Andrew Reynolds, an Alternative Community Education student in Cedarville, holds up a sample jar with some water, sediment, and a crayfish from Steele Creek in Hessel, during a September sampling of Les Cheneaux area creeks.

Students at the Alternative Community Education (ACE) school in Cedarville completed another round of water quality tests in late September, continuing assistance with water quality preservation efforts in the Les Cheneaux Islands. The students collected water and sediment samples at Steele and Law creeks in Hessel, then tested the water chemistry and identified macroinvertebrates back at the school laboratory. Macroinvertebrates are water insects, and other organisms like larval clams and crayfish, that are used by biologists to indicate water quality. The more macroinvertebrates found in a sediment sample, the better the condition of the water, since such organisms thrive in clean water. Fewer macroinvertebrates of limited variety indicate poor water quality and possible pollution.

At left: Cedarville High School science students, led by science teacher Kevin St. Onge, perform water chemistry tests earlier this year on water samples from Prentiss Creek, east of Cedarville. Their annual spring tests complement work that was performed by the Alternative Community Education school of Cedarville. The students were led by ACE instructor Jim Patrick, and Wendy Wagoner of Cedarville, a member of the Les Cheneaux Watershed Council and a program coordinator for the local Water Guardians “Youth to Seniors” project.

Ms. Wagoner and Chippewa/East Mackinac Conservation District Coordinator Dusty King are coordinating the project, training volunteers who will serve as knowledgeable resource people for their communities. Those who are trained as Water Guardians are expected to be able to help prevent and solve local water quality problems. Water Guardians receive the technical training and support they need to access, communicate, and protect ground and surface water quality throughout their regions. With their knowledge and ability to identify problems, their goal is to help local units of government respond to water quality problems before those problems lead to human health impacts in the general population.

The Water Guardians program focuses on training older adults in the Eastern Upper Peninsula, however, the program coordinators also seek to enable young people to serve as Water Guardians in their community as well.

Last year, Ms. Wagoner worked with ACE to test local creeks for the Les Cheneaux Watershed Council. The testing has become part of the science curriculum at ACE, which obtained a grant to buy a microscope and books to assist with macroinvertebrate identification.

“I love working with the ACE kids on this project. We hope to collect data each year,” Ms. Wagoner said, describing her experience over the past two years. “This year the kids are very interested in the project and all participated well. Sometimes we get kids who are a little squeamish but they all seem to find this interesting. We really enjoy finding the caddis flies. They make their shells out of materials from the bottom of the creek bed. Some look like little pebbles or a stick, then their legs and head poke out and they move.”

She said the school is planning a field trip to Lake Superior State University in Sault Ste. Marie to meet with a biologist who specializes in macroinvertebrates and to tour the science facility.

“I would like the kids to see that doing this kind of field work could lead to jobs in this area of biology, if they are interested,” Ms. Wagoner said.

She hopes students will gain from these experiences a greater interest in their environment and in keeping it clean.

“The next time someone is to pollute in the watershed, they might say, ‘Hey, maybe we shouldn't do that-- it affects our drinking water, animals, the food we eat, our recreation activities such as swimming, boating, and fishing,’” Ms. Wagoner said. “It also helps them connect the chain from these small macroinvertebrates, to the insects we see on a daily basis in the summer, and the effect they have on the chain of life.”

Over the past two years, the ACE students have tested 10 creeks in the Les Cheneaux watershed, including Beavertail, Prentiss, Bush, McKay, Flowers, Pearson, Pollack, Mackinac, Law, and Steele. Samplers collect 100 macroinvertebrates from each creek and identify them by type to determine how many different species are present. Water chemistry tests determine the dissolved oxygen, nitrates, phosphates, conductivity, total dissolved solids, turbidity, and pH levels. Les Cheneaux Watershed Council members and Cedarville High School science classes, led by science teacher Kevin St. Onge, also perform annual tests to contribute to the Les Cheneaux Watershed water quality surveys. Mr. St. Onge also took his biology students to Prentiss Bay this fall to collect and analyze macroinvertebrate numbers and diversity. These numbers are then used to assign a water quality value to the body of water being sampled, High School Principal Randy Schaedig said in a report to the Les Cheneaux Schools Board of Education.

“Getting data and keeping up on this on a yearly basis will give us material we will need to get any grants in the future of our local watershed,” Ms. Wagoner said. “This data will help us provide indicators of a clean or unclean ecosystem.”