Our volunteers monitor at 3 week intervals
from late spring to early fall and process the samples in their
homes. The processed samples are stored in volunteers’ freezers
until LMVP staff can pick them up. The samples are then analyzed
at the University of Missouri’s Limnology laboratory following
accepted standard methods.
LMVP data are “research quality”, and have been used
in several scientific journal articles.
One study (Obrecht
et al. 1998) shows LMVP data to be of comparable quality to
data collected by employees of the University of Missouri. |
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Water
clarity, represented by Secchi depth (inches), in Little Dixie
Lake. Bars show University of Missouri employee collected data,
dots show volunteer collected data. Please note that zero is at
the top of the vertical (“Y”) axis, as the values
represent depth.
Regular sampling intervals give a good estimate
of average conditions in a lake. Additionally, values obtained
by LMVP volunteers are very comparable to values obtained by “professionals”.
The MU data averaged 30 inches, the volunteer data averaged 28
inches.
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