While we have postponed Snapshot Day 2020 due to COVID-19, we are hard at work developing engaging and family friendly options for you to investigate and learn about water quality at home and in your neighborhood. Sign up below to receive these digital materials when they are available.

Snapshot Day is the largest single-day water quality monitoring event in California! Join us on May 2nd, 2020 for the 21st Annual Snapshot Day. You can become a community scientist, learn about water quality, explore local streams in Santa Cruz County and make a difference in your watershed.

Each year Santa Cruzans like you join the Coastal Watershed Council and Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary in this one-day water quality monitoring event. Together we collect water quality data from local watersheds to create a “snapshot” of the health of rivers and streams flowing into Monterey Bay. The valuable data collected by Snapshot Day volunteers is used to determine the biggest threats to local water quality and to design and drive management actions to improve watershed health.

As a Snapshot Day volunteer, you’ll be trained by professional scientists to monitor temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, electrical conductivity and transparency in the field. You’ll also learn how to properly collect water samples for laboratory analysis of nutrient and bacteria levels. You’ll get to visit a variety of stream sites in Santa Cruz County and explore the wonder of our local watersheds.

Sign up to be a Snapshot Day volunteer below! This event has a limited number of volunteer spots and they will fill up quickly, so sign up today! Once we reach capacity, we will start a waitlist. If you are interested in volunteering for a San Mateo or Monterey County team please indicate that in the Message section below.

Special opportunities:

• Like last year, we will have one monitoring team traveling by bicycle! This team will focus on monitoring sites along the lower San Lorenzo River and travel along the paved Santa Cruz Riverwalk path. If you are interested in being on the bike team, please indicate that in the Message section below. You must provide your own bike. The team will need 1-2 bike trailers to carry equipment.
• We are forming a Snapshot Day Volunteer Committee to help with event preparation. If you love Snapshot Day and want to help make the event a success, sign up in the form below.