The spreadsheet is the master database used for the research with the title of "Stakeholder engagement and knowledge co-production for better watershed management with the Freshwater Health Index" to be published on Current Research in Environmental Sustainability in late 2022. The data include narratives for six principles on stakeholder engagement and knowledge co-production. These principles were derived by combining Talley et al’s five principles for effective stakeholder engagement (Talley et al. 2016) with Norström et al’s four principles for knowledge co-production (Norström et al. 2020). The six principles were aligned with the components of the freshwater health index (FHI) framework. Project leaders from nine FHI case studies completed a text table based on the description of the six principles and their FHI factors. This process generated the present master qualitative database with narrative responses. The socio-ecological context for each case study is provided for contextualization.