Publications

Recent technological improvements have increased the ability of street sweepers to remove sediment and other debris from street surfaces; the effect of these technological advancements on stormwater quality is largely unknown. The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the City of Madison and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, evaluated three street-sweeper technologies...

From March through November 2005, the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ), did a statewide screening to aid in understanding the occurrence and distribution of selected pesticides in Michigan streams. Stream-water samples were collected from 23 sites throughout Michigan. In all, 320 water samples were analyzed by use of...

Water samples collected from 20 stream sites in Oakland and Macomb Counties, Mich., were analyzed to learn more about the occurrence of cephalosporin-resistant Escherichia coli (E. coli) and vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) and the co-occurrence of antibiotics and mercury in area streams. Fecal indicator bacteria concentrations exceeded the Michigan recreational water-quality...

The Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (MMSD) Corridor Study is a three-phase project designed to improve the understanding of water resources in the MMSD planning area to assist managers and policy makers in their decisions. Phase I of the Study involved the compilation of existing data from multiple agencies into a single database. These data were analyzed to identify spatial...

Certain ecosystem types, particularly wetlands, have environmental characteristics that can make them particularly sensitive to mercury inputs and that can result in large mercury concentrations in fish or other aquatic biota. To provide information needed to make effective management decisions to decrease human and wildlife exposure to methylmercury in northern prairie pothole wetlands...

Population growth in the St. Croix River Basin in Minnesota and Wisconsin has intensified concerns of county resource managers and the National Park Service, which is charged with protecting the St. Croix National Scenic Riverway, about the potential for ground-water contamination in the basin. This report describes a previously developed method that was adapted to illustrate potential...

Summaries of the major hydrogeologic features for each county in Michigan are presented. Each summary includes a listing of the major watersheds in the county and a description of the hydrogeology of the major aquifers in the county. Aquifer properties reported in the literature are given if available. Reports describing the hydrogeology of each county are cited. This work was prepared...

The State of Michigan has more than 11,000 inland lakes; approximately 3,500 of these lakes are greater than 25 acres. The USGS, in cooperation with the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ), has been monitoring the quality of inland lakes in Michigan through the Lake Water Quality Assessment monitoring program. Approximately 100 inland lakes will be sampled per year from...

Regression models were developed for the 25th percentile of June and September flows (first quartile of flow) for 47 streamflow-gaging stations (gaging stations) in the Upper Mississippi, Ohio, and Great Lakes drainage basins. The gaging stations that were selected for this analysis are on unregulated rivers, have at least 40 years of record, and have a nearby weather station with at...

A time-of-travel study involving a luminescent dye was done on the Crow River in Minnesota from Rockford to the confluence with the Mississippi River at Dayton on July 11, 2006, at a streamflow of 293 cubic feet per second at Rockford. Dye was injected in the Crow River at Rockford, and traveltime and concentrations were measured at three sampling locations downstream: at the Hanover...

This report, a product of the Lake St. Clair Regional Monitoring Project, describes four water-quality studies in the St. Clair River/Lake St. Clair Basin from the early 1970's through 2005. All the studies examined water quality of streams in the basin; the most recent studies focused primarily on water quality during high- and low-streamflows. This report explains how storm-runoff and...

This surface-water quality-assurance plan documents the standards, policies, and procedures used by the Wisconsin Water Science Center of the U.S. Geological Survey, Water Resources Discipline, for activities related to the collection, processing, storage, analysis, management, and publication of surface-water data. The roles and responsibilities of Water Science Center personnel in...