Water-quality indicators of surface-water-influenced groundwater supplies in the Ohio River alluvial aquifer of West Virginia
Mitchell A. McAdoo, Gregory T. Connock
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5139
The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources, studied surface-water-influenced groundwater supplies in the Ohio River alluvial aquifer of West Virginia for the purpose of understanding the influence of surface water on groundwater chemistry. Public groundwater supplies obtained from these aquifers receive...
The U.S. Geological Survey Water Resources Research Act Program—Meeting local, State, and national needs for water resources science and training
Mark P. Miller, Earl A. Greene, Tanja N. Williamson
2024, Fact Sheet 2023-3031
IntroductionThe U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has a broad research portfolio that addresses water resource issues that are critical to our Nation’s prosperity and quality of life. Socioeconomics, geopolitical stressors, population growth, climate variability, and other factors provide challenges for the management of water resources. Working collaboratively with partners, the USGS...
Examining the effect of physicochemical and meteorological variables on water quality indicators of harmful algal blooms in a shallow hypereutrophic lake using machine learning techniques
Susan Wherry, Liam N. Schenk
2024, Water (4) 1073-1082
Two independent machine learning techniques, boosted regression trees and artificial neural networks, were used to examine the physicochemical and meteorological variables that affect the seasonal growth and decline of harmful algal blooms (HABs) in a shallow, hypereutrophic lake in southern Oregon. High temporal resolution data collected...
Multigenerational, indirect exposure to pyrethroids demonstrates potential compensatory response and reduced toxicity at higher salinity in estuarine fish
Sara Hutton, Samreen Siddiqui, Emily Pedersen, Christopher Markgraf, Amelie Segarra, Michelle L. Hladik, Richard E Connon, Susanne M. Brander
2024, Environmental Science and Technology (58) 2224-2235
Estuarine environments are critical to fish species and serve as nurseries for developing embryos and larvae. They also undergo daily fluctuations in salinity and act as filters for pollutants. Additionally, global climate change (GCC) is altering salinity regimes within estuarine systems through changes in precipitation and...
Multiple lines of evidence point to pesticides as stressors affecting invertebrate communities in small streams in five United States regions
Lisa H. Nowell, Patrick W. Moran, Ian R. Waite, Travis S. Schmidt, Paul M. Bradley, Barbara J. Mahler, Peter Van Metre
2024, Science of the Total Environment (915)
Multistressor studies were performed in five regions of the United States to assess the role of pesticides as stressors affecting invertebrate communities in wadable streams. Pesticides and other chemical and physical stressors were measured in 75 to 99 streams per region for 4 weeks, after...
Underwater flashlights: What light can tell us about water quality
Kevin Alexander Ryan, Douglas A. Burns
2024, Frontiers for Young Minds
Water is essential for life. The particles and dissolved chemicals found in rivers, lakes, and oceans are constantly changing with weather, seasons, and human activities. The substances found in water can be helpful or harmful to humans and other organisms. New technologies allow scientists to use waterproof computers (called sensors)...
A multiscale perspective for improving conservation of Conchos pupfish
Lindsey C. Elkins, Matthew Ross Acre, Megan G. Bean, Sarah M. Robertson, Ryan Smith, Joshuah S. Perkin
2024, Animal Conservation (27) 538-553
Desert spring systems of the American southwest hold high local fish endemism and are ranked among the most threatened ecosystems in the world. The prioritization of conservation resources to protect species living within these arid landscapes requires knowledge of species abundance and distribution. The...
Resurvey of cross sections on the Yampa and Little Snake Rivers in Lily and Deerlodge Parks, Colorado
Ronald E. Griffiths, David J. Topping, Christina Leonard, Joel A. Unema
2024, Open-File Report 2023-1070
Resurveys of seven geomorphologic cross sections located in the Lily Park and Deerlodge Park, Colorado, reaches of the Yampa and Little Snake Rivers were conducted in October 2017. These cross sections extend from Lily Park, at the confluence of the two rivers, to Deerlodge Park within Dinosaur National Monument. Four...
Report of the River Master of the Delaware River for the period December 1, 2013–November 30, 2014
Kendra L. Russell, William J. Andrews, Vincent J. DiFrenna, J. Michael Norris, Mason Jr.
2024, Open-File Report 2023-1084
Executive SummaryA Decree of the Supreme Court of the United States, entered June 7, 1954 (New Jersey v. New York, 347 U.S. 995), established the position of Delaware River Master within the U.S. Geological Survey. In addition, the Decree authorizes the diversion of water from the Delaware River Basin and...
Extreme low-frequency waves on the Ofu, American Samoa, reef flat
Olivia M. Cheriton, Curt D. Storlazzi, Ferdinand K.J. Oberle, Kurt J. Rosenberger, Eric K. Brown
2024, Coral Reefs (43) 185-191
The southern fringing reef along Ofu, American Samoa, has been a focus of coral research owing to the presence of super-heated pools on the reef flat, where corals thrive in elevated sea temperatures. Here, we present the first documentation of exceptionally large low-frequency (periods > 100 s) waves...
The economics of decarbonizing Costa Rica's agriculture, forestry and other land uses sectors
Onil Banerjee, Martin Cicowiez, Renato Vargas, Edmundo Molina-Perez, Kenneth J. Bagstad, Ziga Malek
2024, Ecological Economics (218)
In 2018, Costa Rica demonstrated its commitment to the Paris Agreement and published its Decarbonization Plan for achieving zero net emissions by the year 2050. We evaluate the impacts of the country's strategy for decarbonizing its Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Uses (AFOLU) sectors by coupling the Integrated Economic-Environmental Modeling...
Identifying and constraining marsh-type transitions in response to increasing erosion over the past century
Alisha M. Ellis, Christopher G. Smith, Kathryn E.L. Smith, Jessica A. Jacobs
2024, Estuaries and Coasts (47) 701-723
Marsh environments, characterized by their flora and fauna, change laterally in response to shoreline erosion, water levels and inundation, and anthropogenic activities. The Grand Bay coastal system (USA) has undergone multiple large-scale geomorphic and hydrologic changes resulting in altered sediment supply, depositional patterns, and degraded barrier...
Dynamic modeling of coastal compound flooding hazards due to tides, extratropical storms, waves, and sea-level rise: A case study in the Salish Sea, Washington (USA)
Kees Nederhoff, Sean C. Crosby, Nathan R. vanArendonk, Eric E. Grossman, Babak Tehranirad, T. Leijnse, W. Klessens, Patrick L. Barnard
2024, Water (16)
The Puget Sound Coastal Storm Modeling System (PS-CoSMoS) is a tool designed to dynamically downscale future climate scenarios (i.e., projected changes in wind and pressure fields and temperature) to compute regional water levels, waves, and compound flooding over large geographic areas (100 s of kilometers) at high spatial resolutions (1...
Temporal variability in irrigated land and climate influences on salinity loading across the Upper Colorado River Basin, 1986-2017
Olivia L. Miller, Annie L. Putman, Richard A. Smith, Gregory E. Schwarz, Michael D. Hess, Morgan C. McDonnell, Daniel K. Jones
2024, Environmental Research Letters (19)
Freshwater salinization is a growing global concern impacting human and ecosystem needs with impacts to water availability for human and ecological uses. In the Upper Colorado River Basin (UCRB), dissolved solids in streams compound ongoing water supply challenges to further limit water availability and cause economic damages....
Wetland geomorphology and tidal hydrodynamics drive fine-scale fish community composition and abundance
Justin Kinsey Clause, Mary Jade Farruggia, Frederick V. Feyrer, Matthew J. Young
2024, Environmental Biology of Fishes (107) 33-46
Effective restoration of tidal wetlands for fish communities requires clear goals and mechanistic understanding of the ecosystem drivers which affect fish distribution and abundance. We examined fish community responses to abiotic habitat features in two adjacent but dissimilar freshwater tidal wetlands in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, CA,...
Water-level change from a multiple-well aquifer test in volcanic rocks, Umatilla Indian Reservation near Mission, northeastern Oregon, 2016
C. Amanda Garcia, Joseph J. Kennedy, Kate Ely
2024, Open-File Report 2023-1081
The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation (CTUIR), (1) estimated water-level change from a multiple-well aquifer test centered on CTUIR well number 422 and (2) evaluated hydraulic connections between the pumping and observation wells on the Umatilla Indian Reservation near Mission, northeastern...
Assessment of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances in water resources of New Mexico, 2020–21
Rebecca E. Travis, Kimberly R. Beisner, Kate Wilkins, Jeramy Roland Jasmann, Steffanie H. Keefe, Larry B. Barber
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5129
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) have been detected in public and private drinking-water wells, springs, and surface waters in New Mexico; however, the presence and distribution of PFAS in water resources across the State are not well characterized. From August 2020 to October 2021, the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation...
Water-quality characteristics of the Red River of the North and tributaries in the Fargo-Moorhead metropolitan area, North Dakota, 2019–22
Joel M. Galloway, Rochelle A. Nustad, Spencer L. Wheeling
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5136
The Flood Risk Management Project was initiated in 2008 in the Fargo-Moorhead metropolitan area to reduce flood risk, flood damages, and flood protection costs in the Fargo-Moorhead metropolitan area. In cooperation with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Geological Survey initiated a water-quality monitoring study to describe the...
On-orbit calibration and performance of the EMIT imaging spectrometer
David R. Thompson, Robert O. Green, Christine Bradley, Philip G. Brodrick, Natalie Mahowald, Eyal Ben-Dor, Matthew R. Bennett, Michael Bernas, Nimrod Carmon, K. Dana Chadwick, Roger N. Clark, Red Willow Coleman, Evan Cox, Ernesto L. Diaz, Michael L. Eastwood, Regina Eckert, Bethany L. Ehlmann, Paul Ginoux, Marıa Goncalves Ageitos, Kathleen Grant, Louis Guanter, Daniela Heller Pearlshtien, Mark Helmlinger, Harrison Herzog, Todd M. Hoefen, Yue Huang, Abigail Keebler, Olga Kalashnikova, Didier Keymeulen, Raymond F. Kokaly, Martina Klose, Longlei Li, Sarah Lundeen, John Michael Meyer, Elizabeth Middleton, Ron L. Miller, Pantazis Mouroulis, Bogdan Oaida, Vicenzo Obiso, Francisco Ochoa, Winston Olson-Duvall, Gregory S. Okin, Thomas H. Painter, Carlos Perez Garcıa-Pando, Randy Pollock, Vincent J. Realmuto, Lucas Shaw, Peter Sullivan, Gregg A. Swayze, Erik Thingvold, Andrew K Thorpe, Suresh Vannan, Catalina Villarreal, Charlene Ung, Daniel W. Wilson, Sander Zandbergen
2024, Remote Sensing of Environment (303)
The Earth surface Mineral dust source InvesTigation (EMIT) is a remote visible to shortwave infrared (VSWIR) imaging spectrometer that has been operating onboard the International Space Station since July 2022. This article describes EMIT's on-orbit spectroradiometric calibration and validation. Accurate spectroscopy is vital to achieve consistent mapping...
Intrinsic and extrinsic regulation of water clarity in a large, floodplain-river ecosystem
Alicia Carhart, Deanne C. Drake, James R. Fischer, Jeffrey N. Houser, Kathi Jo Jankowski, John E. Kalas, Eric M. Lund
2024, Ecosystems (27) 395-413
Ecosystem processes in rivers are thought to be controlled more by extrinsic than intrinsic factors, that is, the result of processes that occur upstream or within their watersheds. However, large floodplain rivers have a diverse assemblage of aquatic areas spanning gradients of connectivity with the main...
Flood of October 31 to November 3, 2019, in the East Canada Creek, West Canada Creek, and Sacandaga River basins in central New York
Alexander P. Graziano, Christopher L. Gazoorian, Travis L. Smith, Arthur G. Lilienthal III
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5126
Between October 31 and November 3, 2019, historic flooding in localized areas of the Mohawk Valley and southern Adirondack region in central New York State resulted in one fatality and an estimated $33 million in damages. Flooding resulted from high-intensity, hyperlocal rainfall in the region within a 24-hour period between...
A machine learning tool for design of behavioral fish barriers in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta
Nicholas M. Swyers, Aaron R. Blake, Paul Stumpner, Jon R. Burau, Summer M. Burdick, Mohamed Shahid Anwar
2024, Open-File Report 2023-1095
Executive SummarySurvival of out-migrating juvenile salmonids (Oncorhynchus spp.) through the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta averages less than 33 percent, depending on water flow through the delta, and is partially governed by the distribution of fish among three Sacramento River distributaries: Sutter, Steamboat, and Georgiana sloughs. Behavioral altering structures in the...
Physics to fish—Understanding the factors that create and sustain native fish habitat in the San Francisco Estuary
Larry R. Brown, David E. Ayers, Brian A. Bergamaschi, Jon R. Burau, Evan T. Dailey, Bryan D. Downing, Maureen A. Downing-Kunz, Frederick V. Feyrer, Brock M. Huntsman, Tamara E. C. Kraus, Tara Morgan, Jessica R. Lacy, Francis Parchaso, Catherine A. Ruhl, Elizabeth B. Stumpner, Paul Stumpner, Janet Thompson, Matthew J. Young
2024, Open-File Report 2023-1087
Executive SummaryThe Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) operates the Central Valley Project (CVP), one of the nation’s largest water projects. Reclamation has an ongoing need to improve the scientific basis for adaptive management of the CVP and, by extension, joint operations with California’s State Water Project. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)...
National shoreline change—Summary statistics of shoreline change from the 1800s to the 2010s for the coast of California
Meredith G. Kratzmann
2024, Data Report 1187
Rates of shoreline change have been updated for the open-ocean sandy coastline of California as part of studies conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey. Shorelines from the original assessment (1800s through 1998 or 2002), as well as additional shoreline position data from 2009 to 2011, 2015, and 2016 extracted from...
National-scale remotely sensed lake trophic state from 1984 through 2020
Michael Frederick Meyer, Simon Nemer Topp, Tyler V. King, Robert Ladwig, Rachel M. Pilla, Hilary A. Dugan, Jack R. Eggleston, Stephanie E. Hampton, Dina M. Leech, Isabella Oleksy, Jesse Cleveland Ross, Matthew V Ross, R. Iestyn Woolway, Xiao Yang, Matthew R. Brousil, Kate Colleen Fickas, Julie C Padowski, Amina Pollard, Jianning Ren, Jacob Aaron Zwart
2024, Scientific Data (11)
Lake trophic state is a key ecosystem property that integrates a lake’s physical, chemical, and biological processes. Despite the importance of trophic state as a gauge of lake water quality, standardized and machine-readable observations are uncommon. Remote sensing presents an opportunity to detect and analyze lake...
