AWWareness

The Alabama Water Watch Program has reached a monumental moment:

The AWW Database now contains 100,000 water quality data records!

This would not be possible without the dedication of our statewide network of volunteer citizen water quality monitors, past and present.

Many thanks to each and every one of you who collected and sent 1, 100, or 1,000+ data records.

Alabama Water Watch works to protect Alabama’s precious water resources by training citizens to collect credible water quality data from rivers, lakes, and other local waterbodies.  Educating people about Alabama’s waters and helping them to find a meaningful connection to their watershed is an important part of what we do.

Lucky for us, Alabama has so much to offer in the way of water resources, it is easy to foster these connections.  With 132,000 miles of streams and rivers, Alabama can call itself “the River State”. Moreover, each river has a unique set of flora and fauna, geology, culture and history that can provide you with a lifetime’s worth of learning.

How much do you know about your own river basin? Check out AWW’s Twelve Months of Alabama Rivers  campaign to test your knowledge and learn more. During each month of 2021, we will be publishing blog articles and social media posts that highlight the unique and interesting characteristics of each of the state’s major river basins.

The Cahaba River is perhaps the most famous major river in Alabama. The Cahaba’s main stem is 190 miles long and remains the longest free-flowing river remaining in Alabama. This absence of hydrological modifications along the main stem has aided in maintaining the unique aquatic biodiversity of the Cahaba. With that said, the Cahaba Basin also is unique in the number of aquatic species that are imperiled or declining in number.

When describing the Cahaba, it is easy to separate two distinct personalities of this River (the Upper and Lower) separated by the Fall Line, a geographic feature that divides Alabama into two distinct physical regions, the uplands and the lowlands. The Fall Line is considered the most significant physical feature in Alabama affecting the distribution of plants and animals and also represents the zone of contact between the hard rocks of the Appalachians and the softer sediments of the Coastal Plain.

Are you an educator, or do you know of an educator who would like to engage your students with citizen science and watershed stewardship?  After a one year postponement, we are excited to announce that we are currently recruiting educators from coastal counties to help us pilot the new 4-H AWW Project “Exploring Pathogen Pollution in Our Waters.”