Community Watershed Monitoring

Updated on July 02, 2026

Community Watershed Monitoring

What is the Community Watershed Monitoring Network?

It's a partnership between the RDN's Drinking Water and Watershed Protection (DWWP) program, the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy (ENV), Island Timberlands LP (managed by Mosaic Forest Management), and many amazing community watershed stewardship groups in our region.

The RDN provides the equipment and works with ENV to complete annual training and data analysis. ENV contributes expertise in water quality testing, deciphering gathered data and guidance in program direction. Mosaic Forest Management sponsors the lab analysis costs for Quality Assurance and Quality Control, loans volunteers' safety gear, and provides access to the upper watersheds. Dedicated community groups donate their time, attending annual training sessions, calibrating equipment and getting out on their local streams to collect and monitor water quality data.

Resources

Watershed Stewardship Network Get Involved Page

The Watershed Stewardship Network Get Involved page is an online platform for community members, members of the Community Watershed Monitoring Network, and other partnered environmental stewardship groups to stay connected with Drinking Water & Watershed Protection (DWWP) initiatives, highlight their group and the work that they are doing, share project updates and ideas, network and recruit volunteers from other groups, collaborate with other local and nearby stewardship groups, find resources and information for support, and more!

Features of the interactive webpage include open forums for discussion, a call out forum to recruit volunteers, a newsfeed that will be updated with current DWWP initiatives, an events calendar with key dates, a Stewardship Projects and Stories feature to share your own project or personal stewardship projects and stories with like-minded folks, an idea board to share any stewardship related thoughts and ideas and an interactive Stewardship Map where you can upload pins to bring attention to your group, projects, or highlight something you’ve found while you’re in the field.

The webpage is intended to act as a hub for stream stewards to network, share ideas, and find information! The more stewards and organizations that use it, the better it functions!

If you have any feedback or ideas on what you’d like to see included on the page, please don’t hesitate to contact us at waterstewardship@rdn.bc.ca.

Click here to Get Involved!

Why monitor watersheds?

To expand on the provincial database, collect enough data to see watershed trends and raise watershed health awareness in local communities. The long-term objective is to use multiple years of data to determine which watersheds require more detailed monitoring and/or improved watershed management and to assist in land use planning. In 2025, data was collected for turbidity, dissolved oxygen, water temperature and conductivity at 74 sites in 45 streams across 29 watersheds within the region.

Additional lab analysis has and continues to be completed to further investigate what potential contaminants are associated with water quality exceedances observed in the data collection. In 2014 eleven sites in northern RDN waterways were sampled for E. coli and Phosphorus, in 2015 eleven sites in southern RDN waterways were sampled for E. coli, Phosphorous and metals, and in 2019 with nine sites sampled for Chloride (as a proxy for road run-off) and twelve sites sampled for Phosphorus (as a proxy for agricultural run-off). Further sampling for nutrients was completed in 2021 in-partnership with ENV in areas with upstream agricultural land-use.

When does watershed monitoring take place?

Monitoring occurs once a week for 5 weeks in the summer low flow period (August - September) and once a week for 5 weeks in the fall flush period (October - November).

Who is responsible for watershed monitoring?

The 13 environmental stewardship organizations and Streamkeepers currently and previously involved are:

Stewardship Organizations table
Stewardship Organizations	Maps
Beaufort Watershed Stewards - contact info(at)beaufortwater.org	Map of monitoring sites for BWS
Cat Stream Stewards - contact stewardship(at)nalt.bc.ca	Map of monitoring sites for CSS
Fanny Bay Salmonid Enhancement Society	Map of monitoring sites for FBSES
Nile Creek Enhancement Society	Map of inactive monitoring sites for NCES
Qualicum Beach Streamkeepers Society	Map of monitoring sites for QBS
Friends of French Creek Conservation Society	Map of monitoring sites for FFCCS
Mid Vancouver Island Habitat Enhancement Society	Map of monitoring sites for MVIHES
Mid Vancouver Island Habitat Enhancement Society - Nanoose Group	Map of monitoring sites for MVIHES Nanoose Group
Island Waters Fly Fishers - two groups	Map of monitoring sites for both IWFF groups
Departure Creek Streamkeepers	Map of monitoring sites for DCS
Walley Creek Streamkeepers	Map of monitoring sites for WCS
Mount Arrowsmith Biosphere Region Research Institute	Map of inactive monitoring sites for VIU MABRRI
Nanaimo and Area Land Trust	Map of monitoring sites for NALT
Gabriola Streamkeepers	Map of inactive monitoring site for GSk
Wexford Creek Streamkeepers - for more information email ting.pan(at)nanaimo.ca	Map of monitoring sites for WxCS
Quennell Lake Watershed Stewardship Society - for more information contact the Ecoforestry Institute via email cheryl.bancroft(at)ecoforestry.ca	Map of inactive monitoring sites for QLWSS

Where does watershed monitoring happen?

There are 45 streams currently monitored by trained volunteers, these include:

Chef Creek
Sandy Creek
Rosewall Creek
Cook Creek
Deep Bay Creek
Nash Creek
Thames Creek
Nile Creek
Hunts Creek
Annie Creek
Upper Cameron River
Cameron River
Little Qualicum River

Whiskey Creek
Harris Creek
Grandon Creek
Beach Creek
French Creek
Morningstar Creek
Morison Creek
Swayne Creek
Shelly Creek
Upper Englishman River

Englishman River
Centre Creek
South Englishman River
Craig Creek
Nanoose Creek
Walley Creek
Millstone River

McGarrigle Creek
Departure Creek
Cottle Creek
Chase River
Beck Creek
Richards Creek
Cat Stream
Holden Creek
Nanaimo River
Wexford Creek

After three years of sampling, each site's results are reviewed and testing at sites with consistently good water quality may be suspended for three to five years. This allows resources to be used to expand the network, adding sampling at new sites where needed.