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There are many concerns about water quality throughout the United States today. With more factories and industry spreading throughout the United States, water quality in many places has been affected. To observe the quality of water in the St. Charles area, a project was performed during the summer of 1999. The project was designed to test the water in three different types of bodies of water: Ferson Creek, a small stream, the Fox River, a fast moving river, and Braeburn Marsh, a protected wetlands. A marsh is a wetlands area always or sometimes covered with shallow water whose main types of plants are soft-stemmed reeds, rushes, sedges, and grasses according to the EPA. (1) This would mean that there would be much sediment and other factors that would indicate water quality that is much different than the other bodies of water. The Fox River is a large river that can be used for many different purposes, some of which may cause the Fox River to have poorer water quality than less commonly used bodies of water. Ferson Creek is smaller, with very few if any industries on it. A body of water such as this might seem like it should be cleaner than the Fox River or Braeburn Marsh. This does not appear to be true from a visual point of view however. The creek looks just as dirty in some places as the Fox River. Visual observation is not necessarily the best way to judge water quality, but is often used as a describer. There are very few large living organisms visible in any of the three, and almost none are visible in a cursory glance at the wetlands. Therefore, a question was posed. What is the water quality of these three types of water in the St. Charles area: streams, represented by Ferson Creek in Leroy Oaks (map 1), rivers, represented by the Fox River in Ferson Creek park (map 2), or marshes, represented by Braeburn Marsh next to the Randall 16 movie theatre in Batavia (map 3)? These were chosen because they are the most widely known three bodies that fit the profile of the project. This project used standard testing procedures used by the Environmental Protection Agency for monitoring water. (3) This data is then based against a standardized chart. This chart measured such things as dissolved oxygen, pH, turbidity, and hardness. Dissolved oxygen is the oxygen available in water, and is important to organisms such as fish. This is transferred into the water by algae and is also transferred by riffles and such which allow air to enter the water. With more oxygen, more organisms are able to live in the water. (7) The water temperature effects the habits of creatures in the water in many different ways. Animals will feed differently, reproduce differently, and their metabolism will be different. (7) The temperature will also effect the chemical reactions that take place. pH is a measurement of the acidity of the water. Values between 6.5 and 8.2 are the best for most organisms. With pH values in this range, more living organisms are able to live in the water. (7) Hardness is an indicator of the salinity in the water. The salt content in water effects the different types of organisms that can live in the water. (6) Turbidity is the factor with which people generally relate with visual cleanliness of water. Turbidity is a measurement of the clarity of the water. This factor measures the suspended particle matter in the water. It is measured with a secci disk. High turbidity factors will be seen close to riffles and they will also be seen when the water is stirred up. Water with a high turbidity is seen as cloudy or murky. Less turbidity is generally a good thing, as this means more sunlight and other nutrients can enter the water. (8) All five of these factors affect the water quality of a stream. With these factors, a general idea of how polluted these bodies of water really are can be determined. Once this is discovered, a general idea of which is the most polluted can be determined.

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During the experiment samples were taken from three different bodies of water. They were taken at seven different times to ensure that the data would be accurate and would not all be grouped together. The samples were all taken in July. Samples were taken one foot underwater 3 feet out from the shore. To take a sample underwater a water bottle was used and the bottle was filled with enough sample water to provide for the necessary tests. Each bottle was rinsed with tap water after each test, and then dried out with a paper towel so that it would not be affected by the tap water. To ensure that tested water wasn’t affected by surface conditions, the bottle was held upside down underwater until it was one foot beneath the surface, then water was allowed to enter it. Water was taken from six inches deep using the included tube for the dissolved oxygen because the process described above might affect the dissolved oxygen reading. To measure the amount of dissolved oxygen, a LaMotte Dissolved Oxygen kit was used. The tube for water that came with the kit was used so that the water would not be affected from pouring it and allowing it to be changed. The temperature of the water was also taken with a digital thermometer. Readings were recorded in degrees Celsius. For turbidity a secci disk was used; the depth at which the disk could no longer be seen was recorded. To obtain this reading, the secci disk was lowered into the water until it could no longer be seen, then the depth was recorded. This process was repeated as the secci disk was brought back up and an average was taken to minimize error. The other tests were done at home. The sample was poured out of the water bottle and into the test tube provided with the dissolved oxygen kit. The pH was tested by tearing off a one-inch piece of pH paper from a pHydrion water pH test kit, then holding it in the water for
ten seconds. The test paper was then taken out and compared to the color-matching chart provided with the kit. All of this was done according to the instructions included with the kit. The same was done for the water hardness test, using a pHydrion Low Range Water Hardness Tester, again testing using the tube provided with the LaMotte dissolved oxygen kit. Between tests, the tube was rinsed so that other testing materials would not contaminate data. For the chlorine, the instructions provided with a testing kit that is made for pools were carefully followed. Because none of the bodies of water showed any chlorine at all the two times they were tested, they were not tested anymore as it would most likely have been a waste had the testing continued. This procedure was repeated for all three bodies of water and results were recorded for each day that measurements were taken.

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The dissolved oxygen reading is in milligrams per liter. It measures the amount of oxygen in the water. Hardness measures the amount of dissolved minerals in the water. pH is a measure of the acidity of the water. It measures the amount of hydrogen in the water and compares it to a set scale. The temperature is an indicator of how warm or cold the water is. Turbidity is based on a scale of one to five. It measures the suspended particle matter in a body of water. One means that at one foot deep, the bottom of the body of water is clearly visible. A two means that the bottom is visible, but not clear. A three means that the water is only clearly visible to 6 inches. A four indicates a visibility depth of 3 inches, while a five means that the water is not clear at all and nothing can be seen beneath the surface.

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From the data that was collected, it is unclear whether there is a difference in water quality between Ferson Creek, the Fox River, and Braeburn Marsh in Batavia. This conclusion is based on comparisons to data that is used for water quality testing by the EPA.

The bodies of water that were tested during this project had properties that were very similar to each other. The water was all within allowable ranges for clean water. The level of pH was between six and nine for all the tests. This is the value that all ground water should have to be safe for human consumption. (4) Dissolved oxygen readings should be above 5 mg/L and below 8-mg/L. (5) One of the only differences between water quality standards and the data that was collected is the temperature reading, while this project shows readings of up to 32 degrees Celsius. According to most water quality standards, this reading should not go above 25 degrees Celsius. (5) Temperatures over this may affect aquatic life in any body of water. The problem with these standards is that while a temperature of less than 25 degrees may be average, during a heat wave such as the one experienced this summer, temperatures may exceed this amount. Because this temperature is a temporary value, if it goes above 25 degrees Celsius temporarily, it is not a problem. However, no standards seem to account for this factor. Hardness of water is a major factor in many communities. Many people in St. Charles have water softeners so that they have softer water because the ground water in the area is very hard. There were no values collected during this project that were less than 30 grains per gallon. The average for water being used by people is about 15 grains per gallon. (6) Turbidity in the water is normal for water standards. It is within all normal bounds, most of which would have it with values less than or equal to 3 for creeks and rivers, and above 3 for marshes. (7)

In the future, it is likely that a study such as this one might want to be followed up by a more extensive study concerning one factor pertaining to water quality such as living organisms in the water. This would be a logical continuation because the organisms that are in a body of water are a further indication of the quality of water. A study such as that would require specific tests to be performed about the factors relating to life in the water. Examples of the tests might include a fecal coliform bacteria test or a nitrate test. Both of these tests would add relevant information about the quality of water. This would provide a worthwhile branch off this project in which to extend studies if someone wanted to know more specifically what the quality of water is.

There were some areas in this project, which could have caused some discrepancies in the data. One example of this is the water used for cleaning out the water bottles used for sample collection. Since distilled water was unavailable, tap water was used, which could have caused some results to be different than they would have been otherwise. There was also the fact that the water tested was only three feet out from the shore. While in most cases this should have been far enough out to prevent against surface conditions from affecting the readings, in the Braeburn Marsh it might have been better to go out farther before collecting data. Because of the extremely muddy bottom and lack of appropriate tools to reach any farther out though, it would have been extremely difficult to do that.

All three bodies of water that were tested during this project are within the United States Environmental Protection Agency standards. They all gave very similar results when analyzed based on water quality standards. None of the bodies of water seem to have remarkable different results than the others. They do not seem to show that there is a significant difference between creeks, rivers and marshes in the St. Charles area. This is because data collected during this project did not seem to vary as much as was expected. This seems to mean that water quality is based less on what type of body of water it is, but more on what time of year the data was collected, what types of activities the water is used for, and where in the water a sample is taken. It seems that none of the bodies of water tested in this project show any outward signs of being outside parameters for clean water.

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1. "Types of Wetlands." 25-Aug-1997. On-line. Internet. 27-Oct-99. Available WWW: http://www.epa.gov/OWOW/wetlands/facts/types.html

2. "Glossary-What is a Marsh?" On-line. Internet. 27-Oct-99. Available WWW: http://www.3datlas.com/list_gl.html#Marsh.

3. "Guidelines on Water Quality Monitoring." 7-Sep-99. On-line. Internet. 27-Oct-99. Available WWW: http://waterland.net/riza/imac-water/guidelines/

4. "Water Quality Standards." On-line. Internet. . 24-Oct-1999. Available WWW: http://www.emnrd.state.nm.us/ocd/OCDRules/Environ/Handbook/attachments/Tab3Att1.htm

5. Stoks, P.G. "WRK: Water Quality Standards." 18 July 1998. On-line. Internet. 24-Oct-1999. Availiable WWW: http://www.wrk.nl/wqstandards.html.

6. Randall, Dean. "Water Resources Management." ASCE Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management. 123. (Mar/Apr 1997).

7. Chelias River Council. "Water Quality Monitoring: Streams and Rivers." On-Line. Internet. . 24-Oct-1999. Available WWW: http://www.crcwater.org/wqmanual.html.

8. "Sedimentation and Circulation." 20-May-1997. On-line. Internet. 27-Oct-99. Available WWW: http://sofia.usgs.gov/metadata/sflwww/fb007.html.

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