clean and clear

monitoring & research

Vermont Lay Monitoring Program
VT/ NY Long-Term Water Quality and Biological Monitoring Program
Lake Champlain Basin Land Use Update and Phosphorus Loading Study
University of Vermont Project to Develop Phosphorus Accounting System
St. Albans Bay Studies

Vermont Lay Monitoring Program

Clean and Clear funds for monitoring are being used to support the Vermont Lay Monitoring Program. The Vermont Lay Monitoring Program is a statewide, cooperative effort between the Water Quality Division and volunteer lake monitors. The program has operated continuously under the original program goals established in 1979, which are to involve citizens in lake protection and to establish a database on each lake useful for documenting changes in water quality. Reports are produced each year summarizing the monitoring results.

Water samples obtained by the volunteers are collected by program staff and analyzed at the Department of Environmental Conservation’s LaRosa Laboratory. Seasonal program staff train the volunteers, conduct quality assurance visits, pick up and deliver the samples to the laboratory, and document the results in a database. During the summer field season, the Vermont Lay Monitoring Program monitors approximately 55 inland lakes and 16 stations on Lake Champlain for phosphorus and algal chlorophyll concentrations, and for water clarity.

2007 Lay Monitoring Lakes Click for larger image

The Lay Monitoring Program produced a Volunteer Surface Water Monitoring Guide in 2005 as a resource for all citizen water quality monitors in Vermont.

VT and NY Long-Term Water Quality and Biological Monitoring Program

The Lake Champlain Basin Program supports the Long-Term Water Quality and Biological Monitoring Program on Lake Champlain, which is operated jointly by the States of Vermont and New York. The program measures phosphorus and many other parameters in the lake and its tributary rivers. All chemical analyses are conducted by the Vermont DEC Laboratory. The tributary monitoring results are analyzed with data from the network of stream flow gauges in the basin operated by the U.S. Geological Survey. The monitoring results are updated annually on the Lake Champlain Long-Term Monitoring Program website where the data and graphical summaries are freely available to researchers, students, consultants, and the general public.

Lake Champlain Basin Land Use Update and Phosphorus Loading Study

The Agency of Natural Resources funded a study titled “Updating the Lake Champlain Basin Land Use Data to Improve Prediction of Phosphorus Loading” (on the LCBP web site). This study was completed by the University of Vermont in May 2007, with technical oversight provided by the Lake Champlain Basin Program.

The purposes of the study were to produce an updated land use and land cover data layer for the entire basin, analyze changes in land use between 1992 and 2001, and develop updated phosphorus loading estimates for each subwatershed based on the new land use data.

Comparative analysis of the new 2001 and corrected 1992 land use data indicated that change was most pronounced in three land use classes: urban (+1.9%), agriculture (-5.4%), and brush (+4.5%). With respect to phosphorus loading, the report found that, on average basinwide, 53% of the nonpoint source phosphorus load to Lake Champlain came from urban or developed land, 39% from agricultural land, and 8% from forest land. This breakdown varied by watershed, however. For example, it was estimated that nonpoint source loads in the Missisquoi Bay watershed (Vermont and Quebec) were derived from agricultural land (68%), urban land (28%), and forest land (5%).

University of Vermont Project to Develop Phosphorus Accounting System

Clean and Clear FY 2007 funds were approved for a research project at the University of Vermont to begin developing a phosphorus accounting system for the Lake Champlain Basin. This project will be developed in consultation with the Lake Champlain Basin Program Technical Advisory Committee, and is in the early technical planning stages.