A young girl’s work to clean up the Lahave River is getting national attention.
Twelve-year-old Stella Bowles, from Dayspring, has been nominated as a “Top 25 Under 25 Environmentalist in Canada.”
Bowles has been testing the water for fecal bacteria since November and posting her results on Facebook.
She says her classmates were surprised by what she’s found.
“The kids at school are really disgusted that people are flushing their toilets into the river,” she says.
The project started as a science fair submission at Bridgewater Elementary.
Bowles got the idea after her parents told her she couldn’t swim in the river due the more than 600 straight pipes pouring sewage into the water.
She was surprised to learn while the pipes are technically illegal, work to remove them has been slow moving.
Now, Bowles is expanding her project in hopes of learning how far the problem reaches.
She hopes the attention garnered by her work will put pressure on the government to keep working on a solution.
As for the award, she’ll find out if she’s won in the next few weeks.
