On doing Melbourne Bioblitz, I noticed an almost complete lack of interesting species in and adjacent to the water canal in a public park. This park is sited in the middle of an industrial area and water enters it from a small pipe. I strongly suspect that the water coming out of that pipe is exceedingly heavily contaminated, and want to know what is contaminating it, in order to fix the problem.

The challenge is that standard water quality tests (temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen, chloride, turbidity, hardness, electrical conductivity, nitrate, phosphate) would totally fail to pick up most types of industrial pollution. My number one guess would be that it’s laced with high concentrations of herbicide and insecticide that are perhaps used on adjacent properties. I know for a fact that one large industrial property that is nearly adjacent has its buildings and yard “cleaned” at the same time every day and that this industrial property has not a single plant or insect on its whole site.

So, what tests would I need to apply to test for industrial pollutants, and where can I find some competent organisation to do them?

Any chance of doing some of these tests at home?

ALS.

http://www.alsglobal.com/

http://www.alsglobal.com/en/Our-Services/Life-Sciences/Environmental

Call and ask them to send you their book of methods. (I have one, but not with me at the moment.)

ALS also contract to many councils and other organisations for environmental monitoring; ALS collect the samples and analyse them, so correct procedures are followed. (Often water samples have to be treated in very special ways, eg temperature, buffers etc.)

Also, bear in mind that this drain may already be monitored – so the council should be the first port of call – unless you want to end up with expense for no reason. Talk with the council engineer. He may be interested in your observation, and interested to do something about it, if the drain is not already being monitored.

mollwollfumble said:

On doing Melbourne Bioblitz, I noticed an almost complete lack of interesting species in and adjacent to the water canal in a public park. This park is sited in the middle of an industrial area and water enters it from a small pipe. I strongly suspect that the water coming out of that pipe is exceedingly heavily contaminated, and want to know what is contaminating it, in order to fix the problem.

The challenge is that standard water quality tests (temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen, chloride, turbidity, hardness, electrical conductivity, nitrate, phosphate) would totally fail to pick up most types of industrial pollution. My number one guess would be that it’s laced with high concentrations of herbicide and insecticide that are perhaps used on adjacent properties. I know for a fact that one large industrial property that is nearly adjacent has its buildings and yard “cleaned” at the same time every day and that this industrial property has not a single plant or insect on its whole site.

So, what tests would I need to apply to test for industrial pollutants, and where can I find some competent organisation to do them?

Any chance of doing some of these tests at home?

Perhaps I could look at this from first principles. What actively kills plants and insects?
. Drain cleaner – NaOH – check pH (eg. Pool test kit)
. Pool chlorine & bleach – check free chlorine (eg. Pool test kit)
. Salt – check electrical conductivity (multimeter?)
. Acetylcholine inhibitors (incl. orthophosphates, carbamates, possibly some heavy metals) – (eg. Pesticide test kit)
. Herbicides – glyphosate etc. (how to test?)
. Fungicides (how to test?)
.

Michael V said:

ALS.

http://www.alsglobal.com/

http://www.alsglobal.com/en/Our-Services/Life-Sciences/Environmental

Call and ask them to send you their book of methods. (I have one, but not with me at the moment.)

ALS also contract to many councils and other organisations for environmental monitoring; ALS collect the samples and analyse them, so correct procedures are followed. (Often water samples have to be treated in very special ways, eg temperature, buffers etc.)

Also, bear in mind that this drain may already be monitored – so the council should be the first port of call – unless you want to end up with expense for no reason. Talk with the council engineer. He may be interested in your observation, and interested to do something about it, if the drain is not already being monitored.

Very interesting. What ALS offers in environmental monitoring is not too different to what my former CSIRO colleagues were doing in monitoring algae growth, which included O2, CO2, temperature, turbidity and pH.

In the ALS specialist environmental services I note that water services include: “Disinfection by-products … Pesticides, Herbicides and PCBs”. Have sent them an email.

Will follow your suggestion and talk to the council engineer, possibly as soon as next week.

you might find the council had struck a deal with the place with the pipe

another old trick is when they release – in the dead of night – yes it happens

There’s a really good mob just down the freeway a bit from you – Aqua Science

wookiemeister said:

you might find the council had struck a deal with the place with the pipe
another old trick is when they release – in the dead of night – yes it happens

I’m starting to be concerned that it may be the council that has distributed this pollution deliberately. In a misguided attempt to “control” mosquitoes and water weeds. This council is known to have used bucketloads of insecticide in its attempt to control the Elm Leaf Beetle.

> There’s a really good mob just down the freeway a bit from you – Aqua Science

Will check it out.

mollwollfumble said:

wookiemeister said:

you might find the council had struck a deal with the place with the pipe
another old trick is when they release – in the dead of night – yes it happens

I’m starting to be concerned that it may be the council that has distributed this pollution deliberately. In a misguided attempt to “control” mosquitoes and water weeds. This council is known to have used bucketloads of insecticide in its attempt to control the Elm Leaf Beetle.

> There’s a really good mob just down the freeway a bit from you – Aqua Science

Will check it out.

Shire councils tend to believe they can.

Have now been into the city and taken a water sample. GPS location -37.8032, 144.9283. Am tempted to get a $20 pool test kit to do a preliminary test for chlorine and pH, before taking it in to the Council, then to a testing organisation.

mollwollfumble said:

Have now been into the city and taken a water sample. GPS location -37.8032, 144.9283. Am tempted to get a $20 pool test kit to do a preliminary test for chlorine and pH, before taking it in to the Council, then to a testing organisation.

You can but the council won’t like it, dirty secrets are bad news

I’d contact an environmental organisation and see if you can get water testing done cheap/ free by them

Looking at your location, I’m hardly surprised that you’re not seeing a lot of diversity. I certainly wouldn’t expect to.

What/how are you sampling?

If you’re looking at aquatic inverts, I’d expect to see leeches and Chironomids dominating.

You’re talking about a heavily industrialised area where multiple pollutants have been making their way into the waterway for over 100 years. I’d suggest that the most obvious pollutants are likely to come from automobiles but given the site, there could be any number of nasties in the water.

Evening all.

wookiemeister said:

Have now been into the city and taken a water sample. GPS location -37.8032, 144.9283. Am tempted to get a $20 pool test kit to do a preliminary test for chlorine and pH, before taking it in to the Council, then to a testing organisation.

Don’t let me put you off, but you need to know that there’s some knowledge and procedure required to get good quality results. The taking, preparing and reading of samples is a bit of a black art.

Also, it’s worth recording the normal parameters. They will tell you a lot about the habitat before you start spending up big on lab tests – which aren’t cheap. If the pH is super low or high, it may give you an idea of things to look for.

If you haven’t seen it before, have a look at AUSRIVAS It’s an excellent tool for examining the overall health of a waterway. The models are poor for the tropics, but are very robust for the southern states.

Rule 303 said:

Evening all.

wookiemeister said:

Have now been into the city and taken a water sample. GPS location -37.8032, 144.9283. Am tempted to get a $20 pool test kit to do a preliminary test for chlorine and pH, before taking it in to the Council, then to a testing organisation.

Don’t let me put you off, but you need to know that there’s some knowledge and procedure required to get good quality results. The taking, preparing and reading of samples is a bit of a black art.

Beware of stratification.

sibeen said:

Beware of stratification.

Fight the class system, man…

Rule 303 said:

sibeen said:

Beware of stratification.

Fight the class system, man…

word

Rule 303 said:

Evening all.

wookiemeister said:

Have now been into the city and taken a water sample. GPS location -37.8032, 144.9283. Am tempted to get a $20 pool test kit to do a preliminary test for chlorine and pH, before taking it in to the Council, then to a testing organisation.

Don’t let me put you off, but you need to know that there’s some knowledge and procedure required to get good quality results. The taking, preparing and reading of samples is a bit of a black art.

Yeah, a $20.00 pool test kit isn’t going to cut the mustard. When I did this sort of thing for a living, we had a kit of rather expensive meters and you really needed to think about what you were doing to ensure you collected good data.

You’re unlikely to get much stratification in a waterway that small, but it’d be very easy to stir up the sediment on the bottom which can make a huge mess of results.

You also need to look at a bigger picture of the ecosystem. There’s obviously some riparian vegetation, but how healthy is it? Are there lots of weeds? Is there any erosion? What’s the substrate like? Is it heavily embedded/compacted? Is there a lot of silt?

All of these things and many more make a considerable contribution as to the quality of the habitat. Before you start worrying about point pollution, a thorough assessment of the physical habitat may well explain a significant portion of why the area is less diverse than expected.

Rule 303 said:

Evening all.

wookiemeister said:

Have now been into the city and taken a water sample. GPS location -37.8032, 144.9283. Am tempted to get a $20 pool test kit to do a preliminary test for chlorine and pH, before taking it in to the Council, then to a testing organisation.

Don’t let me put you off, but you need to know that there’s some knowledge and procedure required to get good quality results. The taking, preparing and reading of samples is a bit of a black art.

that wasn’t me

Teleost said:

Looking at your location, I’m hardly surprised that you’re not seeing a lot of diversity. I certainly wouldn’t expect to.

You’re talking about a heavily industrialised area where multiple pollutants have been making their way into the waterway for over 100 years. I’d suggest that the most obvious pollutants are likely to come from automobiles but given the site, there could be any number of nasties in the water.

I would have thought so too, but found that there’s a very much wider biological diversity in and adjacent to every other waterway in the City of Melbourne council area. The council does count the Dynon Street ditch as a public park.

> What/how are you sampling? If you’re looking at aquatic inverts, I’d expect to see leeches and Chironomids dominating.

Just sampling species by sitting still still for fifteen minutes and noting every item of wildlife, and every unusual plant, I see in that space of time. No plants grew in the water or near the water’s edge. Saw only one bird, who dropped in hoping that I’d feed it. Saw no invertebrates, not even the omnipresent vinegar flies, whiteflies and cabbage whites. Didn’t collect water specimens invertebrates there, just looked for them. PS. At a different location was startled to discover that flypaper works well for collecting species underwater, it attracts some water bugs and beetles.

I’d be surprised to see any leeches there, I’ve not seen even one in Victoria in the past 20 years, though I’ve seen plenty in NSW and Qld. Had to look up web for Chironomids, they’re non-biting midges. Plenty of Chironomids around Werribee Sewage Farm. Come to think of it, I may have seen quite a few just a little bit north of there at Flemington Racecourse. None flying around at Dynon St.

Teleost said:

Also, it’s worth recording the normal parameters. They will tell you a lot about the habitat before you start spending up big on lab tests – which aren’t cheap. If the pH is super low or high, it may give you an idea of things to look for.

If you haven’t seen it before, have a look at AUSRIVAS It’s an excellent tool for examining the overall health of a waterway. The models are poor for the tropics, but are very robust for the southern states.

(Checks link) “predict the aquatic macroinvertebrate fauna expected to occur at a site in the absence of environmental stress”. Nice. Pity there’s an $80 registration fee.

What does a simple litmus test show?

Teleost said:

You also need to look at a bigger picture of the ecosystem. There’s obviously some riparian vegetation, but how healthy is it? Are there lots of weeds? Is there any erosion? What’s the substrate like? Is it heavily embedded/compacted? Is there a lot of silt?

All of these things and many more make a considerable contribution as to the quality of the habitat. Before you start worrying about point pollution, a thorough assessment of the physical habitat may well explain a significant portion of why the area is less diverse than expected.

That’s the distressing part. No riparian vegetation at all, not even any weeds. No erosion or compaction. Some silt. None of the plants further from the ditch, such as lawn grass, are in any way water-loving and seem to be surviving on water from local rainfall.

There was riparian vegetation everywhere else I looked, but not there.

mollwollfumble said:

On doing Melbourne Bioblitz, I noticed an almost complete lack of interesting species in and adjacent to the water canal in a public park.

Is it signposted? By this I do mean are there warning signs in place?

I’d try someone with commitment. http://www.cleanocean.org/pages/display/1/90668238abcd9bfde28b6df00fae4bd7/2/display/7b9207dbf19f2f2f02d2b23536d7f1ce

roughbarked said:

What does a simple litmus test show?

Just tested. Off the scale for alkalinity. This pond water may be almost pure drain cleaner. Will get back to you with more.

mollwollfumble said:

roughbarked said:

What does a simple litmus test show?

Just tested. Off the scale for alkalinity. This pond water may be almost pure drain cleaner. Will get back to you with more.

Mathematics question. I need to dilute the sample to “25% sample, 75% tap water” to get it back into the litmus scale.
Results:
Tap water, pH 6.8, alkalinity 40
25% sample, pH 7.8, alkalinity 180

What is the pH and alkalinity of the pure sample?
alkalinity 600? pH 9.8 or pH 9.2?
Either way, that looks pretty deadly to me.

mollwollfumble said:

mollwollfumble said:

roughbarked said:

What does a simple litmus test show?

Just tested. Off the scale for alkalinity. This pond water may be almost pure drain cleaner. Will get back to you with more.

Mathematics question. I need to dilute the sample to “25% sample, 75% tap water” to get it back into the litmus scale.
Results:
Tap water, pH 6.8, alkalinity 40
25% sample, pH 7.8, alkalinity 180

What is the pH and alkalinity of the pure sample?
alkalinity 600? pH 9.8 or pH 9.2?
Either way, that looks pretty deadly to me.

Couldn’t say. But rember, pH is a log scale.