Watershed researchers receive $2.1 million from CWN

WATERLOO, ON, December 13, 2011 — Water researchers across Canada have received a $2.1 million boost today from the Canadian Water Network to develop monitoring nodes within the network’s Canadian Watershed Research Consortium.

CWN’s investment in these end user–led research projects will allow university research groups to advance regional environmental frameworks to support cumulative effects assessment in watersheds. The consortium’s focus is on standardizing approaches nationally to monitor watersheds where multiple uses and activities affect conditions.

“The process began last fall when we issued a call to watershed groups across Canada to develop proposal requests that would help them address their specific monitoring challenges,” said Bernadette Conant, CWN Executive Director.

“We asked them to identify monitoring challenges of shared interest to decision-makers in their region. In total, we received 29 submissions from watershed groups across nine provinces.”

The submissions were peer-reviewed in the spring of 2011, which ultimately resulted in selecting four watershed groups to co-develop with CWN requests for research to catalyze a regional monitoring consortium within their individual watersheds. This unusual approach to research — asking end users what they need to know to better assess and manage their watersheds and involving them in developing a tailored call for research proposals — has turned the traditional research process on its head.

“Usually, it’s the researcher who calls the shots — what water issues to study, what questions should be asked, what data should be collected,” said Dr. Kelly Munkittrick, CWN Scientific Director.

“Through our watershed research consortium we have turned that process upside down by asking watershed managers what they need to know to better manage the effects of cumulative stressors in their watersheds and insisting that research programs be designed in a way that can support those decision needs.”

This shift from a researcher-driven push to an end user–articulated pull ensures not only that CWN’s research is applied, but also that the findings lead to tangible impacts and strong partnerships, Dr. Munkittrick explained.

“The end-user pull here included the opportunity for watershed groups to co-develop with CWN a research program within their watersheds, to which outstanding Canadian water researchers have responded,” Dr. Munkittrick said.

“But it doesn’t end there — the watershed groups are also integral partners in the research teams.”

In total, four research groups have been funded.

The project titled “A regional monitoring framework for supporting cumulative effects assessment and adaptive management in the Grand River,” led by Dr. Mark Servos, the Canada Research Chair in Water Quality Protection at the University of Waterloo, will receive $600,000 from CWN over three years.

His team, involving 10 researchers across six universities and institutions, will synthesize characteristics of the Grand River and the need for a regional watershed biomonitoring framework. Dr. Servos’s group will conduct a review of available biomonitoring data for the Grand River, select potential biotic indicators, and conduct integrated field surveys and experiments to develop tools to predict how biotic indicators will respond to watershed stressors. The project will provide recommendations for the criteria and foundation of a regional watershed monitoring framework.

Dr. Servos’s research team responded to the Grand River Watershed Consortium, whose call solicited proposals that integrate research on biological indicators that detect change and current river monitoring to support aquatic cumulative effects assessment in the Grand River watershed.

The proposal titled “Managing the cumulative effects in the Muskoka River watershed: Monitoring, research and predictive modelling,” led by Dr. Catherine Eimers, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography at Trent University, will receive $600,000 from CWN over three years.

Her team, involving 10 university and four government scientists across seven universities and institutions, will build a conceptual model, develop physical, biological and chemical indicators and assessment criteria, design a comprehensive monitoring program and predictive models for cumulative effects. Her project will focus on eutrophication and changes to the relative amounts of ions and their effects on crustaceans and algae.

Dr. Eimers’s research team responded to the Muskoka River Watershed Monitoring and Management Consortium, whose call solicited proposals to develop best practices for a collaborative monitoring program aimed at early detection of cumulative effects and predictive models to manage multiple stressors at small and large scales.

The proposal titled “Towards a regional monitoring framework for cumulative impacts assessment in the Northumberland Strait: Linking land-use stressor loads and nearshore biological integrity,” led by Dr. Michael van den Heuvel, the Canada Research Chair in Watershed Ecological Integrity at the University of Prince Edward Island, will receive $592,500 from CWN over three years.

His team, involving seven researchers across six universities and institutions, will identify biological monitoring endpoints and techniques best suited to the needs of end users to develop a sustainable regional monitoring framework for estuaries in the Northumberland Strait. Research will be conducted in 18 estuaries across the range of nutrient and sediment stress in the Northumberland Strait. Research will be divided into quantifying land-based stressors, monitoring tools for estuarine integrity, and developing stressor-based models of estuarine impacts.

Dr. van den Heuvel’s research team responded to the Northumberland Strait–Environmental Monitoring Partnership, whose call sought proposals to examine the cumulative effects of land-based nutrients, sediments and contaminants on coastal economic activities within a number of drainage basins along Northumberland Strait.

The proposal titled “Monitoring and assessment of beneficial management practices: Insights from the Tobacco Creek watershed,” led by Dr. Howard Wheater, the Canada Excellence Research Chair in Water Security at the University of Saskatchewan, will receive $347,249 from CWN over three years.

Dr. Wheater’s team, involving six researchers across three universities and institutions, will design an environmental monitoring network for the Tobacco Creek watershed, and develop a conceptual model transferrable to other parts of the Red River Valley. The research will focus on integrating sensor technologies and modelling. Existing data from the watershed will be assessed and applied in models. Identifying and monitoring indicators and beneficial management practices will be part of this process.

Dr. Wheater’s research team responded to the Tobacco Creek Model Watershed Research Consortium, whose research call solicited proposals to support cumulative effects monitoring of agri-ecosystem sustainability within the Red River Valley and Lake Winnipeg Basin.

These four inaugural watershed research nodes are complemented by a pilot node for the program established in the Saint John Harbour, New Brunswick in 2010, totaling five watershed nodes that focus on advancing regional environmental frameworks to support cumulative effects assessment.