Water Monitor Poetry

We pride ourselves on our volunteers. Not only do they collect crucial information about our waters throughout San Diego County, but they are also poets, and they don’t even know it. 

I took their comments from water monitoring data sheets and found myself with a beautiful poem that I’d like to share with you.

More trash than normalpeople posing for camera picture of them and trash picker upper items beach cleanup san diego coastkeeper sunset cliffs
Probably kids wading

Mountain lions sighted here last week
Our parking spot was on television
No sightings for us

Female mallard swimming in pond
A few pieces of trash
Willow seed pods floating in water

Carcass of coyote
(has been here for a while)
Inch of water flowing over walkway

Ducks upstream
Grass in stream
Thick brown-green algae on bottom of stream
Gnats

Lots of brush was cleared out
Crawfish isn’t here today

Lots of sediment on bottom
Water clear but gross stuff on bottom
Craig has photos of fecal matter for your enjoyment

To learn more about Coastkeeper’s Water Quality Monitoring Program, the program that has produced such talented monitor-poets, click here.