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Iowa

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Iowa Volunteers

Iowa Volunteer Water Monitoring Directory
The Iowa Volunteer Water Monitoring Directory is a resource for educators, volunteers, policy makers, government agencies, the media, and others interested in water quality, citizen involvement, and environmental protection and enhancement. It is a directory of individuals and groups involved in local programs who have volunteered their time to promote water quality issues.

Adopt-A-Stream
The Iowa Adopt-A-Stream program was developed to stimulate public awareness of Iowa's water resources and to encourage environmental action to protect and enhance these resources. Adopt-A-Stream is open to any individual or group including students, families, businesses, landowners, sporting groups, and scout troops. Volunteers are able to design their own program or projects for their stream. Projects include river cleanup, streambank stabilization, stream habitat improvement, tree and grass planting, water quality monitoring, access improvement, trail development, and educational programs.
Those interested should contact:
Michelle Wilson
Division of Parks, Recreation and Preserves
Wallace State Office Building
502 East 9th
Des Moines, IA 50319
(515) 281-8675
michelle.wilson@dnr.state.ia.us

Kansas Volunteers

KanCRN
The Kansas Collaborative Research Network is a community of researchers, teachers, and students interested in conducting collaborative research. Developed by the Kansas City Kansas Public Schools, the Olathe School District, and the University of Kansas, this community is working together to create an instructional model that demonstrates that doing science is a better way of learning science.

T.R.U.E. Blue Project
Teaching Rivers in an Urban Environment is a program in which students, teachers, and community members from eleven school districts volunteer their time to monitor the quality of the Blue River. The Blue River runs through the core of the Kansas City Metropolitan area. Its location provides a unique opportunity to study an entire river watershed and man's impact on what is now, primarily, an urban stream. The T.R.U.E. Blue monitoring program consists of a visual survey, nine chemical tests, a benthic macroinvertebrate inventory, and calculation of the flow/discharge rate. In addition, volunteers are active in tree planting, litter pickups, training workshops, storm sewer stenciling, environmental conferences, and community education.

Kaw Valley Heritage Alliance
The Kaw Valley Heritage Alliance is in the process of building a school-based, volunteer water quality monitoring network within the twelve counties of the main stem of the Kansas River Valley. Students and teachers will document the prominent land uses, and the kinds of vegetation and wildlife within the watershed. In addition, chemical analysis and macroinvertebrate collection and identification will be perfomed on the river.

Kansas StreamLink
Kansas StreamLink is a growing network of K-12 watershed and stream study teams that provides training and support for watershed education efforts throughout the state of Kansas. The goals of the program include providing a means for students to explore their immediate watershed, facilitating the building of life-long relationships with water resources, and strengthening communities' understanding of watershed concepts. Ultimately, StreamLink is a community-based water resource literacy program focused on creating and sharing outdoor watershed studies and explorations.

Missouri Volunteers

Missouri Stream Team
Missouri Stream Team organizes concerned citizens to address stream problems that result from pollution, alteration, and general neglect and educates members of the community on the importance of water quality and conservation of natural resources. Team members must go through a 9-hour training course to learn about stream organisms and different chemicals that are found in streams. Stream Teams clean up stream litter, monitor water quality, plant trees, stabilize stream banks and improve fish wildlife habitat along streams. They educate communities by talking to landowners, homeowners, school students and businesses about water quality problems and potential solutions.

Streets to Streams Project
A grant from the Environmental Protection Agency has enabled Missouri 4-H to provide adults with the skills and knowledge necessary to teach Missouri youth about water quality.

Trout Unlimited
Trout Unlimited conserves, protects, and restores North America's trout and salmon fisheries and their watersheds. Missouri's spring-fed rivers contain some of the best populations of self-sustaining rainbow trout in the Midwest. Trout Unlimited members work to improve trout habitat and fishing in these streams. There are two chapters of Trout Unlimited in Missouri: The Meramec Basin Chapter and the Mid-Missouri Chapter.

Meramec Basin Chapter of Trout Unlimited
One project that is currently underway is the use of volunteers to help with a dye-tracing project. The project's goal is to define the recharge area for Blue Springs so that potential hazards to the watershed can be better identified.

Mid-Missouri Chapter of Trout Unlimited
The Mid-Missouri Chapter helped the Forest Service purchase 1 mile of Mill Creek in Phelps County. The Mid-Missouri Chapter is working to protect the habitat and water quality of Spring Creek, Mill Creek and Current River. Volunteers actively participate in fundraising and conservation education.

Nebraska Volunteers

Wayne State College
Student volunteers at Wayne State College, in northeastern Nebraska, took part in a Service Learning Volunteer Stream Monitoring Project of the South Logan Creek Watershed. Students collected data on habitat, physical stream characteristics, dissolved oxygen, and benthic macroinvertebrates. They identified specimens to the family level using a dichotomous key created for northeastern Nebraska aquatic macroinvertebrates. Students compared total abundance, taxonomic richness, Shannon-Weaver diversity, and the Hilsenhoff Biotic Index to reference conditions in the Western Corn Belt Plains Ecoregion. Contact Dr. Barbara Hayford at bahafo1@wsc.edu (click here for webpage).

Nebraska Wildlife Federation
Nebraska Wildlife Federation is committed to taking action to protect endangered species in the state, promote wildlife conservation practices, and encourage public policies that protect wildlife habitat.