Forest Grove high school students obtaining water samples.

Forest Grove high school students measured, observed, and noted water chemistry, water temperature, stream flow, presence of a variety of macro-invertebrates (bugs), and in-stream and riparian habitat to learn more about the health of Gales Creek at Gales Creek Highway and Roderick Road. Water quality monitoring has been ongoing at this site for over 12 years. Observations drawn from this monitoring will be presented to the Tualatin River Watershed Council in February 2006 and posted on the council’s website. The Student Watershed Research Project (SWRP) trains teachers each summer on monitoring techniques and assists in students’ monitoring activities and quality assurance on water quality measurements.

The students will monitor again at this site in Spring 2006. The students will present their results in an annual SWRP Summit on May 19th at the University of Portland, posing and answering questions in both poster and power point presentations.

Forest Grove high school students reviewing the procedures and recording the data.

A number of high schools throughout the Tualatin Basin participate, monitoring different creeks in our basin. High schools participating in the Tualatin Basin include: Forest Grove, Glencoe, Westview and Sherwood.

Data and past findings from these schools can be found on the SWRP website: www.swrp.org