Publications
New York Water Science Center publications
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Filter Total Items: 674
Decision-making for managing harmful algal blooms
Cyanobacteria are a global water-quality
concern because these organisms can develop into
harmful blooms that affect ecologic, economic, and
public health.
U.S. Geological Survey scientists worked with
the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation
and Historic Preservation and the New York State
Department of Environmental Conservation to
develop a structured decision-making template for
managing
Authors
Jennifer L. Graham
Evaluation of select velocity measurement techniques for estimating discharge in small streams across the United States
Multiple instruments and methods exist for collecting discrete streamflow measurements in small streams with low flows, defined here as less than 5.7 m3/s (200 ft3/s). Included in the available methods are low-cost approaches that are infrequently used, in part, because their uncertainty is not well known. In this work, we evaluated the accuracy and suitability of three low-cost velocity measureme
Authors
Tyler Victor King, Stephen Hundt, Amy E. Simonson, Kyle Blasch
Green infrastructure in the Great Lakes—Assessment of performance, barriers, and unintended consequences
The Great Lakes Basin covers around 536,393 square kilometers, and the Great Lakes hold more than 5,400 cubic miles of water, accounting for more than 20 percent of the world’s fresh surface water supply. The Great Lakes provide a source of drinking water to tens of millions of people in Canada and the United States and support one of the most diverse ecosystems in the world. Increasing urbanizati
Authors
Nancy T. Baker, Daniel J. Sullivan, William R. Selbig, Ralph J. Haefner, David C. Lampe, E. Randall Bayless, Michael R. McHale
Glacial geology and hydrogeology of valley-fill aquifers in the Oneonta area, Otsego and Delaware Counties, New York
The glacial geology and hydrogeology of valley-fill aquifers and their surrounding uplands are described within a 112-square-mile area in southern Otsego and northwestern Delaware Counties, New York, centered around the City of Oneonta. The major valleys include those of the Susquehanna River, Otego Creek, Charlotte Creek, and Schenevus Creek. A variety of data were analyzed to provide a broad pic
Authors
Paul M. Heisig, P. Jay Fleisher
Using microbial source tracking to identify fecal contamination sources in South Oyster Bay on Long Island, New York
The U.S. Geological Survey worked in cooperation with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation to assess the potential sources of fecal contamination entering South Oyster Bay, a shallow embayment on the southern shore of Long Island, New York. Water samples are routinely collected by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation in the bay and analyzed for fecal c
Authors
Tristen N. Tagliaferri, Shawn C. Fisher, Christopher M. Kephart, Natalie Cheung, Ariel P. Reed, Robert J. Welk
Geohydrology and water quality of the northern and central parts of the Tug Hill glacial aquifer, Jefferson and Oswego Counties, north-central New York
The northern and central parts of the Tug Hill glacial aquifer consist of a 29-mile-long, crescent-shaped, mixture of glaciofluvial, glaciolacustrine, and recent alluvial deposits of predominantly sand and gravel on the western side of the Tug Hill Plateau in Jefferson and Oswego Counties in north-central New York. Approximately 11,400 people are supplied by groundwater that is withdrawn from muni
Authors
Todd S. Miller, Benjamin N. Fisher, William M. Kappel
Assessment of fecal contamination sources to Alley Creek, Queens County, New York, August 2020–June 2021
Alley Creek, a tributary to Little Neck Bay in Queens County, New York, has been designated by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation as impaired (Class I) for fecal coliform because of pollution from combined sewer overflow, including stormwater runoff. The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the New York City Department of Environmental Protection, conducted a 1-year
Authors
Shawn C. Fisher, Christopher M. Kephart, Natalie Cheung, Tristen N. Tagliaferri
Assessing spatial transferability of a random forest metamodel for predicting drainage fraction
Fully distributed hydrological models are widely used in groundwater management, but model speed and data requirements impede their use for decision support purposes. Metamodels provide a simpler and faster model which emulates the underlying complex model using machine learning techniques. However, metamodel predictions beyond the ranges, in space and/or time, of training data are highly uncertai
Authors
Elisa Bjerre, Michael N. Fienen, Raphael Schneider, Julian Koch, Anker L. Højberg
Characterization of the bathymetry, hydrodynamics, water quality, infrastructure, and channel condition of the Old Erie Canal from DeWitt to its junction with the current Erie Canal in Verona, near Rome, New York, 2018–19
The Old Erie Canal has undergone sedimentation and aquatic growth that have restricted flow and diminished the aesthetic quality of the canal during the nearly 200 years since its construction. During 2018–2019, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in cooperation with the Madison County Planning Department and the New York State Canal Corporation conducted a study of the Old Erie Canal between the To
Authors
John F. Wernly
A structured decision-making framework for managing cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms in New York State parks
Cyanobacteria are increasingly a global water-quality concern because of the potential for these organisms to develop into potentially harmful blooms that affect ecological, economic, and public health. Cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms (CyanoHABs) can lead to a decrease in water quality and affect many of the recreational and ecological benefits of parks that include lakes. The New York State O
Authors
Jennifer L. Graham, Gabriella M. Cebada Mora, Rebecca M. Gorney, Lianne C. Ball, Claudia Mengelt, Michael C. Runge
Using microbial source tracking to identify fecal contamination sources in Great South Bay on Long Island, New York
The U.S. Geological Survey worked in cooperation with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation to assess the potential sources of fecal contamination entering a part of Great South Bay (referred to as Great South Bay for the purposes of this report) near the hamlets of West Sayville, Sayville, and Bayport on the southern shore of Suffolk County on Long Island, New York. Water sa
Authors
Tristen N. Tagliaferri, Shawn C. Fisher, Christopher M. Kephart, Natalie Cheung, Ariel P. Reed, Robert J. Welk
Application of a soil-water-balance model to estimate annual groundwater recharge for Long Island, New York, 1900–2019
A soil-water-balance (SWB) model was developed for Long Island, New York, to estimate the potential amount of annual groundwater recharge to the Long Island aquifer system from 1900 to 2019. The SWB model program is a computer code based on a modified Thornthwaite-Mather SWB approach and uses spatially and temporally distributed meteorological, land-cover, and soil properties as input to compute p
Authors
Jason S. Finkelstein, Jack Monti, John P. Masterson, Donald A. Walter