The River of Macros!

This morning we got to search for Macroinvertebrates! What are macroinvertebrates? Don't worry, I didn't have much of an idea either. They are animals, without a spine, that you can see, and it is in the water. They are very diverse and can range from crayfish to Caddisfly larva. The first thing we did was collect the macroinvertebrates. We got into groups, got a yellow net with two poles on the end, and stepped into the water. The water wasn't too cold, but the current was really strong! It was difficult to hold to net. After we got into the water, we had to gather rocks that were VERY slimy and put them on the bottom of the net. Next, we danced in the water in order to bring up all of the silt and the wildlife that was in the water. After that we took the wildlife out of the water. We then picked out the different wildlife that we picked out on a table. We found many different organisms including crayfish. We found out that the stream was considered fairly clean.