Our goals are to connect communities through data-driven science and empower actions around improving water quality and conserving local waterbodies.
About Us
The Community Water Monitoring Network is a community science program run by the Wilkinson Lab at the Center for Limnology, UW–Madison. Research from our lab focuses on carbon and nutrient processes in highly nutrient-enriched lakes and small waterbodies. These hypereutrophic systems are heavily impacted by human actions and might react differently in their capacity to release and store carbon. Our project on Stricker’s and Tiedeman’s ponds in Middleton aims to study these questions directly. Data collected under the CWMN augments these focal research questions and adds to our knowledge of limnology.
Community water monitors (‘Pond Pals’) help us gain further useful data on various ponds of differing nutrient levels around the area. We are excited to learn even more about how ponds function in the ecosystem and how we can be good stewards of these important systems!
As of 2026, CWMN volunteers are regularly monitoring 10 ponds in Madison, Middleton, and Fitchburg. Monitors test a suite of limnological parameters including temperature, clarity, conductivity, pH, and chlorophyll. They record observations and collect water samples for lab analysis of nutrients, carbon, and anions.
CWMN Photos
