Category: Water Quality

Environmental Education, South Sound GREEN, Student GREEN Congress, Updates, Water Quality

Monthly Update – February 2026

Stephanie Bishop
Students from East Olympia conducting the dissolved oxygen test at their monitoring site.

With Spring right around the corner, South Sound GREEN has been getting back into the swing of water quality testing and prepping for our annual Student GREEN Congress!

This month, Thurston County students are returning to their monitoring sites to gather their Winter water quality data. These are the times of year that are the most important for local salmon. Rain, cold, or snow won’t stop these scientists!

TnT volunteers joined the Center for Natural Lands Management this past Valentine’s Day for their bonfire for prairie restoration! Volunteers got to collect various brush and limbs from trees cut down for safety and oak release and pile them into a bonfire. This bonfire helps restore our prairie habitats by spreading nutrient rich ash to support the ecosystem. And, of course, no bonfire is complete without s’mores! If you have a teen who is interested in getting some outdoor work experience, please contact Sam Nadell (snadell@thurstoncd.com).

Student GREEN Congress will be taking place on March 19th at The Evergreen State College and delegates are working hard in preparation! Students from elementary and middle schools all over the county will gather to share their water quality data from both Fall and Winter testing. Together they will work to identify hot spots, come up with action projects, and celebrate healthy water parameters. This event is done in collaboration with the Nisqually River Education Project and Chehalis Basin Education Consortium. If you’d like to know more about it, check out our Student GREEN Congress Webpage and this article from Thurston Talk!

Environmental Education, Updates, Water Quality

Monthly Update – October 2025

Stephanie Bishop
Students at Pioneer Park doing a dissolved oxygen test.

October brings cozy Fall weather and our water quality monitoring trips! Students all over the county have been conducting water quality tests, including four schools that are new to testing as of the past year! We’ve spent this month conducting practice lessons in the classroom and taking students out into the field to their community sites. It’s been a blast getting these students, their families, and their teachers pumped about water quality and salmon.

North Thurston schools have completed their Watershed Explorers field trips! In sun, rain, wind, and cold, every 5th grade student across eight schools gathered at their testing sites to collect water quality data as each student conducted each test. Using site surveys and the data gathered, students discussed what may be impacting the water quality and how their communities can work together to make improvements.

Orca Recovery Day was on the 18th and our volunteer group, Teens in Thurston (TnT) worked alongside other volunteers to help restore riparian and forested areas in Squaxin Park to support our Southern Resident Orcas! A beautiful mosaic art piece was created by the volunteers in celebration. If you or someone you know is a high school student looking for volunteer hours and enjoy working outside, please contact Sam Nadell (snadell@thurstoncd.com) for more information.

Updates, Water Quality

Monthly Update: October 2020

Stephanie Bishop
A screenshot of one of our pre-recorded water quality monitoring Zoom videos.

Water Quality Monitoring at South Sound GREEN is back! We’ve been reconnecting with students and teachers this month to lead live and pre-recorded water quality lessons over Zoom and empower students to strive for healthier waterways. Hands-on environmental experiences may be hard to come by in a time of virtual learning, so in addition to our virtual resources we have worked to provide teachers with water quality test strips for students to test water in their own homes. It’s been so great to do what we do best with water quality monitoring again, even with the given circumstances. If you’re a teacher or you know a teacher who could use some support and would be interested in our water quality program, please reach out and let us know!

With the seasons changing and the days getting shorter, remember that now is a great time to enjoy the outdoors! A lot of our ThurstonTalk activities (including our recent Orcas in Disguise activity) are great for getting out in nature and taking advantage of the beautiful fall weather. And keep an eye out for future videos and resources from McLane Creek Nature Trail, where salmon will be returning to soon! We’re working with StreamTeam to create resources to experience salmon spawning even if you can’t make it to the trail. 

Stay safe and healthy everybody!

Environmental Education, Salmon, South Sound GREEN, Water Quality

Water testing in South Sound

Stephanie Bishop

IKPThis fall nearly 1200 students visited their local waterways to find out how healthy the water is for salmon.  With mostly sunny, dry days this fall, students fanned out across the Henderson, Deschutes, Eld and Totten Watersheds.  Overall, 57 sites were tested.  Student data showed better than optimal levels of dissolved oxygen in the Deschutes River, cold temperatures (all below 9 degrees C), and low turbidity.  Students will trek back out to their monitoring sites this February to once again collect and test the water, this time making observations on how increased rainfall might change their results.  Many thanks to the teachers and multiple parent and community volunteers who turned out to make this day a success!

Environmental Education, Nearshore, South Sound GREEN, Uncategorized, Water Quality

How Many Seashells Does She Sell on the Seashore?

ssgreenamericorps

Nearshore 2018 Infograph_Short

Hopefully, for the ecosystem and the beach goers, none.
With the oceans becoming more acidic it is harder for shelled marine critters to build strong outer protection and secondary shellers (like hermit crab) are having trouble finding homes! Each item on the beach, whether it’s shells, crab molts, or rocks plays an important role in the beach’s local ecosystem.
And that is the main message being shared at the seashore during Nearshore Field Trips!


This spring South Sound GREEN hosted 770 students to participate in the Nearshore program. Students ranged between 5th to 8th grade, and came from 6 local schools. The Nearshore program is a field trip that South Sound GREEN offers as a way for students to connect their freshwater monitoring experience with the marine waters of Puget Sound.


For many kids this is the first time seeing some of the different marine species up close and in person, and gives students an introduction to marine biology. “I am thankful for this experience because I got to see new animals in a beautiful place” Aeivet, 5th grader. Through this hands-on program students learn about what affects marine water quality and how their freshwater monitoring site is connected to the Puget Sound. The students get to collect plankton samples, identify the plankton under microscopes, and use a Secchi disk to measure turbidity with Pacific Shellfish Institute. They also get an overview of scuba diving and interact with marine life brought up to the surface by the divers.


Students had the opportunity to explore the subtidal zone at Zittel’s Marina, and then then intertidal zone at Tolmie State Park and Johnson Point Beach. In this nearshore habitat they identified marine life with South Sound Estuary Association’s Beach Naturalists and discovered various adaptations that help the organisms to survive in the different habitat zones. During the programs, 255 volunteer hours were spent helping students to identify over 90 different marine species.


Julia from Lydia Hawk wrote “This was one of my favorite field trips in fifth grade! And thank you for letting our class experience this!” If each person that went to beach to experience the amazing marine ecosystem (like the 770 students in the Nearshore program) collected a souvenir, there would be very little for others to enjoy and even less left for marine critter’s to build their homes.

So remember the next time you’re on a vacation and want to take that beautiful cockle shell home, Life’s a Beach. Or rather Beach = Life.