From the Guyanese Amazon to Menomonie, Wisconsin

Devil's Punch Bowl

When I think of the kind of impressions I have of Menomonie,  the first thought in my mind is the breeze that overpowers me when I ride past Lake Menomin on my rented two-wheel bike. It's a feeling of calmness, freshness, as well as a profound feeling of nostalgia. Cradled in rural Dunn county, the atmosphere feels familiar. It feels like the Guyanese Amazon. Memories always seem to hit me,  as I ride past Lake Menomin, of a past summer in South America. The feeling of "being with nature", being separate from the chaos-ness of urban suburbia, from wild cars that roar down the street...this feeling was indeed one that was all too familiar.

New Home for the Summer

As this was our first week working on the LAKES project, our blog topic was whether or not the civic and work environments meet our expectations. In some ways it does, but I was definitely surprised when seeing and finding out more about Lake Menomin.

It Takes a Watershed to Clean a Lake: Trust and Relationship Building in Environmental Regulation

Poster presentations at the Raw Deal (Photo taken by Chris Ferguson)

Trust forms the backbone of all relationships—between family members, friends and…policy actors and the community? Over the last few months I have been interviewing and observing policy actors (practitioners, policy makers, officials, and organization members) who have influence over the creation, implementation, and enforcement of environmental regulations in the Red Cedar Watershed. This research is a part of the research conducted by the Linking Applied Knowledge in Environmental Sustainability Research Experience for Undergraduates (LAKES REU) at UW-Stout. My goal was to gain an understanding of the ways that policy actors view land use and water pollution in the watershed, their opinions on the effectiveness of current policies, programs, as well as the decision-making process behind those environmental policies.

A little late, but it counts right?

First off sorry everyone for the delay, but I took two long and amazing canoe trips. One of which I had planned since January and one that was a last second idea with a friend. The past two weeks which I spent entirely technology free minus one night that I came home to get supplies and leave for my families annual BWCA trip gave me a lot of time to reflect on my experiences this summer.

The End

Throughout the summer, my research partner and I studied the Groundwater and Surface Water interactions of the Red Cedar River Watershed. We gathered preliminary data for hopefully more promising years to come. By using Solinst Data Loggers that measure water stage and barometric pressure and then taking cross sections, depth, and flow measurements at our three stream sites (Wilson Creek, Tiffany Creek, South Fork of Hay River) we were able to measure the baseflow and stormflow during the 8 weeks we spent in Menomonie, WI.

8 weeks over... still struggles with titles

Here it is, folks! My previous blogs have touched a bit on my summer research but without much detail. In part, this is because my research project took time to develop and really take shape. Now that the summer is over, I will do my best to summarize my research and findings.

The End of a Beginning to Something Great

For our last blog post, we were asked to write about what our results and what we find most important from this summer (at the end is the touchy feely stuff and the internet in the sticks runs slow so no pictures for now).

The purpose of this study was to better understand the impact that farmers' relationships have on individual farming behavior. To do this, we surveyed and interviewed farmers about BMP adoption as well as who they would name as their closest farming colleagues. From this information, we were able to create a social network map. This research project and experience revealed a lot of useful data as well as allowed student researchers to form some valuable connections to landowners and local farmers.