Publications

Answers for many critical water-related issues require solid-phase water-quality data that are representative, accurate, and consistent. Collection of suspended sediment samples for subsequent analyses of solid-phase constituents that represent water-column sediment concentrations requires use of appropriate isokinetic samplers and sampling techniques (Davis, 2005a). Recent review of...

In our directionally and continuously changing world, history still matters, and it does so in increasingly novel and important ways. Human adaptation to global change will rely heavily on robust baselines of historic environmental variability and detailed understanding of how both past and modern ecosystems have responded to both individual and multiple stressors. The question of global...

Atmospheric rivers are important mechanisms for transporting water vapor through the atmosphere outside the tropics. These long, narrow, transient corridors occur at low altitudes just ahead of the cold front in midlatitude cyclone systems. These rivers in the sky stitch together the components of the extratropical water cycle by providing large-scale horizontal water vapor transport.

A three-dimensional finite-difference model for part of the Mississippi River Valley alluvial aquifer in the Cache Critical Groundwater Area of eastern Arkansas was constructed to simulate potential future conditions of groundwater flow. The objectives of this study were to test different pilot point distributions to find reasonable estimates of aquifer properties for the alluvial...

We've invited Michael R. Rosen, water quality specialist within the USGS Water Science Field Team in Carson City and Elizabeth Gierlowski-Kordesch, professor of geology at Ohio University, to take a look at the intriguing new developments that are emerging in limnogeologic studies. These studies are increasing our understanding of how climate and movements of the Earth's surface...

Since 2001, irrigators in the upper Klamath Basin have increasingly turned to groundwater to compensate for reductions in surface-water allocation caused by shifts from irrigation use to instream flows for Endangered Species Act listed fishes. The largest increase in groundwater pumping has been in and around the Bureau of Reclamation’s Klamath Irrigation Project, which includes the Tule...

Perchlorate (ClO4-) in groundwater can be from synthetic or natural sources, the latter of which include both historical application of imported nitrate fertilizers from the Atacama Desert of Chile and naturally deposited ClO4- that forms atmospherically and accumulates in arid regions such as the southwestern US. The objective of this study was to evaluate the use of isotopic data to...

River flow and sediment transport in estuaries influence morphological development over decadal and century time scales, but hydrological and sedimentological records are typically too short to adequately characterize long-term trends. In this study, we recover archival records and apply a rating curve approach to develop the first instrumental estimates of daily delta inflow and...

Statistical summaries of streamflow data collected at 184 streamgages in Iowa are presented in this report. All streamgages included for analysis have at least 10 years of continuous record collected before or through September 2013. This report is an update to two previously published reports that presented statistical summaries of selected Iowa streamflow data through September 1988...

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Hydrologic Instrumentation Facility (HIF) is nationally responsible for the design, testing, evaluation, repair, calibration, warehousing, and distribution of hydrologic instrumentation in use within the USGS Water Mission Area (WMA). The HIF's Hydraulic Laboratory has begun routine quality assurance (QA) testing and documenting the performance of every...

The Appalachian National Scenic Trail (AT), a unit of the National Park Service (NPS), spans nearly 2,200 miles from Georgia to Maine, encompassing a diverse range of ecosystems. Acidic deposition (acid rain) threatens the AT’s natural resources. Acid rain is a result of sulfur (S) and nitrogen (N) compounds produced from fossil fuel combustion, motor vehicles, and agricultural practices...

Suspended sediment concentration (SSC) rating curves for the Kalamazoo River and its tributaries from Marshall to Kalamazoo, Michigan, U.S.A., were developed based on measured data. The slopes of the atsite SSC rating curves were of two general types: either increasing or decreasing with increasing discharges. By examining the basin characteristics and flow patterns, streams with...