Samantha, CUR- Canal Street Cruise

Canal Street (located in New Smyrna Beach) is an imperative historical thruway for locals and tourists for many reasons.  At the East End of the street, lies a man made subterranean (existing underneath) canal.

Photo from East end of the canal approx. 3/4 of basin which cuts
off into the IRL

Mid September of last year Dr. Woodall, former colleagues as well as myself found that this body of water was hypoxic, measuring at 1.23mg/L(milligrams per Liter).  Hypoxic waters mean that the specific body of water is depleted in dissolved oxygen and thus very little or no  life would be able to live in that specific body of water.  Canal Street Canal consists of a 5x8 box culvert running along the Southside of Canal Street westward approximately 1 mile to the Hickory street intersection which is considered the upstream location.  The contributing watershed (if unfamiliar with term refer to, What is a Watershed) is approximately 170.6 acres collecting mostly untreated street runoff.

Outline of Canal Street Canal (CSC) contributing watershed
flowing East, discharging into a body of water (starting on the left flowing to
the right where CSC discharge is located)

Thus, leading to my scientific question, are there any water quality parameters that exceed acceptable Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) regulations.  FDEP is Florida's lead agency for environmental management, protecting our air, water and land. In order to maintain waters, the FDEP has a criterion regarding acceptable measurements of nutrients such as Nitrogen and Phosphorus which I will be specifically focusing on.  The FDEP also has a hypoxic criterion, stating that any water quality measurement reading for Dissolved Oxygen(DO) less than 2mg/L is considered to be hypoxic.  I will also be focusing on measuring chlorophyll, a pigment found in photosynthetic organisms such as plants and algae or more commonly known as phytoplankton.  Canal Street Canal is defined as class III water and for more information regarding FDEP surface water criterion can be found here; Florida Surface Water Quality Standards.  With this being said, I have participated in water quality monitoring within this canal at discharge point.  The discharge point of the canal is the point where the affluent from a facility sewage disposal enters a ditch, surface of the ground, or in my case a body of water.  In order to do so, I have used common water quality monitoring procedures listed below;

Materials &Methods
In the field:

• Van Dorn was used to take water samples within the canal at surface as well as depth
• YSI85 measuring oxygen, salinity and conductivity
• 500 mL nalgene bottles in order to store water samples and transfer back to the IMES (Institute of Marine and Environmental Studies) lab

In the lab: 

• DR/890 HACH colorimeter to measure TIN(total inorganic nitrogen) & TP (Total Phosphate).
• For chlorophyll measurements the Fischer Scientific Filtration device was used                                                                                      -47mm filters (0.45 micron pore size)

Measuring depth of canal with Dr. Woodall's handy "concoction"
which is basically plastic tubes that fit together to make one big,
long tube. Consisting of lovely meter markings
allowing a determination of the water depth within the canal
(p.s please correct me if there is a certain name
for this "concoction.")

The water quality within this canal is significant element to maintaining water quality discharge standards into the Indian River Lagoon (IRL) and therefore will be continued to be monitored at discharge as well as possible further monitoring within the extensive canal.  Questions or suggestions are greatly appreciated