Creek Day from Dan's Perspective

Creek Day was awesome!  At the start of the day, Maggie and her mom-van stopped by our house and picked up a bunch of materials that we needed for the event such as a few tables, a watershed model, and recyclables.  After that, we drove over to Eric’s to pick up his supplies.  We arrived at the school around 10 am and went inside and talked to the teachers.  They were so excited to have us there.  After some logistical conversations about where to put the stations and how to divide up and rotate the groups, we started to unpack Maggie’s van and the River Institute van and started setting up for the event. 

                          

It fits!  Maggie’s van with our supplies

My station was the watershed station.  Here the kids “made it rain” on the plastic watershed model with a spray bottle and pitcher of water to see where the water would go.  Following this, the students sprinkled green sugar cookie crystals all over the model to represent pollution.  After making it rain again, we checked out the water that had drained into our rivers, lakes, and streams.  It was green water, and I showed it to the kids, and they all said “Eeewww” or “That’s gross.”  When I asked them if they would drink it, they always replied with a loud “No!”

Following this, we went over to the large River Mobile map of the US which shows all the rivers in Dayton as well as the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers which drain into the ocean.  Here, we followed the path of water downstream to the ocean, acknowledging how many states these rivers touched along the way.  Many learned which state Arkansas was in addition to the rivers along the way to the ocean.  Then we talked about how if I dropped my infamous empty chip bag on the ground in our watershed, it would flow to the rivers and creeks in Dayton when it rains.  Next, it would flow to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers all the way to the ocean, affecting all of the fish, animals, plants, birds, people, and communities along the way. 

Finally, we talked about how we can protect our watershed to keep this from happening.  We talked about cleaning up our dogs’ poop in the yard and not washing our cars outside in the driveway.  They mentioned most frequently that not littering and picking up trash would help protect the watershed and the people downstream.  So with this, we had a race to pick up 2-3 pieces of trash on the school property and bring them back to the table.  By the end of the day, we had a full box of trash that was found on the property.  This was one of my favorite parts of the station.  I told them, “Look at all of this trash that we collected.  You’re awesome!  We kept all of this trash out of the river today!”  It was super cool.  I was proud of them.  They were making a real difference in the health of the watershed, the fish and organisms in the river, and us.  That’s pretty cool.  They I asked how long it took us to do this.  1-2 minutes is what they told me.  Here, we learned that spending just a little time and being a little conscious of our actions, we can make a big difference.

It was really fun teaching the kids.  They were very receptive to the information and almost always willing to answer my questions.  They loved “making it rain” on the watershed and laughed every time I said it :) .  I felt like they all learned something that day from this station, whether it was to not litter, or to clean up your dog’s poop, what the AR state is called, or how pollution affects the fish, birds, animals, and us.  I felt like each person took away something.  And that’s what really matters in the end.  If one person learned anything from this, then it was worth it.  And I believe this project was most certainly worth it.  I am pretty proud of our cohort after today.  We came together and really made this happen using all of our different talents, abilities, and interests to create something truly beautiful and awesome.  And I believe that we made an impact on the 7^th grade students at Edison Elementary.  Now I think they know a little bit more about protecting the environment and being stewards of our rivers.

Until next time,

River Love,

Dan Striebich

A Steward's In-Depth Look Beneath the Surface

   This past weekend, spring break 2K16, 30 UD students traveled to Williston, Florida.  For the 25 open water SCUBA divers, this was a chance to get SCUBA certified in the sun and the sand. Students in the advanced class got to log many more dives using Nitrox air on their way to their advanced certifications. This is an annual trip for UD SCUBA students and instructors, and this was the largest group in almost fifteen years. They started this tradition 22 years ago, under the leadership of Donn Shade.

   Learning to SCUBA dive was a very unique experience. Telling your brain to breathe while underwater takes some coaxing, and learning how to safety dive and manage the equipment is overwhelming for a beginner’s mind. The class spent four weeks learning in the classroom, covering topics from the underwater environment to health conditions that can arise from diving. We had three pool lessons before the trip, in which we covered things such as regulator retrieval, mask clear, out of air situations, and emergency ascents, skills that we demonstrated in Florida for our certifications.

   The first diving location was Devil’s Den, a sinkhole/underground cave. It is so called named after the pioneers first saw steam rising from the Earth, and mistook the moisture for the breath of the Devil, rather than the warmer water temperatures below. This was a very comfortable place to dive, with a big dock to get into the water, and platforms in which to demonstrate our skills.

   The next day we dove at Blue Grotto. This diving site is much deeper than Devil’s Den, the lower caverns actually stretching down 100 feet. The advanced divers were able to make this dark journey through the use of nitrox air. I went to a max depth of 57 feet, actually sitting on Peace Rock and absorbing my surroundings. It is amazing how quickly colors fade, and I was surrounded by a blues. The water was very clear, until a clumsy diver touched the silty bottom and stirred up the dirt. The mascot of the place is Virgil the Turtle; he is loved by all. It was really cool to see the air bubbles travel up the rock walls and overhang; their quick movements resembling an animal scurrying around.

   Saturday, the open water students got a chance to swim with Manatees, at the only place in the world to allow these types of encounters.

   This trip was a lot of fun, and valuable as I am now an open water SCUBA certified diver. I got a lot more comfortable with diving and learning to handle problems underwater. Experiencing the underwater environment at a deeper depth is really neat, but eerie and unnerving at times. I’m glad I was a part of this diving class and Florida was a great way to spend spring break.

River Steward in the "Real World"

My name is Megan Guy. I am a part of the 2015 River Steward cohort. My experience in River Stewards has opened doors to many unique opportunities.

   After graduation, I headed to Kenai, Alaska and worked as the Stream Watch Intern for the Kenai Watershed Forum. Each year, the Kenai Watershed Forum partners with the US Forest Service and local agencies to host a volunteer program for the community called Stream Watch.

  In Alaska, salmon fishing is huge. As a result, many people come from near and far to utilize the amazing fishing areas. Consequently, there is a great amount of degradation to the banks of the rivers and natural lands which effects the salmon habitat as well as other wildlife. The goal of the Stream Watch program is to have volunteers as a presence on the highly used fishing rivers during the summer. When out on the rivers, volunteers do a variety of tasks from picking up trash, talking to anglers about fishing regulations, putting up temporary fencing along river banks, erosion control projects, beach clean ups, and collecting fishing line. In 2015, volunteers contributed 1,400 hours on the rivers, spoke to over 5000 anglers, installed over 2 miles of temporary fishing, collected 1,800 lbs. of trash, and collected 150 lbs. of fishing line. These volunteers truly make an impact! This program has been going on for 21 years and continuing to go stronger each year. My position was helping coordinate, recruit, and make a difference with these folks. It was been an experience that I will never forget! A community coming together can make a world of a difference!

   Currently, I am in New Hampshire doing a 10-month Americorps position through the Student Conservation Association (SCA) where I serve as a Conservation Steward. I am a part of a team of 30 passionate individuals who work and live together. We all are 20-25 in age and come from varying backgrounds ranging from theater to finance to the sciences.

   Everyday is an adventure at Bear Brook State Park. We live in community in non-electric cabins and have a lodge with a kitchen, bathrooms, and limited WiFi. We spend most of our time in the lodge reading, playing instruments, playing board games, and doing lesson planning. If we aren't in there, we are out in the park making igloos, having snowball fights, or on hikes.

   We are currently teaching environmental education in the schools. In small groups, we create a 10-week curriculum teaching over 1,000 kids in the Manchester area about our natural world. Once school lets out, we do trail work and assist the state parks in maintaining their recreation areas. This will result in the creation of many shelters, bridges, and new trails by the end of October. 

   So far, it has been one of the most challenging and rewarding experiences to be a part of this group. I have gained amazing skills in environmental education and team building and there is much much more to come. I'm excited to see what the future has to hold!

   River Stewards has inspired my passion to learn, explore, and protect our natural world. I’m so lucky to have the opportunity to explore this passion further through this position!

Megan

A Steward's Adventures in China

Greetings from China!

Two weeks ago, I arrived in Shanghai for a semester of study at the University of Dayton China Institute. Since I arrived, I’ve been kept busy absorbing as much of Chinese culture as possible, whether that takes the form of eating duck feet and pig brain or learning to speak the language. In addition to learning about the culture, I’ve also metaphorically (and literally) worn my blue RS shirt by observing the water here in China.

I am living and studying in Suzhou, a city just inland of Shanghai, which was purportedly dubbed the Venice of the East by Marco Polo. As the moniker suggests, Suzhou is home to a beautiful network of canals connected to China’s famous Grand Canal, the longest canal in the world. Bordering Suzhou to the left is the large Lake Tai, which is about 1/10th the size of Lake Erie, and dotting Suzhou’s land are many smaller lakes. Suzhou sits in the Yangtze River Delta Plain at the mouth of the Yangtze River, Asia’s longest river. The Yangtze drains a fifth of the land area in China, and flows directly into the East China Sea.

The water challenges in China were apparent as soon as I arrived; one of the first things I learned was to not drink the tap water. As the tap water can have a number of bacterial or viral contaminants, you must either drink bottled water or boiled water. After taking clean tap water for granted all my life, non-potable tap water required an adjustment.

There are also many ecological concerns with the water system around Suzhou. Lake Tai and the Yangtze rivers experience significant industrial pollution and untreated wastewater is often released into those waterways. Just like the Great Miami, the Yangtze runs through farmland, so agricultural runoff contributes to the pollution of the river and ultimately the Pacific. Over the past few decades, hundreds of dams have been built along the river for flood control and irrigation. These dams have wreaked havoc on the natural ecosystems and radically altered many lakes. Ecologically harmful damming projects continue; one of the most notable is the recently constructed Three Gorges Dam—one of the largest hydroelectric dams in the world.

My experiences in China so far have been stimulating and enlightening. Needless to say, there’s still much to learn about how the Chinese people and government utilize, and neglect, China’s water resources. I’m excited to see what the next three months bring.

Jason Demeter
2018 Cohort

A Steward’s Adventure in Guatemala

I recently just got back from an amazing trip to Guatemala.  While there, I stayed with a host family in Quetzaltenago (called Xela by the locals), which is a beautiful city with some of the most amazing people that I have ever met.  I was there for four weeks and had many adventures, like hiking to the top of the tallest point in Central America, seeing my first live tarantula, jumping off a forty foot bridge into a river, getting sick from eating some delicious street tacos, and learning more about myself and others than I ever thought possible.

I was able to volunteer at a local clinic there named Primeros Paso.  This clinic was basically the main source of medical and dental care for over 15,000 people in the valley that I was staying in, and it was basically this small “building” with a couple rooms and electricity that would go in and out.   Some of the volunteering projects that I took part in were helping out with a class that taught the indigenous women about nutrition and how they should be taking care of their children, and going out to some of the schools and teaching the kids there about nutrition as well as just some basic life skills while also bringing some well needed medicine to the children and families. I was able to learn so much from these people, more than they could have ever learned from me.  Sure I learned that I should appreciate what I have, but what person goes to a third world country for a month and comes back still not appreciating the fact that they have things like heated showers, or running water for that matter.  Something that I feel was more important that I learned on this trip was that you shouldn’t go into service looking at all the bad that has happened and thinking that your going to be able to fix everything for these people, because in reality that doesn’t happen.  What really happens is that you see yourself in those people, you see the humanity and the similarities with yourself in another person, and you figure out that you can’t fix all their problems.   Thinking about this while on my trip really made me reflect on the Fitz Center, and my involvement with the River Stewards Program, mostly due to our asset based thinking approach to service.  Looking at all the good that the communities had was a lot easier than focusing on all of the bad.  I felt like I got a lot more out of my “service” trip down there then any of the Guatemalan people got out of it. 

 

I learned a lot about the water resources in Xela.  There actually is a big problem with pollution there, especially because of the fact that a big mining company just bought a lot of land near the clinic I worked in, and basically stripped everything off of it.  Also, this one village that I worked in was located on top of a mountain, and everyday the women had to walk up and down that mountain just to get water.  I actually had to walk up it in order to get to the community one day (since the buses would not go up there because of the incline and the roads were too dangerous).  So, I can tell you first hand that the hike up and down that mountain is no stroll in the park.  Those women must have legs the size of body builders, because in order to walk up and down that mountain and also be carrying a couple gallons of water on their head would take a lot of strength.  I was able to see first hand how not having direct access to drinking water affected these people’s lives, and just how much I can take that for granted.

 

My trip to Guatemala was one of the most life changing experience that I have ever had, and I think that it has changed some of my perspectives on life and the way that I view the world.  I would not trade the experience that I had or the relationships that I built for anything.

Nick Racchi
2017 Cohort

 

 

"A year of life after River Stewards"

It's been one year since graduating from the University of Dayton with a BS in Biology and SEE, minor. When friends and family ask me what I've been doing or what I've done since graduation I usually give them the short version, "I've been taking a few seasonal jobs and applying to graduate school." While that is true, it nowhere near encompasses the experiences I've had, the people I've met, and the landscapes that I've seen. Right after graduation I took an internship with the Ohio EPA in their surface water division in Columbus. I specifically worked under the Wetland Ecology Group where I got to assist two biologists and two other interns in taking National Wetland Condition Assessments (NWCA) and Ohio Rapid Assessment Methods (ORAM) of Wetlands. Basically, these assessments grade different aspects of a wetland such as hydrology, vegetation, soils, buffer area, and more to determine wetland class and health. I learned so much about each assessment method, soil profiling, and even got some lessons on bryophyte identification. 

After working the summer on wetlands, I headed out to the prairies of Montana for the months of October and November. I was volunteering for an organization called Adventurers and Scientists for Conservation (ASC) on a project called Landmark. ASC partnered with the American Prairie Reserve to collect wildlife data. If you have not heard about the American Prairie Reserve, it is definitely worth looking up. In short, the American Prairie Reserve is an organization aimed at creating and managing a grassland reserve that could reach as far as three million acres. The reserve reintroduced bison in 2005 and will soon be nearing 500 total bison. Anyway, the six Landmark crew members lived on the reserve and our job as volunteers was to hike 8-12 mile transects and record field observations on wildlife. We would carry a tablet, GPS and other equipment in the field and every time we saw an animal we would mark the location, number of animals, approximate age, health, behavior, and the direction it was moving. We were also responsible for maintaining motion-activated camera traps, which was always fun to review the footage to see what the camera caught. On these transects we were likely to see bison, pronghorn, mule deer, white-tailed deer, coyotes, bald eagles, golden eagles, rabbits, prairie dogs, sage grouse, sharp-tailed grouse and different species of hawk. On a more rare occasion, we'd catch a glimpse of a badger. Being on the prairie in a remote location was a completely new experience for me and it gave me a lot of time to take in the landscape and to reflect. I got to experience -20 degrees in November, see the Aurora borealis, see a black footed ferret (an endangered species), and meet some great people from all over the country and Germany.  If you ever get the opportunity to visit Montana, don't forget about the prairie. They call the state Big Sky for a reason and the sun rises and sunsets are unrivaled.

 

 

The prairie was absolutely beautiful, but I was off again onto a different landscape. In February and March, two other technicians and I helped a University of Tennessee graduate student with his Elk Forage research project. We were tasked with taking vegetation data in North Cumberland Wildlife Management Area which is about an hour north of Knoxville. We would set up 40 meter transects and identify the vegetation (mainly trees) that crossed the transect and looked for evidence of deer and elk forage (basically if a branch had been chomped on). Since it was winter in the mountains of Tennessee we experienced quite a bit of snow and got to test our winter driving on unplowed mountain roads. We got to see a ton of white-tailed deer and turkey, practice our animal track identification, and we even glimpsed a few elk. Personally, I had never had any winter tree identification, so I was able to learn a great deal from the other techs and graduate student. 

 

As for my most recent excursion, I will be heading up to northern Minnesota to work as a wildlife technician for the National Park Service. While I don't know what is entirely in store for me, I know I will be taking data on wildlife (such as grey wolves) using camera traps and hair snares. I'm really excited to be working for the National Park Service this summer and can't wait to meet the other wildlife techs that I'll be working with. And as for the future, I am currently applying to graduate schools for wildlife ecology or management. 

 

While I can't say that this is a typical career path for a recent graduate, I can say that this was definitely the right one for me. It has been stressful constantly applying for jobs and not knowing where I'll end up next, but I have seen some amazing things in the past year and have leaned more than I ever could have hoped for!

Cheers! 
River Love

Allie Rakowski (2014 River Steward Cohort)

 

MY INTODUCTION TO THE GREAT BARRIER REEF

May 9-11,2015

Léa Dolimier

2016 Cohort

  In the belief that we can bring groups of people together around something as essentially simple and common as water, the wonders of the Ocean  in Whitsunday definitely proved  so. Whitsundays is the lower extent of the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. This past weekend 23 other water adventures and I, along with our three incredible crew members, boarded a catamaran and took off for the outer reef for two nights. Having known no one before embarking, we all quickly began to chat like old friends as the excitement of the coming weekend mounted.

Over the next few days I was able to do three snorkels and my FIRST dive ever. There is certainly something magical about the first moment when you look under the water. A whole colorful, chaotic world, unlike any that can be found on land, opens up in front of you. An everlasting scene of colorful corals and fish of all sizes going about their daily routine as you, a guest in their world, can do nothing but gape at the wonders below.
 

The whole trip was beautiful. After hours spent in the water and exploring the world renowned Whitehaven beach, nights were then spent with cups of tea and sunsets, followed by long twilight conversations below a star filled sky. This is where we built our community and grew as a group. All world travelers, we shared adventure stories and swapped facts about the various countries we came from. The fun lasted long into the night. After a short nap we woke early to watch the sunrise over the horizon and did it all over again.

I learned so much about the world from people from many different places and with so many different perspectives. And the more I heard the more I wanted needed to see.

Then, as most things do in Australia, the excursion ended with a party on land later that night. After a few drinks and lots of dancing we said our farewells and good lucks and went our separate ways. My time with these two dozen people may have been brief, but their stories have touched and inspired me nonetheless.

I will say that at first I was nervous about traveling this trip on my own, but having done it
I would highly recommend it. It forces you to meet and really get to know new people and you will see that many people are wandering too on their own.

Lastly to anyone who has not had the chance to explore the depths of that magical thing we call water - which makes up our world and allows us to live- DO IT! The ocean is one amazing place that will really open your eyes to the unbelievably unimaginable things that our planet is capable of creating.