Selected Resources For Citizen Monitors

Compiled by Maryland Department of Natural Resources
Updated: December 2004
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Manuals and References

American Public Health Association Standard Methods for the Examination of Water and Wastewater. 20th edition. 1999.
http://www.standardmethods.org/

From the EPA:

The Volunteer Monitor's Guide to Quality Assurance Project Plans. 1996. Outlines the procedures volunteers can use to ensure that the data collect will be reliable enough to meet the project needs. EPA 841-B-96-003
http://www.epa.gov/OWOW/monitoring/volunteer/qappcovr.htm

Volunteer Stream Monitoring - A Methods Manual. 1997. EPA 841-B-97-003
http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/volunteer/stream/

Volunteer Estuary Monitoring - A Methods Manual. Second Edition. 2001 EPA 842-B-93-004
http://www.epa.gov/owow/estuaries/monitor/

Volunteer Lake Monitoring - A Methods Manual. 1991. EPA 440/4-91-002
http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/lakevm.html

Volunteer Wetland Monitoring - An Introduction and Resource Guide 2001. EPA 843 B-00-001
http://www.epa.gov/owow/wetlands/monitor/volmonitor.html

Streamwalk Manual. 1994. EPA 910-B-94-002
http://www.epa.gov/adopt/patch/html/streamwalk.html

Rapid Bioassessment Protocols For Use in Streams and Wadeable Rivers. 1999. EPA 841-B-99-002 http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/rbp/

Spanish Language Publications for Volunteer Monitors.
The Volunteer Monitor, Vol. 7, No. 2, Fall 1995 http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/volunteer/newsletter/volmon07no2.pdf

The Volunteer Monitor. Free national newsletter.
For more information, contact:
Eleanor Ely, Editor
The Volunteer Monitor
50 Benton St.
San Francisco, CA 94112
ellieely@earthlink.net

http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/volunteer/vm_index.html

For EPA documents:
National Center for Environmental Publications and Information
P.O. Box 42419
Cincinnati, OH 45242-2419
(800) 490-9198
http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/

From Kentucky Water Watch:

A Watershed Survey - How to get started
http://www.ctic.purdue.edu/KYW/Process/HowToStart.html

From Izaak Walton League:

A Citizen's Streambank Restoration handbook. Guide to streambank restoration.

Community Sustainability Collection. Information on sustainable development.

Hands-on Save Our Streams. Procedures and forms for stream monitoring.

Izaak Walton League
707 Conservation Lane
Gaithersburg, MD 20878
(800) BUG-IWLA
www.iwla.org/sos/

From River Network:

The Clean Water Act: An Owner's Manual (2nd Edition) 2004.

Living Waters: Using Benthic Macroinvertebrates and Habitat to Assess Your River's Health. 1997. Information and methods for developing a study on benthic macroinvertebrates.

Program Organizing Guide: A step-by-step guide for initiating and maintaining a community-based river monitoring program. 1995.

River Monitoring Study Design Workbook: Intended to help people produce study designs for community-based river monitoring.

River Network
3814 Albemarle St., NW
Washington, DC 20016
202-364-2550
dc@rivernetwork.org
http://www.riverwatch.org/

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Data Management and Presentation

From the EPA: Chapter 6 of the Volunteer Stream Monitoring Manual http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/volunteer/stream/vms60.html

From Massachusetts Water Watch partnership:
Ready, Set Present! A Data Presentation Manual for volunteer Water Quality Monitoring Groups.
http://www.umass.edu/tei/mwwp/datapresmanual.html

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Time and Volunteer Management

No Surprises: Harmonizing Risk and Reward in Volunteer Management, by Melanie L. Herman and Peggy M. Jackson (Nonprofit Risk Management Center, 2001). http://www.nonprofitrisk.org/

The (Help!) I-Don't-Have-Enough-Time Guide to Volunteer Management by Susan J. Ellis and Katherine Noyes Campbell (Energize, 1995). http://www.energizeinc.com/

Volunteer Maryland (provides trained Americorps volunteer managers to non-profit organizations and government agencies for a stipend)
100 Community Place
Crownsville, MD 21032
410-514-7270
http://www.volunteermaryland.org/

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Workshops

Audubon Naturalist Society - Workshops on stream sampling, invertebrate identification and related topics.
8940 Jones Mill Road
Chevy Chase, MD 20815
(301) 652-9188
HQ@audubonnaturalist.org
http://www.audubonnaturalist.org/

Chesapeake Bay Foundation - Workshops on water monitoring, oyster restoration and other activities.
Philip Merrill Environmental Center
6 Herndon Avenue
Annapolis, MD 21403
410-268-8816
410-269-0481(from Baltimore)
chesapeake@cbf.org
www.cbf.org

Izaak Walton League - Workshops on stream monitoring and restoration.
707 Conservation Lane
Gaithersburg, MD 20878
(800) BUG-IWLA
www.iwla.org/sos/

Maryland Association of Nonprofit Organizations - Workshops on starting a nonprofit organization, fund raising, grant writing, and other topics.
8720 Georgia Ave. Suite 303
Silver Springs, MD 20910
(301) 565-0505
www.mdnonprofit.org

Maryland Department of Natural Resources - Workshops and/or demonstrations on benthic invertebrate collection, stream walks, water monitoring, volunteer management and other topics.
580 Taylor Avenue, C-2
Annapolis, MD 21401
Contact: Dan Boward
(410) 260-8605
dboward@dnr.state.md.us

Project WET has many activities for aquatic education. The DNR contact is Cindy Etgen at cetgen@dnr.state.md.us or (410) 260-8716.

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Equipment/Catalogues

Carolina Biological Supply Co. (800) 334-5551 www.carolina.com
Fisher Scientific (USA) (800) 955-1177 https://www1.fishersci.com/index.jsp
HACH Co (800) 227-4224 www.hach.com
LaMotte Co. (800) 344-3100 www.lamotte.com
Ben Meadows Company (800) 241-6401 http://www.benmeadows.com/
WARD'S Natural Science (800)962-2660 http://www.wardsci.com/
IWLA - Equipment for stream monitoring. (800) BUG-IWLA www.iwla.org
Water Monitoring Equipment & Supplies (207) 276-5746 www.watermonitoringequip.com


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Identification Guides and Keys

Fish and Herps

Field Guide to Freshwater Fishes of North America. A.J.McClane. 1978. Henry Holt and Co., New York, NY.

Fish Facts. Information on common fish from Maryland DNR
http://www.dnr.state.md.us/fisheries/education/fishfaqs.html

Peterson Field Guide to Reptiles and Amphibians of Eastern and Central North America. R Conant et. al. 1985.

Peterson Field Guide to Atlantic Coast Fishes. C. Richard Robins. 1986. Houghton Mifflin

Invertebrates

Aquatic Entomology. McCafferty, W.P. 1981. Jones and Bartlett Publishing Co., Boston, MA.

EPA's guide to benthic macroinvertebrates:
http://www.epa.gov/bioindicators/html/benthosclean.html

Family-Level Key to Stream Invertebrates of Maryland and Surrounding Areas 1999. Maryland Department of Natural Resources CBWP-MANTA-EA-99-2 (revised 2003) http://www.dnr.state.md.us/streams/pubs/ea99-2rev2003.pdf (1.6 MB)

Freshwater Benthic Macroinvertebrates. Information Sheet.
http://www.dnr.state.md.us/streams/pubs/benthic_macroinvertebrates.pdf
HTML version of Fact sheet: http://www.dnr.state.md.us/streams/pubs/freshwater.html

A Guide to Common Freshwater Invertebrates of North America. 2002. J. Reese Voshell, Jr. McDonald and Woodward Publishing Company, Blacksburg, VA.

Guide to Freshwater Animals without Backbones. De Strulle, A. and Johnson, T. 1997. The Center for Conservation and Development, Inc., P.O. Box 504, Route 28, Arkville, NY 12406 (914) 586-2611.

New York State Dept. of Environmental Conservation http://www.dec.state.ny.us/website/dow/stream/index.htm

Submerged Aquatic Vegetation

Maryland Department of Natural Resources SAV Key
http://www.dnr.state.md.us/bay/sav/key/

Chesapeake Bay Foundation Guide to Underwater Grasses
http://www.cbf.org/grasses  
Contact David Slater (410) 268-8816

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Grants

Chesapeake Bay Trust
60 West Street, Suite 200A
Annapolis, Maryland 21401
(410) 974-2941, Fax: (410) 269-0387
E-Mail: postmaster@cbtrust.org
http://www.chesapeakebaytrust.org/

EPA - web site for funding information.
http://www.epa.gov/owow/watershed/funding.html

The Foundation Center - open to the public
1627 K Street, NW, 3rd Fl
Washington, D.C. 20006-1708
202-331-1400
http://www.fdncenter.org/

The Grantsmanship Center (inexpensive publications on program planning, proposal writing, etc.)
P.O. Box 17220
Los Angeles, CA 90017
213-482-9860
www.tgci.com

Town Creek Foundation
121 N. West Street
Easton, Maryland 21601
410-763-8171
info@towncreekfdn.org
www.towncreekfdn.org


For more information on citizen monitoring, contact Dan Boward (dboward@dnr.state.md.us) or check our Volunteer Monitoring web page: http://www.dnr.state.md.us/streams/volunteer/vol_index.html


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This page was updated on 3/17/2005