A Guide to the Identification of Common Aquatic Benthic Macroinvertebrate Families of California and Western North America

The newest edition of our identification guide contains updated descriptions of 9 orders and 76 families of bottom dwelling aquatic insects. Every page has new explanatory color photographs and/or illustrations along with key taxonomic characteristics, biological information, California tolerance values, primary feeding groups, and tips to help you separate each family from similar ones. In addition, we have included a special chapter for 12 non-insect taxa with descriptions and images to aid identification. New to this edition are tables listing the distribution of each family throughout the Western states, revised pages on biology and metamorphosis, and an updated glossary. The Bug Book is printed in a user-friendly binder format with room for your own notes and comments.

Price: $95.00 plus shipping and sales tax

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Curriculum Guide for Grades K-8

The Nature of This Place was developed and produced by Sierra Streams Institute and the Yuba Watershed Institute, collaborating under a grant from the Teichert Foundation. This standards-based environmental education curriculum for grakes K-8 was designed for students in the Twin Ridges Elementary School District, but is regionally based, so the lessons can be incorporated into classes or programs anywhere in the northern California foothills.  This project is aimed at increasing student participation in hands-on science lessons, using the Sierra foothills as an outdoor classroom.

The Nature of This Place is available for purchase or as a free download through Flicker Press.  Sierra Streams staff members are available to train teachers on how to implement the curriculum in their classrooms.  Please contact Rachel Durben at rachel@sierrastreamsinstitute.org or (530) 265-6090 x252 for more information.

Download or buy the guide from Flicker Press

The following is a list of our more recent reports. The management plans form the basis for much of our work.

• Sierra Streams Institute: A Strategic Planning Update December 2017 Published Decmeber 2017 (2.0 MB).
• Providence Mine Brownfields Cleanup and Phytoremediation Pilot Study (poster). Kyle Leach & Jeff Lauder, authors. Published April 2015 (1.7 MB).
• Deer Creek Watershed Restoration Plan (without appendices), published March 2011 (26 MB).
• Report: Stocking Flat Pilot Restoration Project, published May 2009 (464 KB).
• Report: Friends of Deer Creek Bacteria Study: E. coli Contamination in Squirrel Creek, published March 2009 (13.8 MB).
• Progress report: Legacy Sediment and the Next Generation: Restoration and Education in Deer Creek, published 2009 (52 KB).
• Report: Deer Creek Watershed Mercury Survey, published June 2008 (2.5 MB).
• Water Monitoring Quality Assurance Plan, for the Yuba Watershed Council, published June 30, 2008 (3.5 MB).
• Report: Lake Wildwood Reservoir Drawdown Report--2007, published August 2008 (968 KB).
• Management Plan: Deer Creek Coordinated Resource Management Plan, Executive Summary, published March 2004 (20 MB).
• Management Plan: Deer Creek Coordinated Resource Management Plan, complete report with appendices, published March 2004 (61.3 MB).