BirdTrout

Birch Run, Pennsylvania

4.1 mapped river miles, draining 5 square miles, in the Brandywine Christina basin watershed. A USGS gauge stands in it, but its record is too short for a measured July mean, so what this page knows about its temperature is today's reading and PA DEP's classification of the water itself.

Open in BirdTrout
Map key
Public land — where the bank is open to walk and fish
USGS gauge — live water temperature
Water temperature — the colour of the river, and of every dot on it

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

This gauge stands in Birch Run. Its record is too short for a July mean, so the class below is PA DEP's — but the reading is this water.

64.2 °F
Birch Run Near Wagontown, Pa
on this water · 2 cfs · read 30 Sep, 9:45 am ET
Cool

Thermal classification

PA DEP'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 PA DEP type
RM 4.1–1.9 2.2 cool —
RM 2.1–2.1 1.0 cold —
RM 1.9–0.0 1.9 cool —

PA DEP has classified 5.1 of the 7.8 miles NHD carries for this stream — 66% of it. The typed water splits 4.1 mi cool, 1.0 mi cold. The untyped reaches are not warm water — they are water PA DEP's inventory does not reach, and the mile ranges above span only the reaches it does.

Questions about this river

PA DEP classification

PA DEP classifies this water as Cold Water Fishes and Trout Stocking. More than one class appears because the classification changes along the river. The thermal bar above shows where. The management tier on those reaches is Cold Water Fishes, Trout Stocking. This is a designation of the fishery, not the season and creel rules — those change yearly and live with the agency.

Species

PA DEP designates this as trout water — Cold Water Fishes, Trout Stocking — 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 Run sits in HUC 8 02040205, the Brandywine Christina basin, and drains 5 square miles, Strahler order 3 at the mouth. 18 NHD reaches carry the name for 7.8 miles in total — more than the 4.1 miles of drawn mainstem, because NHD counts side channels and braids as their own reaches.

Other water nearby

The closest 6 rivers on this site, straight-line from the middle of this one — not drive time.