#NEVADA SKIES MISSING MASTER FULL#

Streamflow is always changing, from day to day and even minute to minute. Watersheds are important because the streamflow and the water quality of a river are affected by things, human-induced or not, happening in the land area 'above' the river-outflow point It all depends on the outflow point all of the land that drains water to the outflow point is the watershed for that outflow location. Larger watersheds contain many smaller watersheds. Watersheds can be as small as a footprint or large enough to encompass all the land that drains water into rivers that drain into Chesapeake Bay, where it enters the Atlantic Ocean. A watershed is the area of land where all of the water that falls in it and drains off of it goes to the same place. You're standing, and everyone is standing, in a watershed.

What is a watershed? Easy, if you are standing on the ground right now, just look down. When looking at the location of rivers and the amount of streamflow in rivers, the key concept is the river's 'watershed'.

Because the Earth is not a very levelВ place, water ends up occupying the valleys and depressions in the landscape as rivers and lakes. So, no matter where on Earth water is, it tries to flow downhill. In practical terms, water generally seeks to flow to the oceans, which are at sea level. You've heard that 'water seeks its own level,' but really water is seeking the center of the Earth, just like everything else. One word can explain why any river exists on Earth-gravity.

#NEVADA SKIES MISSING MASTER FULL#

And, we've already mentioned that the oceans stay full of water because rivers and runoff continually refreshes them. Rivers even help keep the aquifers underground full of water by discharging water downward through their streambeds. Rivers are major aquatic landscapes for all manners of plants and animals. Not only are rivers a great place for people (and their dogs) to play, but people use river water for drinking-water supplies and irrigation water, to produce electricity, to flush away wastes (hopefully, but not always, treated wastes), to transport merchandise, and to obtain food. Rivers are invaluable to not only people, but to life everywhere. Although USGS usually uses the term 'stream' when discussing flowing water bodies, in these pages we'll use 'rivers' more often, since that is probably what you are more familiar with. Geological Survey (USGS) uses the term 'streamflow' to refer to the amount of water flowing in a river. Unless the river flows into a closed lake, a rare occurrence, or is diverted for humans' uses, a common occurrence, they empty into the oceans, thus fulfilling their water-cycle duties. But how does much of the water get back into the oceans to keep the water cycle going? A lot of runoff ends up in creeks, streams, and rivers, flowing downhill towards the oceans. Water returns to the Earth from precipitationВ falling on the land, where gravity either takes it into the ground as infiltrationВ or it begins running downhill as surface runoff. If you read our discussion on the role the oceansВ play in the water cycle, you know that evaporationВ from the oceans is the primary way that water returns to the atmosphereВ from the Earth's surface. West Branch Susquehanna River, Pennsylvania (Credit: Wikipedia) Streamflow and the Water Cycle

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