Macroinvertebrate Results and Field Data

Reflection

Today I did the macroinvertebrate collection and I found many, many, many scuds. I collected about 50 and most likely found more than that but anytime I tried to grab them or suck them up with the pipette they swam away. They were just the perfect size to slip through the tweezers and too big to go through the pipette. What I don't know was why there were so many of them. It could be from the stream bed which seemed to be mostly clay or some sort of hard, thick, muddy texture and had very few rocks. While I collected the macroinvertebrates I used a stick to disrupt the ground because the rocks were very difficult to move and the the stick helped me muddle up the clay-like bed. I could also tell that it was something around clay because the day before I noticed there was a dug hole in a area of the stream where a animal most likely lived and today the structure was totally undisturbed. Other macroinvertebrates I found were a leech, one common netspinner (though I am not confident that was what it was), and 2 snails - one gilled and lunged. I took pictures of both and when I got home looked up what the difference was. I believe that the one that I did a watercolor of was gilled. According to the macroinvertebrate criteria, my stream is in very bad condition. I do understand why it says that because over the years I have been visiting the stream it has seemed to not have changed.