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Valerie Hentage and Neil Meredith of MDC
Stream Team demonstrate the invertebrate trapping screen and folding
table. |
| Wading into the river with the screen. It's important
to sample a riffle, a swift, shallow section of stream where many
aquatic creatures live. |
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John Rothgreb and Pat Hight hold the screen upright
at just the right angle. |
| Scuffing up the bottom to release invertebrates in
the gravel, under rocks, and on the plants. |
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The screen is stretched on the frame, and the group
sorts the different kinds of invertebrates. |
| They use tweezers to pick them up and put them into
ice trays. |
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Each critter gets its own compartment,
and the different kinds are added up to get a total water quality
rating. This section of Bryant Creek got an excellent score. |
| The rating depends on the relative number of sensitive
and pollution-tolerant organisms that are present in the samples.
See the Stream Insects
Identification Key for more information. |
Missouri Stream Team sponsors river cleanups and many other activities
throughout the state.
More info: http://www.mostreamteam.org/ |
Top 
Water Quality Monitoring Demo 
On
Bryant Creek just below Hodgson Mill, Bob Schulz (in the red shirt), Missouri
Stream Team Director, and two staffers gave a demonstration showing how
Stream Teams monitor water quality by sampling for stream invertebrates.
The location was below the Highway 181 bridge, just above Sycamore Access.
The demonstration was part of the annual 