Water Assessment Data Lab

Assignment # 5

Land Use

• The first thing you notice when field sampling is the area around your site. What type of land use is going on around it? What condition is it in?

• www.maps.google.com• Which stream do you think is going

to be severely impacted and which will be non- impacted?

The Data Sheets

• Data courtesy of Watershed Assessment Associates

Physical Characteristics

• Width, Depth, Current- affect who lives there

• Substrate- particle size of the stream bottom

• Embeddedness- How deeply the rocks are pushed into the stream bed

Chemical Measurements

• Temp• Conductance- Indicates salts and

ions• DO and %DO-• pH• Salinity

Biological Attributes

• Canopy• Aquatic Vegetation• Macroinvertebrates • Faunal conditions• Observations- What other things

might you want to note from your sample site?

Invert counts

• This is what we are going to do for the final lab!

• Genera Richness- Why would this be important?

• EPT- Ephemeroptera, Plecoptera, and Trichoptera (who are highly sensitive to pollution)

EPT= {(E+P+T)/ Total bugs}*100%

EPT= {(E+P+T)/ Total bugs}*100%

{(11+0+78)/100}*100%= 79%

SENSITIVE__B__ Caddisflies (except net spinners)__A__ Mayflies_____ Stoneflies_____ Water snipe flies__A__ Riffle beetles__A__ Water pennies_____ Gilled snails

LESS SENSITIVE_____ Dobsonflies_____ Fishflies_____ Common

net spinningCaddisflies

_____ Crane flies_____ Damselflies_____ Dragonflies_____ Alderflies_____ Crayfish_____ Scuds_____ sowbugs_____ Clams_____ Mussels

TOLERANT_____ Aquatic worms_____ Black flies__A__ Midge flies_____ Leeches_____ Lunged snails

__4__ # of letters multiplied by 3 =__12___

____ # of letters multiplied by 2 =_____

__1__ # of letters multiplied by 1 =__1___

Now add the three totals from each column for your stream’s index value. Total index value = ____13______

Water Quality Rating_____ Excellent ( > 22) _____ Good (17-22) __X___ Fair (11-16) _____ Poor ( < 11)

Use letter codes (A = 1-9, B = 10-99,C = 100 or more) to record the numbers of organisms.

How's the water?

• Put it all together! • Do you think this stream is Severely

impacted, somewhat impacted or non-impacted?

• Now try it on your own with the next 2 and use the questions to walk you through the analysis.