A Harmonized Discharge Record for Select Tributaries to the Lower Boise River, Southwestern Idaho, 1986-2022

Publication Date

2023-06-12

Start Date

1986-04-01

End Date

2022-12-11

Bittmann, B.M., King, T.V., Kaiser, K.E., and Molloy, C.M., 2023, A Harmonized Discharge Record for Select Tributaries to the Lower Boise River, Southwestern Idaho, 1986-2022: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/P93MAQA8.

Discharge records from tributaries to the lower Boise River Basin are needed to understand long-term trends in loading of sediment and nutrients to the Boise River. In 2017, the USGS installed a series of continuous stage-discharge gaging stations on 9 of the key tributaries in the Lower Boise River basin. While these stations provide highly accurate continuous data, their period of record is not long-enough to identify trends in discharge and loading within the system. The IDWR has compiled daily discharge from 1986 to present from multiple water management organizations (e.g., irrigation districts) within the Lower Boise River basin at 14 locations. In this work, we examine the compatibility of daily discharge data reported in the IDWR daily discharge database with mean daily discharge computed from the USGS continuous gaging stations and modify the IDWR dataset to maintain consistency and integrate the datasets. The harmonized daily discharge dataset is intended for use in water quality modeling where daily discharge estimates are needed.

• USGS Data Release Products
• USGS Idaho Water Science Center