Hydrologic/ Hydraulic Monitoring

About 1 billion pounds of conventional pesticides are used each year in the United States to control weeds, insects, and other pests. The use of pesticides has resulted in a range of benefits, including increased food production and reduction of insect-borne disease, but also raises questions about possible adverse effects on the environment, including water quality. The National Water Quality...

Starting in 2000, the U.S. Geological Survey partnered with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management, the National Atmospheric Deposition Program, and the Lake Michigan Air Directors Consortium to investigate and monitor mercury in the environment in Indiana. This web page provides a list of publications and links to statewide studies of mercury in Indiana and regional mercury studies...

Eutrophication, or excess nutrients in streams, is typically one of the top reasons that a stream is listed as impaired on the 303(d) list as part of the Clean Water Act.

Eutrophication, or excess nutrients in streams, is typically one of the top reasons that a stream is listed as impaired on the 303(d) list as part of the Clean Water Act. How nutrients, primarily nitrogen and phosphorus, are transported to streams and groundwater greatly affects the best management plan to keep them on fields and out of streams and groundwater. Likewise, environmental managers and...

The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) is an interagency effort that seeks to accelerate ecosystem restoration in the Great Lakes by confronting threats to the region, such as nonpoint source pollution. Three Priority Watersheds have been targeted (Fox/Green Bay, Saginaw, and Maumee) and are characterized by having a high density of agricultural land use and have ecosystem impairments...

Sediment and nutrient runoff (nitrogen and phosphorus) from agricultural and urban land-use practices are of great concern in the Western Lake Erie Basin watersheds. Excessive nutrient inputs can lead to algal blooms that deplete the oxygen available to aquatic plants and animals. The blooms may result in cyanotoxins or cause taste and odor problems to public water supplies.

Our mission is provide the best quality stage and discharge information to our customers. The stage data along with discrete measurements are used to develop stage-discharge relationships thus inferring discharge.

The long-term goals of the National Water Quality Assessment (NAWQA) and National Stream Quality Accounting Network (NASQAN) programs are to describe the status and trends in the quality of a large representative part of the Nation's surface-water and groundwater resources and to provide a sound, scientific understanding of the primary factors affecting the quality of these resources. USGS Water...

Hellbranch Run is a second order stream tributary to Big Darby Creek. Big Darby Creek was designated a “National Scenic River” in 1994 by the U.S. Department of the Interior. Beginning in 1992, concern about the possible effects of urbanization on water quality in Hellbranch Run (and ultimately Big Darby Creek) prompted the USGS, in cooperation with the City of Columbus, Ohio, to begin collection...

The Lake Erie and Lake Saint Clair (LERI) Basins in Indiana, Michigan, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania comprise one of more than 50 study units that are part of the USGS National Water Quality Assessment (NAWQA) Program. The long-term goals of the NAWQA program are to describe the water-quality status and trends in a large representative part of the Nation's surface-water and groundwater...

The City of Columbus operates 5 high-capacity collector wells to extract groundwater for drinking-water supply. To assist the City, the USGS monitors water levels in 5 observation wells and operates a water-quality monitor on the Scioto River where specific conductance, temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, and turbidity are measured on an hourly basis. In addition, groundwater-level synoptic...

How much water is stored in the soil? Does agricultural management affect this? Will this change if temperatures increase and plants need more water? In order to answer this question, we have focused on the differences in soil physical properties under four land management types (forest, pasture, traditional agriculture, and conservation agriculture) and whether these differences effect how water...