Two Alabama Water Watch volunteer monitors, Beth Prior (Auburn High School student) and Sydney Smith (AU student), have compiled various forms of data about Parkerson Mill Creek on Auburn University’s campus, with the goal of highlighting negative impacts on the stream and encouraging landscape managers to address them.
Beth Prior (right) and Sydney Smith, (left) at the CASIC building on the AU campus, where they incubated the bacteriological samples from Parkerson Mill Creek
The data consists of photos, erosion assessments using Bank Erosion Hazard Index (BEHI), evaluations of overall stream health and areas where erosion prevention design have been used. This research was done as apart of Beth’s Girl Scout Gold Award project. The data was presented to Auburn University’s facilities department. Beth and Sydney also monitor six different sites on Auburn University’s campus for bacteria and chemistry following AWW water monitoring protocols.
Beth conducting BEHI measurements in Parkerson Mill Creek at a badly eroding location
Click the link below to access the Google Maps file of their research sites:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B98TL4IYreZ4dHl2YzQ4Ny1nT1R0X2ZYN2R0OHI1T0xOdjF3/view
Click the link below to access the Dropbox file (if you have Google Earth, then you can use this link and download and open the information in Google Earth):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/fk3scihof8bqb8z/My%20Places.kmz?dl=0
To access photos and data at a certain site, just click the site’s pin in Google Maps.
And guess what, this ambitious project won Beth Gold – read more about her achievements and her award in the Opelika-Auburn News by clicking:
Local Girl Scout earns highest award