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Dakota Water Science Center

Welcome to the USGS Dakota Water Science Center!  Please use these pages to explore the hydrologic data and scientific investigations we conduct on water resources of North and South Dakota.

News

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Public Invitation: Learn the Latest on Your Water Resources in the Dakotas

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Media Alert: Public Invitation: Remembering the 1972 Flood, Planning for the Future of Water Resources

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Bakken Shale unconventional oil and gas production has not caused widespread hydrocarbon contamination to date in groundwater used for water supply

Publications

Assessing the added value of antecedent streamflow alteration information in modeling stream biological condition

In stream systems, disentangling relationships between biology and flow and subsequent prediction of these relationships to unsampled streams is a common objective of large-scale ecological modeling. Often, streamflow metrics are derived from aggregating continuous streamflow records available at a subset of stream gages into long-term flow regime descriptors. Despite demonstrated value, shortcomi
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Taylor E Woods, Ken Eng, Daren Carlisle, Matt J. Cashman, Michael Meador, Karen R. Ryberg, Kelly O. Maloney

Comprehensive water-quality trend analysis for selected sites and constituents in the International Souris River Basin, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, Canada, and North Dakota, United States, 1970–2020

The Souris River Basin is an international basin in southeast Saskatchewan, north-central North Dakota, and southwest Manitoba. Sustained exceedances of water-quality objectives for total phosphorus, sodium, sulfate, total dissolved solids, and total iron have been reported since the late 1990s at the two binational sites on the Souris River (Souris River near Sherwood, North Dakota [U.S. Geologic
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Rochelle A. Nustad, Wyatt S. Tatge

Machine-learning model to delineate sub-surface agricultural drainage from satellite imagery

Knowing subsurface drainage (tile-drain) extent is integral to understanding how landscapes respond to precipitation events and subsequent days of drying, as well as how soil characteristics and land management influence stream response. Consequently, a time series of tile-drain extent would inform one aspect of land management that complicates our ability to explain streamflow and water-quality a
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Fleford Santos Redoloza, Tanja N. Williamson, Alexander Headman, Barry J. Allred

Science

Western South Dakota Hydrology Conference

The 2023 Western South Dakota Hydrology Conference will be held on April 20, 2023, at the Monument, Rapid City, SD. Registration will open on February 13, 2023. Previous years' program and abstracts are available from the "Multimedia" tab on this page.
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Western South Dakota Hydrology Conference

The 2023 Western South Dakota Hydrology Conference will be held on April 20, 2023, at the Monument, Rapid City, SD. Registration will open on February 13, 2023. Previous years' program and abstracts are available from the "Multimedia" tab on this page.
Learn More

Flood-Frequency Analysis in the Midwest: Addressing Potential Nonstationary Annual Peak-Flow Records

Period of Project: 2021 -Study Area: MidwestCooperating Agency: Transportation Pooled Fund
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Flood-Frequency Analysis in the Midwest: Addressing Potential Nonstationary Annual Peak-Flow Records

Period of Project: 2021 -Study Area: MidwestCooperating Agency: Transportation Pooled Fund
Learn More

Souris River Basin

Information and products on the Souris River Basin.
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Souris River Basin

Information and products on the Souris River Basin.
Learn More