WHO WE ARE
Missouri Stream Team 4956 is a Stream Team organized and staffed by the Osage Trails Chapter of Missouri Master Naturalist. Our members monitor water quality and do stream cleanups quarterly on two different sites in the Kansas City area. Following pages on this site will talk about some of the wild plants and animals found in or near these two urban streams, and show some of our findings on the water quality of these streams.
The Missouri Stream Team program is a volunteer organization sponsored by the Missouri Department of Conservation, the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, and the Conservation Federation of Missouri.
The Missouri Master Naturalist program is jointly sponsored by the Missouri Department of Conservation and University of Missouri Extension. The program was formed to to develop a corps of well-informed volunteers to provide education, outreach and service dedicated to the beneficial management of natural resources and natural areas within their communities within the State of Missouri.
WHAT WE DO
Four times a year, we clean up trash from our adopted stream segments and monitor the quality of the water using biological sampling and chemical tests. Our team, and over 7,000 teams in the state of Missouri send their results to the state Stream Team, greatly multiplying the amount of data that Missouri water quality agencies have to work with. Missouri has over 110.000 miles of flowing water. Water quality agencies cannot be staffed at levels to monitor all these miles, but with the help of thousands of trained volunteers, Missouri's water quality can be maintained.
HOW WE COLLECT DATA
To access the health of our stream segments we use a combination of biological, chemical, and physical measurements.
BIOLOGICAL These tests involve standardised capture methods to discover the diversity of aquatic macroinvertebrates— animals without backbones that are large enough to see without microscopes. Some of these "macros" that we find need unpolluted, highly-oxygenated water. Others that we find can be found anywhere water is wet. Finding species that need unpolluted water is a sign of water health. And finding a wide variety of organisms in the water indicates a healthy ecosystem.
CHEMICAL We use a variety of tests to determine levels of: dissolved oxygen; Nitrate; Phosphate; and Ammonia. Other tests tell us pH (a measurement of water acidity), and conductivity (the amount of dissolved ions in the water).
PHYSICAL Many other tests show us the temperature of the water and the air, the amount of sediment in the stream bed and the water column, the compostion of the stream bed, and the flow rate of the stream in cubic feet per second. Other data gathered shows the makeup of the ground cover on the stream bank, in the immediate area of the stream, and in the watershed of the stream.
To learn more about these tests, sign up for training from the Missouri Stream Team