Streamkeeper Report - April 2024

by Jim Sauter

SPRING HAS SPRUNG! TIME FOR THE TCTU STREAM MONITORING SEASON TO BEGIN

Greetings from your TCTU Streamkeepers, and welcome to spring! The chemical monitoring season officially begins in April and concludes at the end of September.

According to Heather Wilson with the Izaak Walton League, "Spring is here! We all know that April showers bring May flowers. Unfortunately, they also bring nitrogen-rich runoff to streams and lakes."

Our monitoring efforts will be helpful in addressing this and other potential problems in our streams. Typically, we conduct a minimum of 10 observations per targeted stream with three of those after a major rain event of one inch or more. We also have many streamkeepers monitoring other streams in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, and beyond on a more random basis.

Earth Day Stream Monitoring Demonstration
​Are you interested in learning more about our streamkeeper monitoring? If so, we will have an on-stream chemical monitoring demonstration immediately after our Earth Day Cleanup event at Eagle Creek on April 20th. 

• 9:00am - 12:00pm: Eagle Creek Cleanup (Sign up here)
  
• 12:00 - 12:30pm: Streamkeeper Chemical Testing On-stream Demonstration (Sign up here)

(Note, we will be serving a burger lunch from 12:00pm onward.  You will still have plenty of time to grab a burger if you attend the chemical monitoring demonstration.)

As part of the demonstration, you can help us collect data. We'll walk through the steps to set up the google form on your phone, take one or more measurements on the stream, then enter and submit the data. Here are some of the measurements you can consider taking: temperature, alkalinity, hardness, pH, nitrate, nitrite, phosphorus, chloride, water clarity.

Reporting Data
We are transitioning how we report data. Reporting of test results will be done on a Google form.  We will then send the results to the Clean Water Hub on the Izaak Walton League site. 

If you are a member of our Streamkeepers program, you can report data by following the steps below. If you are not part of our Streamkeeper program and would like to learn more, contact me (Jim Sauter) at [email protected] or 715-210-0710.

Streamkeepers ONLY: Instructions for Entering Data
If you have internet access on the stream:

1. Navigate to https://www.twincitiestu.org/h2o
2. Enter your data by following the instructions in the form

If you DO NOT have internet access on the stream:

1. Take your readings stream-side, then record them with pencil and paper.
2. When you have internet service, navigate to https://www.twincitiestu.org/h2o
3. Enter your data by following the instructions in the form

Streamkeepers ONLY: Bookmarking the form on an iPhone (optional)
To make things easier for entering future data, you can also add a shortcut to this form to your iPhone homescreen:

1. Navigate to https://www.twincitiestu.org/h2o in Safari on your iPhone
2. At the bottom of the screen, choose the icon that has a box with an arrow sticking up. This is the upload tab.
3. Scroll down until you find “Add to home screen" option and select it
4. Click “Add” to confirm

New for 2024: Monitoring on Brown's Creek!
We are adding one more stream to our targeted stream list for 2024 bringing our total to eight
streams: Brown's Creek near Stillwater.

The other targeted streams include Belle Creek, Eagle Creek, Hay Creek, Ike's/ Mall of America Creek, Little Cannon River, South Branch of the Vermillion, and Trout Brook.

Chemical Monitoring Resources:
Some chemical monitoring resources are available free of charge as follows:

• Nitrate watch strips: https://www.iwla.org/water/stream-monitoring/nitrate-watch
• Chloride watch strips: https://www.iwla.org/water/stream-monitoring/salt-watch

For those that have financial need, we do have some other basic chemical strips available to members. Just let me know and we can work out the details.

We are excited about continuing our water monitoring efforts during this upcoming season and sharing some of our findings with you in the months ahead. Thank you to all our TCTU citizen streamkeeper volunteers for your efforts!

​For more information: Jim Sauter, [email protected], 715-210-0710