Introduction

The Northland Regional Council carries out State of the Environment Monitoring in several Northland rivers and streams to identify significant environmental issues and trends in water quality. The performance targets relating to SOE monitoring of river water quality are:

Operate a region-wide water quality network for the measurement, recording and reporting of river water quality trends, and

Carry out sampling and reporting on summer freshwater bathing water quality.

Both of these performance targets were met in 2005-2006.

The Regional Council carried out sampling at 23 freshwater bathing sites throughout Northland to check whether microbiological water quality was suitable for contact recreation. These sites were sampled weekly for 12 weeks over summer. The results are presented in the Recreational Bathing Water Quality section of this report.

The River Water Quality Monitoring Network (RWQMN) includes 21 sites scattered throughout Northland's major river systems. These sites were monitored monthly for several water quality parameters and annually for stream macroinvertebrates. The majority of these sites now have enough data for long-term trend analysis. The 2005-2006 results and long-term trends in water quality are presented in the RWQMN section of this report.

Waipoua River.