Maintaining conserved and highly vegetated riparian corridors can positively impact the health of a river ecosystem by providing habitat for organisms, filtering water from surrounding land use practices, regulating temperatures in the river channel and on land by providing shade relief, and provide nutrient loads through detrital inputs (Vannote, 1980, Garret, 2005, Harding, 1998, and Allan 2004, 257-284). However, determining the size of a vegetated riparian corridor width is largely dependent on the goals of rehabilitation and conservation efforts because time and resources are valuable to government agencies and private land owners (Garret, 2005). Moreover, different agencies, both federal and state, have implemented protocols for determining…show more content… For example, Sponseller et al. found that having forested riparian corridors at the 200 m reach-scale affects community structure in the stream by altering features such as the thermal regime, and these vegetated corridors are highly influential to the health of the river when multiple land use practices are present in the watershed (2001). In addition, detrital inputs from forested riparian corridors also provide micro-habitats and refuge for organisms at varying trophic levels, as well as nutrients through processing plant litter and its associated bacterial flora (Vannote, 1980, Cummins, 1974). Furthermore, maintaining relatively un-impacted riparian corridors or re-establishing vegetation in these areas can reduce rapid changes in geomorphology of the river channel, reduce erosion, and store flood waters (Lake, 2007 and others) thereby creating stability in ever changing environments. These attributes are just a few examples of the multitudinous positive impacts vegetated, and specifically forested, riparian corridors have on riverine…show more content… The quality of water is vital to the health of an ecosystem. However, the concept of “water quality” is ambiguous because standards and thresholds are different for every organism (Resh and Unzicker 1975, 9-19). Therefore, it is difficult for conservationists to determine what levels and parameters of water quality are useful in determining the state of a water body, and their subsequent effects to organisms that inhabit the watershed. Nevertheless, since the Clean Water Act of 1972, state and federal agencies have worked to develop and implement protocols for assessing the conditions of waterways throughout the country. The Environmental Protection Agency has produced a standard procedure for the assessment of river conditions in perennial and wadeable streams, and from this, Missouri state agencies have further developed standard procedures for monitoring rivers in the state (Sarver et al, 2002). Included in these protocols are the sampling and collection of benthic macro-invertebrates, chemical, and physical properties. Each set of parameters provides a long term and snap shot resolution of that river’s dynamics, and are a direct result of environmental properties in the
