Water Resources
Publications
This list of Water Resources Mission Area publications includes both official USGS publications and journal articles authored by our scientists. A searchable database of all USGS publications can be accessed at the USGS Publications Warehouse.
Monitoring wetland water quality related to livestock grazing in amphibian habitats
Land use alteration such as livestock grazing can affect water quality in habitats of at-risk wildlife species. Data from managed wetlands are needed to understand levels of exposure for aquatic life stages and monitor grazing-related changes afield. We quantified spatial and temporal variation in water quality in wetlands occupied by threatened...
Smalling, Kelly; Rowe, Jennifer; Pearl, Christopher; Iwanowiczl, Luke R.; Givens, Carrie E.; Anderson, Chauncey W.; Mccreary, Brome; Adams, Michael J. Eroding Cascadia—Sediment and solute transport and landscape denudation in western Oregon and northwestern California
Riverine measurements of sediment and solute transport give empirical basin-scale estimates of bed-load, suspended-sediment, and silicate-solute fluxes for 100,000 km2 of northwestern California and western Oregon. This spatially explicit sediment budget shows the multifaceted control of geology and physiography on the rates and processes of...
O'Connor, Jim E.; Mangano, Joseph F.; Wise, Daniel R.; Roering, Joshua R.
DGMETA (version 1)—Dissolved gas modeling and environmental tracer analysis computer program
DGMETA (Dissolved Gas Modeling and Environmental Tracer Analysis) is a Microsoft Excel-based computer program that is used for modeling air-water equilibrium conditions from measurements of dissolved gases and for computing concentrations of environmental tracers that rely on air-water equilibrium model results. DGMETA can solve for the...
Jurgens, Bryant C.; Böhlke, J.K.; Haase, Karl; Busenberg, Eurybiades; Hunt, Andrew G.; Hansen, Jeffrey A.
Trends in groundwater levels in and near the Rosebud Indian Reservation, South Dakota, water years 1956–2017
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in cooperation with the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, completed a study to characterize water-level fluctuations in observation wells to examine driving factors that affect water levels in and near the Rosebud Indian Reservation, which comprises all of Todd County. The study investigates concerns regarding potential...
Valseth, Kristen J.; Driscoll, Daniel G.
Statistical methods for simulating structural stormwater runoff best management practices (BMPs) with the Stochastic Empirical Loading and Dilution Model (SELDM)
This report documents statistics for simulating structural stormwater runoff best management practices (BMPs) with the Stochastic Empirical Loading and Dilution Model (SELDM). The U.S. Geological Survey developed SELDM and the statistics documented in this report in cooperation with the Federal Highway Administration to indicate the risk for...
Granato, Gregory E.; Spaetzel, Alana B.; Medalie, Laura
Water-resource management monitoring needs, State of Hawai‘i
In cooperation with the State of Hawai‘i Commission on Water Resource Management and in collaboration with the University of Hawaiʻi Water Resources Research Center, the U.S. Geological Survey developed a water-resource monitoring program—a rainfall, surface-water, and groundwater data-collection program—that is required to meet State needs for...
Cheng, Chui Ling; Izuka, Scot K.; Kennedy, Joseph; Frazier, Abby G. ; Giambelluca, Thomas W. Using heat to trace vertical water fluxes in sediment experiencing concurrent tidal pumping and groundwater discharge
Heat has been widely applied to trace groundwater‐surface water exchanges in inland environments, but it is infrequently applied in coastal sediment where head oscillations induce periodicity in water flux magnitude/direction and heat advection. This complicates interpretation of temperatures to estimate water fluxes. We investigate the...
LeRoux, N; Kurylyk, B.; Briggs, Martin A.; Irvine, D.; Tamborski, J; Bense, V. F. Mapping the global threat of land subsidence
Subsidence, the lowering of Earth's land surface, is a potentially destructive hazard that can be caused by a wide range of natural or anthropogenic triggers but mainly results from solid or fluid mobilization underground. Subsidence due to groundwater depletion (1) is a slow and gradual process that develops on large time scales (months to years...
Herrera, Gerardo; Ezquerro, Pablo; Tomás, Roberto; Béjar-Pizarro, Marta; López-Vinielles, Juan; Rossi, Mauro; Mateos, Rosa M.; Carreón-Freyre, Dora; Lambert, John; Teatini, Pietro; Cabral-Cano, Enrique; Erkens, Gilles; Galloway, Devin; Hung, Wei-Chia; Kakar, Najeebullah; Sneed, Michelle; Tosi, Luigi; Wang, Hanmei; Ye, Shujun Effect of organic matter concentration and characteristics on mercury mobilization and methylmercury production at an abandoned mine site
Thousands of abandoned mines throughout the western region of North America contain elevated total-mercury (THg) concentrations. Mercury is mobilized from these sites primarily due to erosion of particulate-bound Hg (THg-P). Organic matter-based soil amendments can promote vegetation growth on mine tailings, reducing erosion and subsequent loading...
Eckley, Chris S.; Luxton, Todd P.; Stanfield, Brooks; Baldwin, Austin K.; Holloway, JoAnn; McKernan, John; Johnson, Mark Characterizing physical properties of streambed interface sediments using in situ complex electrical conductivity measurements
Streambed sediment physical properties such as surface area, are difficult to quantify in situ but exert a high‐level control on a wide range of biogeochemical processes and sorption of contaminants. We introduce the use of complex electrical conductivity (CC) methods (also known as spectral induced polarization (SIP)) that measure both real and...
Wang, Cheng-Hui; Briggs, Martin A.; Day-Lewis, Frederick; Slater, L. Effect of temperature, nitrate concentration, pH and bicarbonate addition on biomass and lipid accumulation in the sporulating green alga PW95
The mixed effects of temperature (20 °C, 25 °C and 30 °C), nitrate concentration (0.5 mM and 2.0 mM), pH buffer, and bicarbonate addition (trigger) on biomass growth and lipid accumulation were investigated in the environmental alga PW95 during batch experiments in standardized growth medium. PW95 was isolated from coal-...
Corredor, Luisa; Barnhart, Elliott; Parker, Albert E.; Gerlach, Robin; Fields, Matthew W. Temporal and spatial variations in river specific conductivity: Implications for understanding sources of river water and hydrograph separations
Specific conductivity (SC) is commonly used to estimate the proportion of baseflow (i.e., waters from within catchments such as groundwater, interflow, or bank return flows) contributing to rivers. Reach-scale SC comparisons are also useful for identifying where multiple water stores contribute to baseflow. Daily SC values of adjacent gauges in...
Cartwright, Ian; Miller, Matthew