Volunteers Sought To Study Small,

But Significant, Stream Life

By Kendra Bobowick

Grab an ice cube tray and step into a local stream Saturday morning.

Trout Unlimited Candlewood Valley Chapter (CVTU) President James Belden is looking for volunteers interested in helping his group’s environmental efforts. Collecting data that will be used by the state, the CVTU will conduct a macroinvertebrate sampling in sections of Deep Brook and the Pootatuck River on October 20.

“We’re using macros as an indicator of the stream’s health,” Mr Belden said. Macroinvertibrates are animals without backbones that are big enough to see with the naked eye. Small and often hidden beneath rocks or among stream debris for a period of their lives, the creatures, small enough to be separated among sections in an ice cube tray, tell a significant story.

“We look for the most, modest, and the least wanted in the stream as indicators of water quality,” Mr Belden explained. “The more or the most wanted equals the best [water quality] with the assumption that the most wanted is the most sensitive.”

The presence of the most sensitive organisms indicate long-term health, he said. Past samplings have revealed that results in Newtown vary from one site to the next. The Pootatuck samplings are excellent, said Mr Belden. Behind the wastewater treatment plant the results are “a little less.” Along Deep Brook the samplings are better upstream than they are downstream, he said.

Based on the results the CVTU and volunteers gather and forward to the Department of Environmental Protection, he said, “We try to identify the things impacting water quality.” Sampling different sections over time helps researchers address ongoing impacts, he said.

Donuts and coffee will be available for volunteers. The group will meet at the conference room of the town’s wastewater treatment plant at the end of Commerce Road for a training session at 8:30 am Saturday. Volunteers will need clothing appropriate for the outdoors, waders for those who have them, or shoes that can get wet.

Lawn chairs may be more comfortable for those sorting the samples in ice cube trays. Those collecting samples will use nets in the stream.

Contact cvtu.org, call 270-1960 or 470-2952, or e-mail jhovious@snet.net to let Mr Belden know you’re interested in participating or for more information.