Assessing the Seasonal Variation of Macroinvertebrate Life in the Pike River — Presentation Detail — Celebration of Scholars

Instructions

Student presentations must have a faculty sponsor.

Abstracts must include a title and a description of the research, scholarship, or creative work. The description should be 150-225 words in length and constructed in a format or style appropriate for the presenter’s discipline.

The following points should be addressed within the selected format or style for the abstract:

A clear statement of the problem or question you pursued, or the scholarly goal or creative theme achieved in your work.
A brief comment about the significance or uniqueness of the work.
A clear description of the methods used to achieve the purpose or goals for the work.
A statement of the conclusions, results, outcomes, or recommendations, or if the work is still in progress, the results you expect to report at the event.

Presenter photographs should be head and shoulder shots comparable to passport photos.

Additional Information

More information is available at carthage.edu/celebration-scholars/. The following are members of the Research, Scholarship, and Creativity Committee who are eager to listen to ideas and answer questions:

Jun Wang
Kim Instenes
John Kirk
Nora Nickels
Andrew Pustina
James Ripley

Assessing the Seasonal Variation of Macroinvertebrate Life in the Pike River

Name: John Egner
Major: Biology and Neuroscience
Hometown: Joliet
Faculty Sponsor:
Other Sponsors:
Type of research: Independent research
Funding: n/a

Name: Scott Hegrenes
Department: Natural Science
Type of research: Independent research
Funding: n/a

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to compare the macro-invertebrate communities between seasons of a single river ecosystem, the Pike River on the Carthage College campus located in Kenosha, WI. The macro-invertebrate species inhabiting an aquatic ecosystem can be informative of the water quality, indicating levels of pollution, oxygen concentrations, and other factors influencing the abundance and distribution of organisms living throughout that ecosystem. The river is a dynamic system undergoing changes in temperature, physical conditions, and availability of organic nutrients between fall months (September-November) and the winter months (January-March). The seasonal effect on the Pike River’s macro-invertebrate life is predicted to be a reduction in species diversity, abundance, and frequency. To determine the relative changes in species diversity, species richness and frequency, 4-6 Hester-Dendy invertebrate colonization substrates were placed equally in three sampling sites in the Pike River and were collected 4-6 weeks later. The samples were identified to the lowest practical taxa. The winter sample is expected to be retrieved and analyzed soon. During winter sampling, the ice covering over the river had to be broken to set the samplers. In addition, a few samplers were lost after the tethered lines were snapped off due to the cold temperatures.

Poster file