Water Quality Impacts: Point Source

In the short videos on the next several pages, Matt Vincent illustrates impacts to water quality at several different western Montana sites, starting with point source impacts. Right-click or ctrl-click this link to download.   In this short video, Matt Vincent illustrates a second type of point source impact to water quality. Right-click or ctrl-click […]

Sources of Water Pollution

Our waters quality can be impacted by so many uses and ways that it is hard to know where to begin. The best place to start is with us – humans. Pretty much everything we do as humans as it relates to our use of water results in a change to its quality. Introduction of […]

Water Quality Parameters: Dissolved Oxygen

Dissolved oxygen, often referred to as DO, is simply the amount of oxygen that is dissolved in the water. It is measured in mg/L or ppm and is correlated with the water’s temperature to give a % saturation. When DO levels fall below 8 or 9, most trout and oxygen-sensitive aquatic insect populations like stoneflies […]

Water Quality Parameters: Temperature

Temperature is another physical parameter of water that refers to how cold or warm the stream is. In water quality monitoring and scientific field research, temperature is measured in degrees Celsius. Celsius temperature data can be converted to Fahrenheit by multiplying the Celsius reading by 9/5 and adding 32. The majority of trout streams in […]

Soil Profiles

In order to explore what is living in the soil, we will collect and analyze soil profiles from our field sites, describing physical characteristics of the soil and the microbial and insect communities living there. We will then compare our results with other soil profiles compiled from online sources. We will also compare our results […]

Time & Landscape

News Flash! When it comes right down to it, landscape development is all about time. While water, ice, wind and plate movements carve out the hills and valleys outside our windows, time is the key factor. How long do you think it took for the U-shaped valley at the beginning of this module to form? […]

Deposition

Landforms are also created where eroded materials come to rest, or are deposited through a process called deposition. A classic example of this in Montana is alluvial fans that form where fast-running mountain streams enter valleys and slow down, and the sediments they carry fall out of suspension. Take a look at The Perfect Alluvial Fan […]

Weathering & Erosion

Weathering is the slow, continuous chemical and mechanical breakdown of rocks into fragments and dissolved compounds. Around Butte, Montana, weathering has turned solid granite into the sand and gravel that underlies most of the city. Weathering and erosion are strongly controlled by climate. Water is a major contributor to chemical weathering and mechanical or physical weathering, […]

Compressional Tectonics

The Himalayan Mountains were formed when India crashed into Asia, a process known as compressional tectonics. Take a look at the first section of When Continents Collide from geocraft.com, which includes an animation on continental collisions. In southwest Montana, tectonic compression occurred before most of our current landscape was formed. Remnant compressional structures are found […]

Transcurrent Tectonics

Where tectonic plates slide past each other, in a process called transcurrent tectonics, the landscape is dominated by long linear valleys and ridges. The classic example is the San Andreas Fault; for more on the San Andreas Fault, take a look at this article from geology.com on The San Andreas Fault. A Montana example is […]