Reports

The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Lewis and Clark, Lower Elkhorn, Lower Loup, Lower Platte North, Lower Niobrara, Middle Niobrara, Upper Elkhorn, and the Upper Loup Natural Resources Districts, designed a study to refine the spatial and temporal discretization of a previously modeled area. This updated study focused on a 30,000-square-mile area of the High Plains...

Most of the king (Somateria spectabilis) and common eiders (S. mollissima v-nigra) nesting in northern Alaska and northwestern Canada migrate past Point Barrow, Alaska, during the spring and fall migration. Yellow-billed loons (Gavia adamsii) also migrate past Point Barrow and are a species of international conservation concern. Spring migration counts of eiders have been conducted...

A backhoe trench in deposits of Pleistocene Lake Bonneville and Holocene wetlands below the mouth of Juke Box Cave, near Wendover, Utah, provides an excellent view of the late Pleistocene and Holocene geologic history of the area. The following stratigraphic units are exposed (ascending): preBonneville gravel (fluvial or lacustrine) and oolitic sand (ages greater than 30,000 yr B.P.)...

As part of local wellhead protection area programs, areas contributing water to production wells need to be periodically updated because groundwater-flow paths depend in part on the stresses to the groundwater-flow system. A steady-state groundwater-flow model that was constructed in 2009 was updated to reflect recent (2017) pumping conditions in the Lansing and East Lansing area in the...

We used Passive Integrated Transponder (PIT)-tagging and a series of instream PIT-tag interrogation systems (PTISs) to investigate life-histories, populations, and efficacy of habitat restoration actions for wild Steelhead Oncorhynchus mykiss in the Wind River subbasin, WA. No hatchery Steelhead have been planted in the Wind River subbasin since 1997, and hatchery adults are estimated to...

The Climate Change Response Framework is an example of a collaborative, cross-boundary approach to create a set of tools, partnerships, and actions to support climate-informed conservation and land management. Historically, this effort has focused on the needs of forest managers and forestry professionals. In recent years, however, there has been increasing demand for science and tools...

For millennia, wildfires have markedly influenced forests and non-forested landscapes of the western United States (US), and they are increasingly seen as having substantial impacts on society and nature. There is growing concern over what kinds and amounts of fire will achieve desirable outcomes and limit harmful effects on people and nature. Moreover, the increasing complexity...

We present numeric grids containing estimates of the thickness of unconsolidated sediments and depth to the pre-Cenozoic basement for the western United States. Values for these grids were combined and integrated from previous studies or derived directly from gravity analyses. The grids are provided with 1-kilometer grid-node spacing in ScienceBase (https://www.sciencebase.gov). These...

Excessive algal growth and low dissolved oxygen concentrations were observed during low streamflow conditions during summer months along a 5,800-foot reach of the East Fork Carson River in Carson Valley, west-central Nevada. Algal growth from nutrient enrichment of a stream reduces aquatic diversity, threatens fish ecology and stream health, and can be a recreational nuisance. In...

Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated undiscovered, technically recoverable mean resources of 1.1 billion barrels of oil and 793 billion cubic feet of gas in the Putumayo-Oriente-Marañón Basin Province of Colombia, Ecuador, and Perú.

The Williston Basin contains important oil and gas resources for the Nation. Freshwater supplies are limited in this semiarid area, and oil and gas development can require large volumes of freshwater. Groundwater is the primary source of water for many water users in the Williston Basin, so to better understand these resources, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) assessed the groundwater

The U.S. Geological Survey completed a geology-based assessment of undiscovered, technically recoverable oil and gas resources in the Haynesville and Bossier Formations of the onshore and State waters portion of the U.S. Gulf Coast region. Haynesville Formation conventional oil and gas production began in the late 1930s, whereas Bossier Formation production began in the early 1970s...