Area girl scouts help park service biologists with science project

The project tested for mercury in the water and surrounding biology.

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LEE’S FERRY and MARBLE CANYON, Ariz. – Six-year-old Kaia Pilkington wanted to ride with Katherine Ko and park ranger Grace Carpenter to Lee’s Ferry where they would look for dragonfly larvae at a wetland near the Colorado River. And on the 54-minute drive, she talked about her kittens.


  But Pilkington, along with her girl scout troop from Page, was excited to spend the morning at Lee’s Ferry and look for dragonfly larvae, which are almost everywhere. Tthere are countless larvae sites from Alaska to Maine and from to California to Florida, and even in desert oases in the arid Southwest, according to Sarah J. Nelson, associate research professor in the School of Forest Resources at the University of Maine. She is also one of the principal investigators on the Dragonfly Mercury Project there.


   Even though some of the girls complained about the heat and were a bit squeamish about hiking through the lush vegetation, Pilkington and her friends had a great time looking high and low for dragonfly larvae in a small wetland near the river.


   “This has been going … (for) eight years,” said Ko, an intern in the National Park Service’s Mosaics in Science Diversity Internship Program. Ko is originally from Westfield, New Jersey, and she is a senior at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. “And it (is a countrywide project) at multiple parks. So, every year it happens at different parks … and this is the first year it’s happening at Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. So, it’s really exciting.”


   This is the Dragonfly Mercury Project, said Ko, who is leading the project in the Glen Canyon.


  “We’re looking at mercury levels in dragonfly larvae,” Ko explained. “They’re these tiny little creatures but they’re predators and they eat a lot of small bugs in the water. And a lot of things prey on (the larvae as well).”         


   Scientists are keen on understanding mercury fluxes and quantifying mercury concentrations in the ecosystem for potential impacts to human and wildlife health.


And on the leading edge of this is the Dragonfly Mercury Project, a continental-scale, citizen science project to improve understanding of the spatial variation in baseline levels of mercury in the environment. It is a collaboration with Cornell University, the University of Maine, the U.S. Geological Survey, and the NPS.


Dragonfly larvae present a unique opportunity to track environmental mercury because they are long-lived as they spend nearly five years in the larval stage, during which they eat small insects and bioaccumulate mercury. And they are easier to sample than the fast-moving fish.


“That way we can look at how to manage that better in terms of bioaccumulation and magnification,” Ko said, “… like if a fish eats (the larvae), (which) then gets more and more toxic (in the aquatic food web). So, hopefully we can look at it at the level of the dragonflies and kind of get a better idea of what’s happening.”


 Connection with people and the community of Page is vital to this project, said Ko.


This project provides the ideal vehicle for connecting people with the park and using it as an outdoor laboratory.


 “You get to build relationships with (people) and volunteer groups (like Pilkington and the girl scout troop) as much as it is for us to get information about mercury levels,” Ko said. “It’s also to educate the community and inspire kids to hopefully want to go out and do what we’re doing.”


And Ko enjoys taking people out to ponds, wetlands, and other dragonfly larvae sites in the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area to scout around for dragonfly larvae, which are collected and then shipped off to the University of Maine and the USGS for lab analyses.


“We get the results (around) the fall,” Ko said. “They run specific tests to see how much mercury is in (these species). And it’s interesting too. When we catch them, we try to identify them to its family.


Ko added that the Dragonfly Mercury Project is a great opportunity to not only integrate the community of Page but also get the youngsters out of the house and into science.
“We get to hike and get to spend time by the water and get our hands dirty,” she added.


Kaia Pilkington is the daughter of Lonnie Pilkington, biologist for Glen Canyon and Rainbow Bridge.