Water samples and temperature readings are taken at Lizard Creek (LIZ009) a kilometer upstream of its intersection with the Elk River, as part of the Elk River Alliance's Community-based Water Monitoring program (CBWM) and Elk River Alliance's Hydrometric program. The CBWM program assesses aquatic habitat health at selected tributaries of the Elk River to fill in gaps in currently available watershed data and make these data accessible to the wider community. In 2020, ERA's CBWM program transitioned into a fully CABIN (Canadian Aquatic Biomonitoring Network) based program, with macroinvertebrate sampling added on and occurring annually during low-flow conditions.