Publications

A Soil-Water-Balance (SWB) computer code has been developed to calculate spatial and temporal variations in groundwater recharge. The SWB model calculates recharge by use of commonly available geographic information system (GIS) data layers in combination with tabular climatological data. The code is based on a modified Thornthwaite-Mather soil-water-balance approach, with components of the soil-w

In 2003 and 2004, 30 streams near Milwaukee and Green Bay, Wisconsin, were part of a national study by the U.S. Geological Survey to assess urbanization effects on physical, chemical, and biological characteristics along an agriculture-to-urban land-use gradient. A geographic information system was used to characterize natural landscape features that define the environmental setting and the degree

The Lake Michigan Mass Balance Project (LMMBP) measured and modeled the concentrations of environmentally persistent contaminants in air, river and lake water, sediment, and fish and bird tissues in and around Lake Michigan for an 18-month period spanning 1994-95. Tributary loads were calculated as part of the LMMBP. The work described in this report was designed to provide updated concentration d

There are concerns that removal and trimming of vegetation during expansion of the Hayward Airport in Sawyer County, Wisconsin, could appreciably change the character of a nearby cold-water stream and its adjacent environs. In cooperation with the Wisconsin Department of Transportation, a two-dimensional, steady-state groundwater-flow model of the shallow groundwater-flow system near the Hayward A

The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with a consortium of 19 cities, towns, and villages in Dane County, Wis., undertook a study to compare the capability of rain gardens with different vegetative species and soil types to infiltrate stormwater runoff from the roof of an adjacent structure. Two rain gardens, one planted with turf grass and the other with native prairie species, were construc

The availability of light can have a dramatic affect on macrophyte and phytoplankton abundance in virtually all aquatic ecosystems. The Long Term Resource Monitoring Program and other monitoring programs often measure factors that affect light extinction (nonvolatile suspended solids, volatile suspended solids, and chlorophyll) and correlates of light extinction (turbidity and Secchi depth), but r

Like other large rivers, the Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS) serves a diversity of roles. The UMRS provides commercial and recreational fishing, floodplain agriculture, drinking water for many communities, an important bird migration pathway, a variety of recreational activities, and a navigation system that transports much of the country's agricultural exports. These multiple roles present

Regional finite-difference models tend to have large cell sizes, often on the order of 1–2 km on a side. Although the regional flow patterns in deeper formations may be adequately represented by such a model, the intricate surface water and groundwater interactions in the shallower layers are not. Several stream reaches and nearby wells may occur in a single cell, precluding any meaningful modelin

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) investigated the natural attenuation of subsurface petroleum hydrocarbons leaked over an unknown number of years from an oil pipeline under the Enbridge Energy Limited Partnership South Cass Lake Pumping Station, in Cass Lake, Minnesota. Three weeks of field work conducted between May 2007 and July 2008 delineated a dissolved plume of aromatic hydrocarbons and cha

Bootstrapping techniques employing random subsampling were used with the AFINCH (Analysis of Flows In Networks of CHannels) model to gain insights into the effects of variation in streamflow-gaging-network size and composition on the accuracy and precision of streamflow estimates at ungaged locations in the 0405 (Southeast Lake Michigan) hydrologic subregion. AFINCH uses stepwise-regression techni

A groundwater-flow model that was constructed in 1996 of the Saginaw aquifer was refined to better represent the regional hydrologic system in the Tri-County region, which consists of Clinton, Eaton, and Ingham Counties, Michigan. With increasing demand for groundwater, the need to manage withdrawals from the Saginaw aquifer has become more important, and the 1996 model could not adequately addres

To evaluate the treatment efficiency of a stormwater-filtration device (SFD) for potential use at Wisconsin Department of Transportation (WisDOT) park-and-ride facilities, a SFD was installed at an employee parking lot in downtown Madison, Wisconsin. This type of parking lot was chosen for the test site because the constituent concentrations and particle-size distributions (PSDs) were expected to