St. Denis National Wildlife Area collaboration

Data Rescue intern: Erica Fellin

In Winter 2024, I participated in a Living Data Project Data Rescue internship, organizing water quality data from the St. Denis National Wildlife Area (SDNWA). The SDNWA is in Saskatchewan's prairie ecozone, where a network of ecologically significant wetland ponds lies. 

For decades, meticulous data on water quality and soil sediment have been amassed from this area. This wealth of information has been collected from the University of Regina and the University of Saskatchewan, with data collection contributions from students 2006. This is an ongoing project, with continual monitoring. The purpose of my internship was to combine the current efforts of labs from these universities, joining their water quality and sediment data across 50+ wetland pond sites. The goal was for these data to be uploaded to DataStream, an open-access platform for sharing information on freshwater health to advance freshwater protection through open data.