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As you stand on the bank of a clear, rapidly moving stream, or as you watch children at play on the banks of a warm, sluggish, center-of-town river, think about the millions of gallons of water moving past. What is the source of the water? Where does it go? If you follow the muddy river upstream, you may find that it is fed by the clear, cold, trout stream that you were fishing in yesterday. waterfall

Why do rivers and streams undergo such drastic changes as they flow to the ocean? What causes the marked differences among the types of plants and animals to be found along the course of the stream? You would not fish in a slow, muddy river and expect to catch a trout. Nor would you search through the clean gravel on the bottom of a fast stream for leeches, tadpoles, or mosquito larvae.

Monitoring streams is a simple but effective way to understand the natural world. Stream monitoring can provide a quick check on the health of the entire watershed, since, whatever happens on the land ends up in the water, sooner or later. Streams can be monitored for many traits and in many ways. This project looks at steams in four different ways. We will examine closely the physical, chemical, and biological nature of our streams. Testing the water quality, survey fish and wildlife habitat, and keeping abreast of land uses in the entire watershed allows you to become an extra set of eyes and ears for interested agencies and ensure that your stream is looked after on a regular basis. Even more importantly, you can become an informed citizen who can collect information to create new on knowledge about our environment.

To get you started, follow the links below and begin your exploration of your local freshwater stream!

Exploring Freshwater Streams

  1. Visual Survey

  2. Water Quality Index

  3. Biological Inventory

  4. Flow Rate


1996-2009 PathFinder Science
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