Water quality monitoring for Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site: 2013 data report
Ashton IW and Rockwood S. 2020. Water quality monitoring for Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site: 2013 data report. Natural Resource Data Series. NPS/KNRI/NRDS—2020/1257. National Park Service. Fort Collins, Colorado
The Northern Great Plains Inventory and Monitoring Network (NGPN) began monitoring water quality in the Knife River at Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site (KNRI) in 2013, with the assistance of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). This report summarizes the data collected during the 2013 ice-free season (April 4 through October 17) for streamflow, water temperature, dissolved oxygen, specific conductance, and pH. 2013 was a wet year and discharge on the Knife River peaked at 5330 cubic feet per second in early June. There was considerable seasonal variation in all water quality measures. A summary of our results can be found in Descriptive Statistics Summary tables for the ice-free season (Table 3 in Results section) and for each month (Table 4 in Results section). Notably, dissolved oxygen concentrations dropped below 5 mg/ L, a North Dakota state water quality standard, 34 times during September 2013, although that is less than 1% of all records. Water temperature also exceeded state standards a few times in July. NGPN’s collaboration with USGS supported real-time and archived access to this data through the USGS National Water Information System Website, where it remains available to the public.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Ashton, Isabel; Rockwood, Stephanie
- Date of Issue
- 2020-02
- Publisher
- National Park Service
- Units
- KNRI , NGPN , NRSS
- Keywords
- monitoring report, water quality monitor