The Center for Global Change & E

An Ecological Assesment of the Muskgon River Watershed to Solve and Prevent Environmental Problems • Team work • Presentation • Publications Geospatial Modeling • Airborne Hyperspectral Imagery • Invasive Species • Impacts of LULCC change on Wetlands • Spectral • Absorption • Peak • Trophic Status Principal Investigators: Jiaguo Qi *Summary* Rapid land use and land cover change is causing declining water conditions along the Muskegon River Watershed (MRW). The MRW feeds into the Great Lakes, which provide approximately 30 million people with drinking water and recreational activities. Muskegon is also one of the largest trout fisheries in the Great Lakes region. The goal of this project funded by the Great Lakes Fishery Trust is to design better monitoring techniques and management practices for improving water quality. Water samples from 48 inland lakes within the Lower Peninsula suggested that water quality among the lake varies substantially due to surrounding land use and human activities. Therefore, land use and land cover characteristics over the past thirty years were analyzed for quality, and the results suggested that human use index (agriculture, urban, and barren) of lands in Michigan is strongly correlated to total nitrogen and phosphorus concentrations in the inland lakes. This work has resulted in a Master level thesis and several publications. Once we identified water quality and land use relationships, we further expanded this line of research by developing operational means to monitor inland lake water quality over large areas. Remotely sensed and ground based data have been used to develop improved water quality monitoring, including assessment of suspended materials, chlorophyll concentration, and algae concentration over large areas and greater time spans. A set of sensitive spectrabands and statistical correlations were developed in collaboration with the Center for Water Science to allow one to map the spatial and temporal variations of water quality in Michigan. This line of work has resulted in one Ph.D. dissertation and three publications and presentations at various national and international conferences (see the publication list). One of the main components of the project is public outreach and education. Findings are distributed via scientific articles and publications for the general public, including a web site where residents can view the latest measurements of water quality in their area. The project has extensive applications, since the models developed for the MRW can be applied to any watershed system as a way to improve water quality. MSU’s R. Jan Stevenson is the principal investigator of a research team including Thomas Burton, Bryan Pijanowski, David Long, David Hyndman, Stuart Gage, and Jiaguo Qi, as well as researchers from Wayne State University, the University of Michigan, and a number of regional non-profit organizations.

The Center for Global Change & Earth Observations, Michigan State University
218 Manly Miles Building, 1405 S. Harrison Road, East Lansing, Michigan 48823, Phone: (517) 432-7774