Fonteyn Kill

The Fonteyn Kill is long. Historian Helen Wilkinson Reynolds reported in 1924 that the stream is fed by a spring in Arlington, New York. More recently, the exact source of the kill has been reported as unknown. Historical records indicate a variety of courses once followed by the stream. A 2010 study observed that the Fonteyn Kill flows from a culvert beneath Park Avenue in an eastward direction through an urban zone before turning southward and feeding into the artificial Vassar Lake. It then flows southeastward beneath Raymond Avenue through the campus of Vassar College, beneath the college's Bridge for Laboratory Sciences, and into the Casperkill just below Sunset Lake at a location once dubbed "The Meeting of the Waters". The Fonteyn Kill is the only perennial tributary of the Casperkill, itself a tributary of the Hudson River. In 1924, the Fonteyn Kill was noted as having several small tributaries, primarily "small meadow-runs, largely surface-water". ==Watershed and hydrology==

|alt=A stream runs between leafless trees, beneath a footbridge, and towards a reed-heavy area. Historically, the Fonteyn Kill's water has been noted for its cleanness. In 1924, the stream's "purity" was noted while an 1867 book describes the kill's waters as "pellucid". More recently, the stream has been cited as suffering from urban stream syndrome. In spite of this, the stream itself is bordered by a combination of residential lots and forested swaths ranging from in width. A 2010 study of the stream found that the Fonteyn Kill's specific conductance, a measure of the amount of dissolved road salt in the stream's water, was nearly 1.0 mS/cm, higher than any value recorded in the Casperkill. The total inorganic nitrogen in the kill, which is usually correlated with surrounding green cover, was about , average for measurements taken in the Fonteyn Kill and Casperkill in that study. The study also found that the Fonteyn Kill's score on the Hilsenhoff family biotic index (HBI), a scale measuring pollution based on the tolerance of endemic benthic macroinvertebrates, was approximately six, indicating fairly poor water quality, with scores for the rest of the Casperkill–Fonteyn Kill watershed were as high as seven (poor water quality) to as low as four (very good water quality).{{efn|HBI scores are calculated as HBI=\frac{\sum n_{i}\times a_{i}}{N}, where ni is the number of taxa i collected, ai is the tolerance value for taxon i, and N is the total number of sampled specimens. Scores ranging from 5.76–6.50 indicate "fairly poor" water quality and that "substantial pollution [is] likely" in the sampled body of water.}} An oil spill was observed in the kill in 2016 and DEC staff were again sent to respond. The DEC installed booms to absorb the oil and began an investigation into the spill's source, which was unknown as of December 6. Efforts are being made to monitor the water quality of the Fonteyn Kill, led by Vassar College's Environmental Research Institute and the Cornell University Cooperative Extension Dutchess County Environment Program. Three sites are regularly sampled for water quality while devices such as sondes continuously record temperature, conductivity, and pH. Benthic macroinvertebrates are frequently counted and fecal coliform counts are also run. ==Geography and geology==

Cambrian to Ordovician-age dolomite, part of the Wappinger Group, and calcareous shales from the Hudson River Group underlie the Fonteyn Kill. Till and to a lesser extent other glacial sediments today sit atop the dolomite and shale. Surrounding soils are loamy, either silt loam or gravelly loam depending on the underlying surficial geology. The streambed is composed of about 25% sand, silt, and clay and approximately 75% cobbles. Quicksand was once common around the Fonteyn Kill and its minor tributaries. The distance covered by the stream is noted as being relatively flat, descending between over the course of its run. Vassar Lake, through which the kill passes, is a shallow body of water, measured in 2013 with a maximum depth of and an average depth of . ==Biology==

The Fonteyn Kill and its riparian zone are home to a variety of species. Caddisflies, clams and mussels, crayfish (Astacidae), damselflies, gammarids, isopods (Asellidae), oligochaetes, black flies, leeches, chironomids, bladder snails, and other snails were recorded in the stream in 2010. Trees along the banks of the Fonteyn Kill include American elms, sugar maples, black cherries, Norway maples, and red maples, while barberry, privet, holly, Japanese knotweed, honeysuckle, spicebush, common reeds, and Japanese roses make up the kill's riparian shrubs. Carp, mallards, great blue herons, frogs, snapping turtles, and other birds also reside in and around the stream. A 1924 source observed that trout fishing occurred on the kill. ==History==

The Fonteyn Kill flows through land originally inhabited by the Wappinger band which, throughout the 1600s, came under Dutch control. The Dutch lost control of the territory to the British in 1664 and Dutchess County was established. In 1688, Pieter Schuyler was granted a title to the land through which the Fonteyn Kill runs. He split that land and sold the Fonteyn Kill tract (soon to be known as '''' or "Eastward Neighborhood") in 1699 to Myndert Harmense and Robert Sanders. A mill was built along the stream before 1714; in that year, Sanders's son Thomas sold the structure to Isaac Tietsoort who in turn sold it to March Van Bommel in 1717. In 1721, an accurate survey of the land was conducted. The mill on the Fonteyn Kill was discovered to be the property of Catharine Brett who claimed the land and sold a farm parcel that included the mill in 1754 to Johannes Swartwout. The land remained in Swartwout's hands until he died in 1805. From his heirs, the land came to be owned in 1812 by Matthew Westervelt and then Reuben Tanner in 1815. Tanner controlled the Fonteyn Kill land until 1844 when Caleb Morgan acquired the title to the space. In 1854, the land was transferred to Matthew Vassar, for whom "the presence of fresh water was an important factor in deciding the college's location". Etymology The name "Fonteyn Kill" is derived from the Dutch '''', literally meaning "Spring Brook". The stream's name is also sometimes written without a space as "Fonteynkill". ==Recreation==

The Fonteyn Kill and Vassar Lake have been used recreationally since Vassar College's establishment in the 1860s. Benson John Lossing recorded Vassar students in 1867 using Vassar Lake, then known as "Mill Cove Lake", for rowing and boating in the summer months; a simple dock was built to allow access to the water. In the winter, the lake froze over and students at the college would ice skate upon the surface. The shallowness of the lake became an obstacle to recreational use, and while it was suggested by Vassar's Miscellany News that the lake be dredged or removed entirely, neither of these options were employed and the lake is no longer a recreation site. By the 1920s, the Fonteyn Kill's source spring was being dammed in wintertime, flooding a nearby hollow to create an ice skating pond. ==See also==