What do we Monitor?

Weather

The weather station at the Preserve is the Capricorn 2000, manufactured by Columbia Weather Systems in Hillsboro, OR. It continuously measures wind speed and direction, temperature, barometric pressure, rainfall, relative humidity and solar radiation. Other parameters such as heat index, wind chill and evapotranspiration are calculated from the measured data. Current weather conditions can be viewed on this web site. Graphs of several weather parameters can also be viewed.

Water Quality

Water quality monitoring probes measure several parameters, including:

• Temperature
• pH
• Dissolved oxygen
• Electrical conductivity
• Turbidity
• Water level

Two water quality monitoring stations are deployed at the Preserve: one in a restored wetland pond (Gene Pool) and one in the Tualatin River. Each station is solar-powered and uses a Campbell Scientific data logger that is connected to probes in the water. The probes at each station are a YSI multi-parameter water quality probe and a water level sensor. Water quality data are measured and transmitted hourly to the base computer using wireless telemetry (900 MHz license-free spectrum).

The YSI probes measure pH, temperature, dissolved oxygen, electrical conductivity and turbidity (river only). Each level sensor measures the water level by comparing the water pressure with the atmospheric pressure. Two different water level sensors are used: one manufactured by Instrumentation Northwest and one by Greenspan.

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Wildlife