The Friends of the Verde River recently received a $5,000 grant from OneAZ Credit Union’s Community Impact Grant initiative to help them continue the nonprofit’s various community science projects.
“If you are curious about the world around you, if you make observations about the way things are and how things are going, you are halfway to being a community scientist,” Executive Director Nancy Steele said. “Community science advances our knowledge about the world around us; by engaging the power of non-professionals we can collect far more information than the small number of scientists can alone.”
Steele pointed out that community science democratizes science, allowing scientific knowledge to be accessible to everyone, breaking down traditional barriers between scientists and the public. Environmentally-focused community science projects can give people a deeper understanding of their local ecosystems and the conservation efforts needed to preserve them.
“Community science, especially for young people, promotes scientific literacy, critical thinking and problem-solving skills by getting kids involved in real-world data collection,” Steele said. “CS can even inspire a youth to become a scientist. For everyone, participating in a CS project promotes outdoor activities, fosters a sense of belonging and connection and enhances your mental well-being.”
The Friends participate in a number of community science projects aimed at helping maintain a healthy Verde River watershed and ecosystem, including:
- Verde Water Watchers: This year-round project focuses on water quality monitoring to determine where there are issues with unclean and unsafe water. Participation requires a training and certification process and they are always looking for more volunteers. Volunteers visit their assigned sample site on a monthly basis and take the samples to the lab, and may be able to help with lab processing and online data entry.
- BioBlitz: While this project currently takes place once a year, in conjunction with the Verde Valley Birding and Nature Festival and the Science Vortex, it is the easiest in which to participate. Throughout a two-week period in April and May, residents are encouraged to photograph as many species of plants and animals as possible and upload them to the iNaturalist app for identification. This information helps the Friends gain an understanding of the watershed’s biodiversity. Steele aims to have this become a year round project.
- Gully Busters: This project locates and measures gully erosion throughout the Verde River watershed. Gullies are steep-sided channels formed by water rushing downhill and can cause issues as they get larger and deeper. The information collected by this project is shared with land managers to help plan and implement erosion control efforts throughout the watershed.
- Otter Spotter: This project collects data on the river otters of the Verde, in conjunction with the River Otter Ecology Project and Fieldscope. Participants log the date an otter was seen with the location and the number of otters, which assists conservation efforts.
For more information, visit verderiver.org.
