Celebrating Wisconsin’s Stream Heroes: Winners of the 2024 Stream Monitoring Awards
By: Katy Bradford and Mya Gersmeyer
The Wisconsin Stream Monitoring Awards recognize individuals and groups for their exemplary efforts in volunteer stream monitoring and related activities, such as their support of stream stewardship, commitment to developing partnerships, and/or sharing their skills and water quality data to benefit Wisconsin streams and rivers. Let’s celebrate the 2024 winners and their remarkable contributions! Award recipients will be recognized at the Wisconsin Lakes and Rivers Convention Awards Banquet on Thursday, March 27, 2025. Each awardee receives a handmade pottery plaque designed by WAV volunteer Heidi Hankley with the Crimson Artist Collective in Verona, WI.
Frank and Lynn Druecke – “Outstanding Stream Volunteers”
Frank and Lynn have been dedicated members of the Central Wisconsin Trout Unlimited River Keepers volunteer monitoring team since 2008, monitoring the West Branch of White River, Bird Creek, and Willow Creek for over 15 years. While residing in Oshkosh, they regularly traveled 100 round-trip miles to monitor streams throughout Waushara County. Lynn has served as the team’s expert in identifying macroinvertebrates for the WAV biotic index, while Frank has co-coordinated the River Keepers volunteer group since 2014.
Frank recruits new volunteers each year at Central Wisconsin Trout Unlimited’s annual TroutFest and Fox Valley Trout Unlimited’s Cabin Fever Day. Working with the region’s DNR stream biologist, he has also been instrumental in selecting strategic stream sites for newly recruited volunteer teams to monitor.
Frank and Lynn have been responsible for refurbishing and resupplying all Hach dissolved oxygen test kits each winter and training volunteers on maintaining their equipment to improve data quality. With Frank and Lynn’s assistance, Central Wisconsin Trout Unlimited River Keepers has grown in size from 15 volunteer teams in 2014 to 30 teams in 2024. What they most enjoy in their volunteer work is spending time outside and connecting with so many people who share their passion for the environment.
Maria Young – “Outstanding Volunteer Coordinator”
As the Invasive Species Coordinator for Wild Rivers Conservancy, Maria Young plays a vital role in volunteer stream monitoring and aquatic invasive species management across the 7,760-square-mile St. Croix and Namekagon River watersheds.
For the past four years, Maria has expanded volunteer water quality and AIS monitoring in the large watershed, partnering with Polk County to host WAV trainings and AIS Snapshot Day events, and partnering with the National Park Service on AIS monitoring along the St. Croix National Scenic Riverway.
Maria also has worked to steadily recruit and train 20 community scientists to raise, rear, and release beetles as part of the Purple Loosestrife Biocontrol Program. Looking ahead, she’s launching a Watercraft Inspector volunteer program in 2025 to further expand AIS prevention.
Maria’s favorite part about being a coordinator is seeing how passionate all the other volunteers are about protecting our natural environment through stream monitoring. In her colleague’s words, “Maria’s knowledge and enthusiasm for her work in protecting our waterways inspires community members, instills a sense of hope, and provides a way for people to take action to protect and further develop their relationships with these special resources.”
Katie Rademacher – “Outstanding Volunteer Coordinator”
For six years, Katie has served as the Water Quality Manager for Milwaukee Riverkeeper, bringing expertise and leadership to the organization’s volunteer monitoring programs. In her work, she trains and supports nearly 100 stream monitoring volunteers across the 900 square-mile Milwaukee River basin.
Katie has led the growth of volunteer monitoring in the basin for road salt, bacteria, and phosphorus, and coordinates this work as part of the CLEAR coalition with researchers from UW-Milwaukee and the Urban Ecology Center. In the past year, she helped launch a new volunteer effort to continuously monitor dissolved oxygen in coldwater streams showing warming and stress from climate change, helping to supplement the ongoing volunteer continuous temperature monitoring. Katie also leads the production of Milwaukee Riverkeeper’s Annual Report Cards – a data-heavy synthesis of the work of hundreds of volunteers and other data sources across the basin.
Her favorite part about being a coordinator is working with volunteers. Milwaukee Riverkeeper has excellent volunteer retention in part due to Katie’s work to show volunteers the value of their data and her efforts to build a sense of community among the volunteers. In the words of one volunteer, “I think I speak for many people when I say, Katie’s contribution to the WAV program and to the health of the Milwaukee River basin is enormous. We’re extremely fortunate to have such an intelligent and capable leader.”
