MARQUETTE COUNTY, MI (AP)-- Big Bay's Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve group is getting help from volunteers to monitor the environmental well-being of Marquette County rivers.
More than a dozen volunteers donned waders and did a "river dance" on a recent afternoon on the Yellow Dog River to stir up water creatures. By collecting fly larvae, nymphs, snails, snipes, crayfish, clams and worms they are able to better understand the level of the river's pollution.
The group and Michigan Clean Water Corps then provide the information to the public. The preserve has monitored the Yellow Dog for several years and in more recent years several sites on the Salmon Trout River were added.
Sampling is done in spring and fall.