Reference site selection for monitoring and assessment of intermittent streams in South Dakota

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Intermittent streams are defined as those stream channels which flow for only a portion of the year. These streams have well defined bed and bank features and typically display seasonal flow during spring and early summer before drying toward the middle and end of the growing season. Clearer understanding of the importance of these small catchments to downstream water quality, habitat, and biotic integrity has fueled demands to expand protection and monitoring up into these headwater catchments. This project will define intermittent, headwater stream reference sites and provide supporting field data for the Northern Glaciated Plains (NGP) ecoregion (LIII Ecoregion 46) of South Dakota (Figure 1). The objectives of this proposed effort are to 1) define candidate intermittent stream reference sites within the NGP; 2) conduct field sampling to characterize natural, intermittent reference stream water quality, physical habitat, and biological conditions; 3) define optimal macroinvertebrate metrics for monitoring headwater intermittent prairie streams; 4) define the appropriate index period for macroinvertebrate sampling within headwater intermittent prairie streams; and 5) validate selection of intermittent stream reference sites against random and targeted intermittent drainages within the NGP. Major accomplishments in 2007 by South Dakota State University and the South Dakota Department of Environment and Natural Resources included 1) development and approval of the project Quality Assurance Project Plan (QAPP); 2) delineation of the intermittent stream target population within the NGP; 3) optimal selection of ATtILA landscape metrics for generation of watershed condition scores; 4) calculation of ATtILA watershed condition scores for all streams within the target population; 5) random selection of 10 validation sites from the entire target population; 6) selection of 10 targeted sites based upon SD DENR, NRCS, and SD GF&P recommendations; 7) random selection of candidate reference sites from within the upper 15th percentile of watershed condition scores in each level IV ecoregion of the NGP; and 9) field validation of intermittency using the North Carolina Identification Method for the Origins of Intermittent and Perennial Streams and site condition using the Petersen Riparian, Channel and Environmental (RCE) Inventory for each validation, targeted, and candidate reference site.

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ELECTRONIC FILE - Zoology: Multiple Species; ELECTRONIC FILE - Ecology

Note: Support materials (presentation summarizing project activities and data collected through 2007 sampling season) were appended to this report, but we don't have those materials.

SWAP (2/19/2016) citation:
Troelstrup NH Jr., Stueven G. 2007. Reference site selection for monitoring and assessment of intermittent streams in South Dakota. Annual progress report - 2007. Brookings (SD): South Dakota State University. 8 p. EPA Funding No.: CA 83307101-0.

Note also: It's unclear to whom this report was presented. (The 2010 final project report was submitted to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Western Ecology Division, Corvallis, OR, so presumably this one was too as funding was from the EPA.)

Author affiliations in case needed: Troelstrup NH Jr (Department of Biology and Microbiology, South Dakota State University, Brookings, SD) and Stueven G (South Dakota Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Pierre, SD).