Providing Unbiased Science for Idaho's Silver Creek Preserve
The Nature Conservancy has initiated restoration projects on its Silver Creek Preserve, a prized trout fishery. They turned to the USGS for expertise in ecological monitoring to guide their efforts.
Kilpatrick Pond, created by a 19th century irrigation dam, has captured sediment, slowed water velocities, and increased water temperatures as much as 10°F, stressing fish and the macroinvertebrates they feed on.
Cold-water adapted macroinvertebrates, such as this stonefly, are good indicators for the health of an ecosystem. Our assessment will track the macroinvertebrate community throughout the Kilpatrick Pond restoration project.
On Kilpatrick Pond, we've installed artificial substrate (top inset) that aquatic insects can colonize. We'll compare pre- and post-restoration samples to assess how well the insects adapt to restoration efforts.
Our biologists work with Preserve staff and volunteers to collect, examine, identify, measure (top inset), and count fish populations. Our sampling efforts have shown a healthy rainbow and brown trout population.
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What's Up Upstream?
At home or on the go, you can access real-time information about Idaho's water resources provided by the USGS.
USGS WaterWatch (shown at right) provides a statewide snapshot of streamflow conditions compared to historical data for this date.
USGS WaterAlert lets you set conditions you want to know about (flow, level, temperature) to receive text or e-mail alerts when those conditions are met.
USGS WaterNow lets you query a USGS monitoring station and receive a return text with current conditions at that station.
Our Latest Publication
Optimization of Water-Level Monitoring Networks in the Eastern Snake River Plain Aquifer Using a Kriging-Based Genetic Algorithm Method
Long-term groundwater monitoring networks can provide essential information for managing water resources, particularly in areas like eastern Idaho that depend heavily on withdrawals from aquifers. However, tight budgets often force resource managers to cut the number of observation wells in a network. Deciding which wells to cut can be difficult. Wrong choices can impair the reliability of an entire monitoring network.
In this report, USGS scientist Jason Fisher documents the development and testing of a network design tool to determine which wells to exclude from a groundwater monitoring network because they add little or no beneficial information. The tool, available as an R package, was developed in cooperation with the Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. Department of Energy.
Groundwater and Drought
The USGS has launched a new web resource: Groundwater and Drought. Droughts can significantly affect the Nation's groundwater resources while the drought is occurring and for some time afterward.