what the water is protected for — and not the season and creel rules, which change yearly and live with the agency.
NYSDEC water quality classifications and standards →
Access
1 mapped NYSDEC access site within a quarter mile of the water, upstream first: Pine Hill Lake At Pine Hill (RM 2.2). 1 walk-in, 0 boat or canoe launches.
Public land on the river
4 units of public or open-access land touch this river, 11,294 acres in total. Acreage is the whole unit, not the part beside the water.
| Unit | Owner | Acres |
|---|---|---|
| Birch Creek | city land | 180 |
| Shandaken Wild Forest | state conservation department | 6,122 |
| Belleayre Mountain Day Use Area | state conservation department | 53 |
| Halcott Mountain Wild Forest | state conservation department | 4,939 |
Species
NYSDEC designates this as trout water — Trout spawning waters — without naming the species. No fish survey or stocking record for this water is in the files this site reads.
Tributaries and watershed
1 named stream meets this one. Confluence miles are above the mouth; the longest twelve are listed.
Birch Creek sits in HUC 8 02020006, the Middle Hudson basin, and drains 8 square miles, Strahler order 4 at the mouth. 25 NHD reaches carry the name for 7.3 miles in total.
Other water nearby
The closest 6 rivers on this site, straight-line from the middle of this one — not drive time.