California Waters - Fall 2023 - Vol. III | Issue III
USGS Youth Outreach at Expanding Your Horizons Conference
On October 14th, a group from the USGS California Water Science Center hosted both a workshop and career table at the Sacramento State University Expanding Your Horizons Conference. The conference encourages middle school girls to explore STEM education and careers.
Expanded Harmful Algae Monitoring in the San Francisco Estuary
NOAA recently awarded a grant through its Monitoring and Event Response Research Program (MERHAB) to support the development of a harmful algal blooms (HABs) collaborative monitoring program for the San Francisco Estuary.
USGS Water Science Centers Join Forces at the 2023 Lake Tahoe Summit
Scientists from the California and Nevada Water Science Centers attended the 27th annual Lake Tahoe Summit to discuss the work the USGS is doing in the Tahoe Basin.
Water Availability of the Salton Sea Watershed
USGS to work with other agencies and stakeholders on water availability analysis.
NorCal News Station Showcases Work of USGS Hydrotechs on the Sacramento River
Hydrologic technicians (or hydrotechs) from the USGS California Water Science Center were recently featured on Sacramento News Channel ABC10.
Arsenic, chromium, uranium, and vanadium in rock, alluvium, and groundwater, Mojave River and Morongo Areas, western Mojave Desert, southern California
Trace elements within groundwater that originate from aquifer materials and pose potential public-health hazards if consumed are known as geogenic contaminants. The geogenic contaminants arsenic, chromium, and vanadium can form negatively charged ions with oxygen known as oxyanions. Uranium complexes with bicarbonate and carbonate to form negatively charged ions having aqueous chemistry similar to
Data Inspires Transformation
Results show snapshot of dynamic environmental processes that shape the ways nutrients interact with and affect aquatic habitats in the Delta.
The author of the article connected transformation in the Delta to their personal transformation.
Salinity trends in a groundwater system supplemented by 50 years of imported Colorado River water
The Indio subbasin of the Coachella Valley is a desert area of southern California where a growing population depends primarily on groundwater for drinking and agricultural uses. The aquifer system has been supplemented with Colorado River water through managed recharge and widespread irrigation since the mid-20th century. We use a combination of geochemical modeling and trend analysis to identify
Selenium Cycling in Salton Sea Wetlands
The effect of selenium toxicity on wildlife has been known for more than 50 years. This issue drew particular attention in the 1980s when embryo deformity and mortality was observed in birds at a wildlife refuge in California. Harmful effects from selenium were determined to be connected to irrigation drainage water.
As a result, an effort began to monitor levels of selenium in irrigation drainage water throughout the western United States. One location, studied by both the U.S. Geological Survey and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, was the Salton Sea and its surrounding area. The Salton Sea is a shallow, saline, drainage lake at the southern end California. It lies between, and within, the Imperial and Coachella Valleys.
High-frequency Monitoring of Delta Island Drainage Waters
From the second half of the 19th century, land reclamation has transformed the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta (Delta). The landscape of the Delta has gone from a network of shifting waterways and tidal marshland to channels and islands fixed in position by hardened levees.
Water-Quality Monitoring in the Sepulveda Flood Control Basin of the Los Angeles River Watershed
As part of the Urban Waters Federal Partnership (UWFP), this project will enhance water-quality monitoring on a reach of the Los Angeles River slated for revitalization. The UWFP reconnects urban communities—particularly those that are overburdened or economically distressed—with their waterways by improving coordination among federal agencies.
A novel boat-based field application of a high-frequency conductometric ammonium analyzer to characterize spatial variation in aquatic ecosystems
Documenting dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) concentration and form at appropriate temporal and spatial scales is key to understanding aquatic ecosystem health, particularly as DIN fuels primary productivity. In addition to point and non-point source nutrient inputs, factors such as hydrology, geomorphology, temperature, light, and biogeochemical transformations influence nutrient dynamics in su
Multiple-well monitoring site adjacent to the Elk Hills Oil Field, Kern County, California
IntroductionThe Elk Hills Oil Field is one of the many fields selected for regional groundwater mapping and monitoring by the California State Water Resources Control Board as part of the Oil and Gas Regional Monitoring Program (California State Water Resources Control Board, 2015, 2022b; U.S. Geological Survey, 2022a). The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in cooperation with the California State Wa