The Summer ’22 Water Quality testing program is getting underway this May! Friends of Sligo Creek (FOSC) is a partner for the third summer with Anacostia Riverkeeper (ARK). ARK leads this partnership, which also includes Neighbors of the Northwest Branch (NNB), with funding from the Chesapeake Bay Trust and Montgomery County.

Residents interested in the water quality of Sligo Creek and Northwest Branch are invited to help track the chemical and biological health of these streams in a non-technical, user-friendly way. After completing one of the 2 online training sessions, you’ll be ready to take temperature measurements and collect water samples for later analysis. Volunteer training sessions will be held on Thursday May 5th, 10am-12pm or on Friday, May 20th, 10am-12pm. Please sign up for either session of this required training. The monitoring program runs from May through September and is open to adults and youth under 18 with parental supervision.

Summer Volunteer WQ Testers Needed!

We need water quality testers for each of the 3 sites along Sligo and for 1 site on Long Branch. On two Wednesdays per month, volunteers will record water temperature, air temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, and turbidity, and take water samples to be analyzed for bacteria at Anacostia Riverkeeper’s lab. Do not worry if these terms are unfamiliar. All will be taught in the training! Monitoring at a site usually takes just 15 minutes.

The data from the program helps FOSC, ARK, Montgomery Parks, and state and local agencies learn more about the chemical and biological health of Sligo Creek and Long Branch — where the challenges are greatest and where the improvements are strongest — and help FOSC advocate for Sligo Creek and Long Branch.

Interested in the trends from the last 2 summers of testing? Check out ARK’s summary of findings for Sligo/Long Branch test sites. And read more about this program on the FOSC Water Quality Committee main page.

If you have any questions about the program, please feel free to contact the FOSC Water Quality team at [email protected].