Surface Water

In 2012, the USGS Nebraska Water Science Center, in cooperation with the City of Omaha, began monitoring the Missouri River near Omaha to document water-quality changes in the river as the City improved their combined sewer overflow (CSO) system. The monitoring program includes both discrete and continuous data collection at four sampling sites on the Missouri River. Monitoring at each site...

Water resource sustainability in the Elkhorn River Basin, Nebraska is a critical issue. Understanding streamflow trends is important to the determination of sustainable surface water and groundwater in the basin. The Lower Elkhorn and Upper Elkhorn Natural Resources Districts and the USGS cooperatively studied trends in streamflow characteristics of sites in the Elkhorn River, Salt Creek, and...

Streams in the Loup River basin are sensitive to groundwater withdrawals because of the close hydrologic connection between groundwater and surface water. Pumping from aquifers that are hydrologically connected to surface-water bodies can have a significant effect on the streams by reducing the groundwater discharge to surface water. An evaluation of any groundwater management strategy needs to...

Among the various habitat types within a river corridor, sandbars are highly dynamic and quite sensitive to changes such as channel width, streamflow, and riparian woodland expansion. As people, infrastructure, and other factors encroach upon the Lower Platte River, we are exploring variation in the height and area of sandbars to better accommodate all of these uses without jeopardizing these...

We are providing monitoring assistance related to the construction of off-channel aquatic habitat (such as chutes) along the Missouri River. This construction is currently done using a hydraulic dredge to excavate floodplain material. The dredge slurry is discharged into the main channel of the Missouri River. The potential impacts on nutrient and sediment levels in the river from this practice...