River Survey Training

Don’t have any experience, but you want to help contribute to important data collection monitoring the health of the River Lea?

🔍💧Join us for a training day and we will teach you our methodology for water quality testing and aquatic invertebrate surveying!🦐🔬

This session will be a prerequisite to attend our monthly intermediate River Monitoring sessions.

🧪You will learn about the significance of clean water and how to measure key parameters that ensure its safety.

🐌 In addition, the presence or absence of certain freshwater invertebrates can tell a story of a water body’s health. Because some invertebrates are more sensitive to pollutants than others we can use them as “indicator species”.

📈We are introducing this methodology of collecting both physical and biological data together so that we can start to build up a picture of both short- and long-term fluctuations in invertebrate assemblages in the river and how these relate to changes in water quality over time.

We will:

• Use Hanna checkers to measure levels of pollutants in the water
• Use other scientific instruments to measure physical water characteristics, such as flow and salinity
• Sample invertebrates using kicksampling methodology
• Learn about basic aquatic invertebrate ID for species that are commonly found in our river

What the day will involve:

• Collecting water samples
• Kicksampling in the river
• Analyse water quality
• ID invertebrate species

What we will provide:

• All necessary equipment and PPE, including waders and buoyancy aids
• Training in river sampling and invertebrate ID
• Scientific equipment, including microscopes, salinity and pH meters, Hanna checkers

What to bring:

• Appropriate clothing for working outdoors (note we will provide waders for working in the river)
• A reusable water bottle and/or coffee cup, and a packed lunch or money for the cafe.
• An interest in river health, biodiversity, ecology, and/or entomology!

This is an 18+ event

*First time at Cody Dock? Please complete our Volunteer Agreement!