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Verde River Water Sentinels--Your Opportunity to
Help Protect the Verde River!
Mark your calendars for these Water Sentinels activities:
Our next monitoring date is Saturday, December 20, 2008. Checking
flows and water quality monitoring on the Upper Verde River
will be
our tasks for the day.
We hope you'll join us!
For more information on the monitoring project and upcoming
monitoring and clean-up activities, please contact the Grand
Canyon Chapter
office at (602) 253-8633 or sandy.bahr@sierraclub.org.
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| Volunteer Bruce Thompson dons waders to take water samples at Beasley Flat on the Verde River. |
For more than a year the Sierra Club's Grand Canyon Chapter has
been heading out to the Verde River every other month to collect
water samples and flow data at seven locations along the upper
portion of the Verde River. The Upper Verde Water Sentinels sample
for E. coli, arsenic, nitrogen, and phosphorous. Three groups
- a group from the Prescott area, a group from the Verde Valley,
and a group from the Phoenix area - gather the samples and then
the Phoenix group runs them down the hill to a Phoenix lab for
analysis. Two other groups also measure flows on the river and
the Sierra Club is currently working on a program to measure
sediments.
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| Wet feet? No problem! Volunteer JD Trebec wades
ankle-deep into the water monitoring project on the Verde River. |
The Verde River, nominated by the Sierra Club and designated
by American Rivers as one of the ten most endangered rivers in
the country in 2006, faces significant
threats. The river is severely threatened by excessive groundwater pumping
to feed development and several pipeline projects proposed by
the communities of
Prescott, Prescott Valley, and Chino Valley, plus a myriad of water quality
concerns including application of sludge to the land nearby.
Our Upper Verde Water Sentinels
welcome additional volunteers to help protect this amazing river which provides
important habitat for fish and wildlife, drinking water, as well as great recreational
opportunities. The hope and expectation is that the knowledge and experience
gained through this project will help people act to protect the Verde and other
rivers in the state.
To make this program successful, we need volunteers who are willing to commit
to attend one training session, at least three monitoring activities, and to
assist with at least one streamside clean up. This project will provide a great
opportunity to get your hands dirty and feet wet. Volunteers will measure stream
flow and collect water samples for lab testing. Please join us in this fun
and meaningful project! Our next monitoring date is Saturday, December 20,
2008.
For more information on the monitoring project and future
monitoring and clean up activities, please contact the Grand Canyon Chapter
office at (602) 253-8633
or sandy.bahr@sierraclub.org.
 Learn
about the water quality in the Verde River by checking
out this chart that
tracks water-quality data for seven sites on the upper portion of the river(downloadable
PDF).
Sierra
Club in Arizona
Sierra Club Clean Water Campaign
Sierra Club Safe & Healthy Communities Campaign
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