Water Research at Belwin & SMINC

A group of volunteers organized by St. Croix Watershed Steward, Don Wendel and a team of five other volunteers, has just completed the first year of assessing water quality of the Valley Creek stream system in a laboratory maintained at Belwin Conservancy in Afton.  Having received funding from the Grinnell College Grant administered by North Woods and Waters, the group has been able to continue water quality assessment (WQA) from the previous year approximately every two weeks year-round at six sites along the stream before it enters the St. Croix River.  The grant also has helped the group to replicate its WQA program at Sally Manzara Interpretive Nature Center (SMINC) in Lake Elmo.  The testing protocol uses parameters typical for water quality assessment. Results are maintained in a database that automatically graphs each parameter.  Data is to be shared with Belwin Conservation, Washington Conservation District, St. Croix Watershed Research Station, and Minnesota Pollution Control.

TREE GRAVEL BEDS AND PLANTING FOR WATERSHED BENEFIT

SCWS/ Washington County dual- Steward, John Goodfellow, has completed years of work with trees for the benefit of land and water in the area of Marine on St. Croix. John’s initial SCWS projects focused on developing community forestry programming and establishing Marine on St. Croix as a Tree City, U.S.A. through the Arbor Day Foundation [ https://www.arborday.org/programs/treecityusa/ ]. Further projects have included a tree gravel bed and the resources posted here also helped additional stewards with their subsequent tree gravel bed projects.

Washington County Watershed Steward, Tom Furey, created a tree gravel bed in Scandia, MN, to reestablish tree canopy destroyed by storms. Many trees help mitigate watershed pollution from storm events as well as generally benefiting communities. https://dnr.wisconsin.gov/sites/default/files/topic/UrbanForests/UrbanWatershedForestry.pdf ; https://www.mwmo.org/news/protect-water-resources-plant-tree/ ; https://stormwater.pca.state.mn.us/index.php/Overview_for_trees 

Another steward partnership leveraging a small amount of this award for a large return is WCD Steward Anna Barker and the County Fairgrounds. In her stewardship capacity (and with her knowledge as a MN licensed tree inspector and Master Gardener) Anna has already established educational pollinator plots and other educational resources for soil & water health at the Washington County Fairgrounds in Minnesota. Working in partnership with the Washington County fairgrounds, the UMN Dept. of Urban & Community Forestry, Washington Conservation District, MN Master gardeners and others, Anna will establish a  gravel tree bed both to grow easy to plant trees & shrubs and to educate the over 6,000 annual visitors to this part of the fairgrounds in easy steps to soil & water stewardship!

Learn more about Tree Gravel Beds here.

Here are some additional sources on Tree Gravel Beds:

https://conservancy.umn.edu/handle/11299/223266#:~:text=A%20gravel%20bed%20is%20an,universities%20for%20over%2020%20years.

https://trees.umn.edu/outreach/gravel-beds

UMN Forestry Tree Gravel beds YouTube(43 min.): https://youtu.be/odtFQl9qHjI

Tree Gravel Bed example WI: https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/21dc036de93c4619859db7f13574bdc4

Water Quality Monitoring – Participatory Science

Additional stewardship work made possible by the Grinnell College Joseph F. Wall ‘41 Award includes water quality monitoring at several nature centers in the watershed including: Belwin Conservancy, Lee and Rose Warner Nature Center, Sally Manzara Interpretive Nature Center. Water monitoring by SCWS is also ongoing in collaboration with multiple various organizations in the watershed, including: Trout Unlimited, various conservation & Land Trusts, local schools. 

Here are some additional resources on water quality monitoring:

https://www.mobileh2o.com/mh2oapp

 http://www.mnwcd.org/lake-water-quality-monitoring-program 

https://www.pca.state.mn.us/business-with-us/water-quality-resources

https://www.epa.gov/wqs-tech/water-quality-standards-regulations-wisconsin – EPA standards

https://wateractionvolunteers.org/about/what-we-monitor/ – WI water monitoring volunteer option

https://www.seametrics.com/blog/water-conservation-apps/

UWRF Water Tastings and Education at UWRF Chill on the Hill

Water, water everywhere… and we have flights to drink!

UWRF “Talking Waters” experience is a new “watershed – awareness” tool that the UWRF Sustainability Fellows have showcased at several events from the Phipps in Hudson to campus.  Our most recent event was the 7/25 “Chill on the Hill” music series event with the fabulous St. Croix Valley Community Band’s summer concert “Celebrating Nature: Rivers, Lakes and Our Beautiful America”.

Water preservation tips and information were provided by the UWRF Sustainability wing of Facilities Management and additional information was provided via a project of the St. Croix Master Watershed Stewards with sign created by the Renaissance Academy Charter Highschool in River Falls.

We also had a special guest from the City of River Falls (Greg Koehler, not pictured) who brought information about our city water supplies and a map of the River Falls wells.  We are lucky to have such a great City resource to help explain our wonderful natural resource!

Along with important information, the Water Tasting water flights allowed event attendees to taste the “terroir” of their local watershed.  Folks got to “taste test” three different waters in and around River Falls and learn about where our water comes from and how to protect it.

“Whaat? Water tastes like water!” you might say. However, many of our taste-testers would disagree:

Think your tastebuds are top notch? Look for the UWRF “Talking Waters” at future events and look into this precious resource we all take for granted!  

Here are some additional resources on water tasting as outreach:

https://journals.sagepub.com/eprint/FYZFP47P6CWTV5FBGTBD/full – water potability, taste perceptions research, 2023

https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2016-03/documents/activity_grades_4-8_wherewatercomes.pdf – EPA elementary class exercise template on drinking water origins, safety

https://www.water-bar.org/our-story – MN water art & education programming

https://www.scienceteacherprogram.org/genscience/JHoahing10.html – water taste testing as elementary education

Youth Watershed Education Collaboration

SCWS Julie Kilpatrick and Mary Dylkowski are continuing their work with local/regional indigenous communities by coordinating a multi-partner, multi-day water stewardship kayaking experience for indigenous youth in the region & watershed. These stewards will partner with Wild Rivers Conservancy and Indigenous People’s Task Force (IPTF) on this project. IPTF develops and implements culturally appropriate education and services to the indigenous community in Minneapolis. Julie and Mary have partnered with Wild Rivers Conservancy & IPTF to create this experience for youth in keeping with both IPTF education model and the Conservancy’s “Rivers Are Alive” youth environmental program. Julie is also a trip leader for the Conservancy.

Outreach Collaboration in the Northern Watershed

In the Northern part of the Watershed, where population is sparse and challenges to healthy water are many, SCWS Mark Buley & Tracy Nooner are leveraging $2,300 of this award into many more thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours in time reaching out to lake home owners, agribusinesses, municipalities and other key players in water health through a speaker series and other events in partnership with local nonprofits and foundations, including the NACF https://nacommunityfoundation.org/about-us/ 

Carpenter Nature Center Plant ID Booklet

SCWS Gladi Sippel created this Native Plant ID guide in partnership with the Carpenter Nature Center. You can find it HERE.