Beth Run is a

tributary A tributary, or affluent, is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem (or parent) river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean. Tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drainag ...

Bowman Creek Bowman Creek (also known as Bowmans Creek or Bowman's Creek) is a tributary of the Susquehanna River in Luzerne County and Wyoming County, in Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is approximately long and flows through Ross Township and Lake To ...

Luzerne County, Pennsylvania Luzerne County is a County (United States), county in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of , of which is land and is water. It is Northeastern Pennsylvania's second-largest county ...

, in the United States. It is approximately long and flows through Ross Township and Lake Township. The watershed of the stream has an area of . The surficial geology along it consists of Wisconsinan Till and alluvium. The stream's watershed is designated as a High-Quality Coldwater Fishery and a Migratory Fishery and the stream is

Class A Wild Trout Waters Class A Wild Trout Waters are the highest biomass class given to streams in Pennsylvania by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission. They are considered to contain the highest-quality naturally reproducing trout populations in Pennsylvania. ...

Course

Beth Run begins at the head of a valley in Ross Township. It flows east-northeast for several tenths of a mile before turning northeast for several tenths of a mile and entering Lake Township. Here, the stream receives an unnamed tributary from the

right Rights are legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical th ...

and turns north for several tenths of a mile, its valley widening considerably. At the end of the valley, the stream reaches its confluence with Bowman Creek. Beth Run joins Bowman Creek upstream of its mouth.

Hydrology

The concentration of

alkalinity Alkalinity (from ar, القلوي, al-qaly, lit=ashes of the saltwort) is the capacity of water to resist acidification. It should not be confused with basicity, which is an absolute measurement on the pH scale. Alkalinity is the strengt ...

in Beth Run is .

Geography and geology

The elevation near the

mouth In animal anatomy, the mouth, also known as the oral cavity, or in Latin cavum oris, is the opening through which many animals take in food and issue vocal sounds. It is also the cavity lying at the upper end of the alimentary canal, bounded on t ...

of Beth Run is above

sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardise ...

. The elevation of the stream's

source Source may refer to: Research * Historical document * Historical source * Source (intelligence) or sub source, typically a confidential provider of non open-source intelligence * Source (journalism), a person, publication, publishing institute ...

between above sea level. The

surficial geology Superficial deposits (or surficial deposits) refer to geological deposits typically of Quaternary age (less than 2.6 million years old). These geologically recent unconsolidated sediments may include stream channel and floodplain deposits, beac ...

along most of the length of Beth Run consists of a

till image:Geschiebemergel.JPG, Closeup of glacial till. Note that the larger grains (pebbles and gravel) in the till are completely surrounded by the matrix of finer material (silt and sand), and this characteristic, known as ''matrix support'', is d ...

known as

Wisconsinan Till The Wisconsin Glacial Episode, also called the Wisconsin glaciation, was the most recent glacial period of the North American ice sheet complex. This advance included the Cordilleran Ice Sheet, which nucleated in the northern North American Cord ...

. In the stream's upper reaches,

alluvium Alluvium (from Latin ''alluvius'', from ''alluere'' 'to wash against') is loose clay, silt, sand, or gravel that has been deposited by running water in a stream bed, on a floodplain, in an alluvial fan or beach, or in similar settings. Alluv ...

is present as well and some of the Wisconsinan Till is underlain by

glacial lake A glacial lake is a body of water with origins from glacier activity. They are formed when a glacier erodes the land and then melts, filling the depression created by the glacier. Formation Near the end of the last glacial period, roughly 10, ...

clays. There is also a patch of Wisconsinan Bouldery Till at the headwaters; it is rich in

boulder In geology, a boulder (or rarely bowlder) is a rock fragment with size greater than in diameter. Smaller pieces are called cobbles and pebbles. While a boulder may be small enough to move or roll manually, others are extremely massive. In ...

s. The surficial geology along the sides of the stream's valley includes

bedrock In geology, bedrock is solid rock that lies under loose material ( regolith) within the crust of Earth or another terrestrial planet. Definition Bedrock is the solid rock that underlies looser surface material. An exposed portion of be ...

consisting of

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates ...

and

shale Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock formed from mud that is a mix of flakes of clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4) and tiny fragments (silt-sized particles) of other minerals, especia ...

Watershed

The

watershed Watershed is a hydrological term, which has been adopted in other fields in a more or less figurative sense. It may refer to: Hydrology * Drainage divide, the line that separates neighbouring drainage basins * Drainage basin, called a "watershe ...

of Beth Run has an area of . The stream is entirely within the

United States Geological Survey The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, ...

quadrangle of Sweet Valley. The entire length of Beth Run is on public land that is open to access.

History

Beth Run was entered into the

Geographic Names Information System The Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) is a database of name and locative information about more than two million physical and cultural features throughout the United States and its territories, Antarctica, and the associated states of ...

on August 2, 1979. Its identifier in the Geographic Names Information System is 1169332. In the 1970s, the

Pennsylvania Game Commission The Pennsylvania Game Commission (PGC) is the state agency responsible for wildlife conservation and management in Pennsylvania in the United States. It was originally founded years ago and currently utilizes more than 700 full-time employees and ...

was attempting to purchase a tract of land in the vicinity of Beth Run to add to

Pennsylvania State Game Lands Number 57 Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, Maryl ...

. The Pennsylvania Game Commission also once requested a permit to construct an aluminum

box culvert A culvert is a structure that channels water past an obstacle or to a subterranean waterway. Typically embedded so as to be surrounded by soil, a culvert may be made from a pipe, reinforced concrete or other material. In the United Kingdo ...

bridge over the stream with the purpose of providing access to the southern parts of

for tree salvage cutting.

Biology

The drainage basin of Beth Run is designated as a High-Quality Coldwater Fishery and a Migratory Fishery. Wild

trout Trout are species of freshwater fish belonging to the genera '' Oncorhynchus'', '' Salmo'' and '' Salvelinus'', all of the subfamily Salmoninae of the family Salmonidae. The word ''trout'' is also used as part of the name of some non-sa ...

naturally reproduce in the stream from its headwaters downstream to its mouth. It is classified by the

Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission is an independent state agency responsible for the regulation of all fishing and boating in the state of Pennsylvania within the United States of America. Unlike many U.S. states, Pennsylvania has a separ ...

as Class A Wild Trout Waters for brook trout from its headwaters downstream to its mouth.

References

{{authority control Rivers of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania Tributaries of Bowman Creek Rivers of Pennsylvania