Urban Sites

Last week we met and discussed our proposal with Dr. Entrekin. This was very helpful because we narrowed down many of our objectives as well as the methods that we are performing. We recieved some useful edits to help write our proposal. On Friday we went and visited many of the urban streams that we are going to be sampling from. This concluded visiting all of the streams and now we have been to all of the areas that we will be sampling from. In many of the urban streams there is much signs of human impacts on the streams. The first stream flows under a bridge that is completely channelized and has much rocky substrate added by humans which greatly affects the riparian zone. The second stream is impacted greatly by sediment runoff being located right next to a sports complex and near some large wetlands. The final urban stream is located right next to a golf course and has been channelized by the road running alongside and the golf course on the other side. Also it runs through several culverts and the close proximity to the golf course should result in high fertilizer and pesticide runoff.

Equipment List Water Quality

pH Probe
Dissolved Oxygen Probe
Measuring Tape
Temperature Probe
Ziploc Bags (100)
Conductivity Probe
5 Gallon Buckets
Siphon Samplers
Spectrophotometer
HACH Powder Pillow
Ascorbic Acid Reagent
Muffle Furnace
Turbidity Probe
Brown Paper Bags
Plastic Sample
Razor Blade
Chem Wipes
Distilled Water

Last Thursday Meeting

So our meeting went well with Dr. Entrekin. We realized as a group that we kind of aren't good writers but that our ideas are pretty solid. Dr. Entrekin really helped with our methodology and how we are to sample. That really helped us because a lot of the paper we read were way out of our expertise and involved super hard sampling techniques. But the ideas that they had flowed pretty well with the project that we are doing. I feel that we are now more aware of what we need to be doing and sampling won't be difficult with what our group is trying to sample. The new Maumelle sites that we visited will work well for our project I think. Being by an a. apartment complex, b. a newly built baseball complex, and c. a golf course are pretty legitimate sites. Even though the second site by the baseball complex was kind of disappointing at first, I think we all are aware that urban sites aren't necessarily natural... a ditch of some sort definitely shows signs of urbanization, which is perfect for this project. I thought it was really neat how Scott showed us the different wetlands that are still very natural around Maumelle. Gives us something pretty to look at while we're testing at these urban sites.

Urban Stream Site 3

Bayou in the Suburb

Urban Stream Site 2

Photos of first Urban Site