Publications

The U.S. Geological Survey’s Soil-Water-Balance (SWB) code was developed as a tool to estimate distribution and timing of net infiltration out of the root zone by means of an approach that uses readily available data and minimizes user effort required to begin a SWB application. SWB calculates other components of the water balance, including soil moisture, reference and actual evapotranspiration,

The UFINCH (Unit Flows In Networks of Channels) computer application can be used to simulate daily and unit flows in networks of streams based on geospatial data in the National Hydrography Dataset NHDPlus (with value added attributes), and U.S. Geoogical Survey daily streamflow data from a downstream (or base) streamgage. Among streamflow augmentation methods, UFINCH has the unique capability to

An understanding of the spatial and temporal extent of groundwater recharge is critical for many types of hydrologic assessments involving water quality, contaminant transport, ecosystem health, and sustainable use of groundwater. Annual potential groundwater recharge was simulated at a 1-kilometer resolution with the Soil-Water-Balance (SWB) model for the glacial aquifer system east of the Rocky

The Mississippi River and other large rivers have the potential to regulate nitrogen export from terrestrial landscapes, and thus mitigate eutrophication in downstream aquatic ecosystems. In large rivers, human-constructed impoundments and connected backwaters may facilitate nitrogen removal; however, the capacity of these features is poorly quantified and incompletely incorporated into model fram

Groundwater age is an important indicator of groundwater susceptibility to anthropogenic contamination and a key input to statistical models for forecasting water quality. Numerical models can provide estimates of groundwater age, enabling interpretation of measured age tracers. However, to extend to national‐scale groundwater systems where numerical models are not routinely available, a more effi

The North American Great Lakes are a vital natural resource that provide fish and wildlife habitat, as well as drinking water and waste assimilation services for millions of people. Tributaries to the Great Lakes receive chemical inputs from various point and nonpoint sources, and thus are expected to have complex mixtures of chemicals. However, our understanding of the co‐occurrence of specific c

The U.S. Geological Survey developed a regional model of Lake Michigan Basin (LMB). This report describes the construction of five MODFLOW inset models extracted from the LMB regional model and their application using the particle-tracking code MODPATH to simulate the groundwater age distribution of discharge to wells pumping from glacial deposits. The five study areas of the inset model correspon

Following dam installations in the remote Rainy Lake Basin during the early 1900s, water-level fluctuations were considered extreme (1914–1949) compared to more natural conditions. In 1949, the International Joint Commission (IJC), which sets rules governing dam operation on waters shared by the United States and Canada, established the first rule curves to regulate water levels on these waterbodi

Unlike most national parks, main access to Voyageurs National Park is by boat. This remote system of interconnected waterways along the USA-Canada border was an important transportation route for thousands of years of American Indian occupation, leading up to and including the trade route of the voyageurs, or French-Canadian fur traders from around 1680 to 1870. The Ojibwe people collaborated with

Specific conductance (SC), soil volumetric water content (VWC), and discharge were monitored on a subsurface agricultural drain for a 2-yr period (2007–2008) to differentiate preferential flow paths from matrix flow paths. A major observation from the 2-yr period was the fast SC decrease after relatively small rainfall events, often <5 mm. A total of 25 paired rainfall–SC events were classified, w

This study tested a focused strategy for reducing phosphorus (P) and sediment loads in agricultural streams. The strategy involved selecting small watersheds identified as likely to respond relatively quickly, and then focusing conservation practices on high-contributing fields within those watersheds. Two 5,000 ha (12,360 ac) watersheds in the Driftless Area of south central Wisconsin, previously

Three permeable pavement surfaces - asphalt (PA), concrete (PC), and interlocking pavers (PIP) - were evaluated side-by-side to measure changes to the infiltrative capacity and water quality of stormwater runoff originating from a conventional asphalt parking lot in Madison, Wisconsin. During the 24-month monitoring period (2014-16), all three permeable pavements resulted in statistically signific