Quyên Fernandez
Kya Dalton of YCAA and Quyên Fernandez
Quyên is a student at Salt Spring Middle School.
Congratulations Quyên!
The Amazing Importance of Watersheds
Water has such an important role to play in our lives. Without it we cannot survive on earth. It’s an essential piece of being human. If we don’t take care of our water, water will never give back to us. If we poison the water, it’s not safe to drink. If we overuse it, we could suffer. Water is a limited resource that needs to be protected.
My family and I are part of a group called the Water Preservation Society. This group is responsible for making sure our water is safe to drink and protecting land from deforestation. Trees retain water and if we cut them down, the water goes away rather than staying and seeping into the ground to take care of the ecosystems.
The WPS is also cataloging fresh water to observe the amount of water in different watersheds. Did you know there are over a hundred watersheds on Salt Spring Island? My family and I measure seven creeks from seven watersheds around Fulford Bay every week. It's important to do it every week to check to see if the creeks have changed over a time period. If they have, we will document them and see what they are next week. We have been measuring the creeks weekly since 2020. This is a long term project. We need to collect baseline data so that over a long, long time we can look at the facts to inform people about the water for the island. Then maybe people would think twice about consuming so much water. We are on an island that is small and all our water comes from rain. If there isn’t enough rain to sustain our community, we need to conserve and protect watersheds so that the ecosystems can hold the water in the ground.
I will share with you a behind the scenes look at the work we do when we arrive at a creek. First we use a special instrument called an Oakton to check pH, conductivity, and temperature of the water. We take a cup of water from the creek and insert the device and it will read the measurements for us to record. These measurements help determine if fish can live in healthy creeks. If it’s too acidic, nothing can live. Second, we take a wetted width of the creek to see how wide the creek is that week. We use a long bendy ruler. We use a steel ruler to measure the depth of the creek at each 20 cm span. Third, we send a stick or sometimes we send Mr Duckie (a rubber duck) down the creek and we use a timer to see how fast he swims. This shows the flow of the creek which helps determine how much water is flowing out. We manage to catch Mr. Duckie before he escapes! Finally, we record all our numbers into a special water resistant booklet. Then all this data goes into an app called Epicollect. A volunteer receives all our data along with other volunteers measuring creeks on Salt Spring. The data goes into making an educational graph which shows the time period of the dry summer season and the super wet winter season.
I enjoy doing this work because it means so much to actually be able to take care of nature. Not only being out and doing this awesome science, but also it’s a passion of mine to preserve and keep this land we are grateful to be on. We need to protect the land and water that gives so much to us. If we don’t respect it, we are ignorant of its importance. I have learned a lot about the Indigenous teachings from school and the elders I have met. Two eyed seeing means that there is a balance between science and Indigenous knowledge that can lead to so much powerful understanding. Indigenous people have taken care of the land for thousands of years, so we can all learn from them and give and grow and build on the techniques they have always practiced.
Thank you for your time. If I am awarded, I will donate the money to the WPS to help with purchasing forests and wetlands for protection.