STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
Evaluation of Streamflow Requirements for Habitat Protection by
Comparison to Streamflow Characteristics at Index StreamflowGaging Stations in Southern New England
USGS WRIR 03-4332 (2003)
Streamflow characteristics and methods for determining streamflow requirements
for habitat protection were investigated at 23 active index streamflow-gaging stations in
southern New England. Fish communities sampled near index streamflow-gaging
stations in Massachusetts have a high percentage of fish that require flowing-water
habitats for some or all of their life cycle. The relatively unaltered flow condition at
these sites was assumed to be one factor that has contributed to this condition.
Streamflow requirements for habitat protection were determined for 23 index
stations by use of three methods based on hydrologic records, the Range of Variability
Approach, the Tennant method, and the New England Aquatic-Base-Flow method.
Streamflow requirements for habitat protection were determined for riffle habitats near
10 index stations by use of two methods based on hydraulic ratings, the WettedPerimeter and R2Cross methods. Streamflow requirements determined by the different
methods were evaluated by comparison to streamflow statistics from the index
streamflow-gaging stations.
23 Index Gages
Streamflow needs
for Aquatic Habitat
Page 1 of 10
STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
Characteristics and Classification of Least Altered Streams in
Massachusetts
USGS SIR 2007-5291
Streamflow records from 85 streamflow-gaging stations at which streamflows were
considered to be least altered were used to characterize natural streamflows within
southern New England. Period-of-record streamflow data were used to determine
annual hydrographs of median monthly flows. The shapes and magnitudes of annual
hydrographs of median monthly flows, normalized by drainage area, differed among
stations in different geographic areas of southern New England. These differences were
gradational across southern New England and were attributed to differences in basin
and climate characteristics.
Streamflows were used in the Indicators of Hydrologic Alteration (IHA) and Hydrologic
Index Tool (HIT) programs to determine 224 hydrologic indices for the 61 stations.
Principal-components analysis (PCA) was used to reduce the number of hydrologic
indices to 20 that provided non-redundant information. The PCA also indicated that the
major patterns of variability in the dataset are related to differences in flow variability
and low-flow magnitude among the stations.
A comparison of station classifications indicated that a classification based on multiple
hydrologic indices that represent different aspects of the flow regime did not result in
the same classification of stations as a classification based on a single type of statistic
such as a monthly median. River basins identified by the cluster analysis as having
similar hydrologic properties tended to have similar basin and climate characteristics
and to be in close proximity to one another. Stations were not classified in the same
cluster on the basis of geographic location alone; as a result, boundaries cannot be
drawn between geographic regions with similar streamflow characteristics. Rivers with
different basin and climate characteristics were classified in different clusters, even if
they were in adjacent basins or upstream and downstream within the same basin.
 61 Index Gages for Massachusetts
 Reference Streamflows
 WRC Mass. Index Streamflows
Includes
median
seasonal flows
for fish bioperiods
Page 2 of 10
STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
Fish community response to flow alteration, land use, and water
quality in the Ipswich, SuAsCo, and Blackstone River basins,
southern New England (USGS 2008 Pilot Study)
Changes in land- and water-use have resulted in flow alterations in many
streams and rivers in Massachusetts. Changes in streamflow, together with other
stressors can substantially alter stream ecosystems, including fish communities. The
extent to which the flow regime and habitats of rivers in Massachusetts can be altered
from natural while maintaining the integrity of river ecosystems remains unknown.
Project objectives:
1. Assess the degree of flow alteration due to withdrawals and returns in sub-basins
of the Blackstone, Assabet/Sudbury, and Ipswich River Basins. These basins have
been previously modeled by the USGS, and include 65, 44, and 69 HSPF modelnode sub-basins, respectively. The sub-basins range from “reference” (or
relatively unaltered) to highly altered basins.
2. Classify the sub-basins by degree of urbanization and by physical basin
characteristics, including surficial geology (percent sand and gravel), slope,
elevation, ecoregion, percent wetlands, impounded area, and by selected waterquality variables, to the extent data is available.
3. Compare statistically the composition of the fish communities from similar subbasins with different degrees of flow alteration.
2008 Pilot Study of 3 Basins
Fish community response to flow alteration, land use, and
water quality
Flow data for 178
HSPF sub-basins
Impervious
cover
Page 3 of 10
Fish Community data
from MDFW and RIDEM
STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
Development of target fish community models for Massachusetts
mainstem rivers. MA Division of Fisheries and Wildlife,
Westborough, Massachusetts (2008)
The Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife (MDFW) applied the Target Fish
Community (TFC) approach to the majority of Massachusetts mainstem rivers. TFCs
describe expected fish community composition. This allows us to compare an
expectation to what we currently find in our mainstem rivers.
TFC evaluations were developed to determine models for fish community composition
for rivers in southern New England. Each mainstem river TFC is constructed using fish
community data from several relatively high quality rivers (e.g. few or no
impoundments, withdrawals, low impervious surface) that have similar physical and
zoo-geographical characteristics (e.g. watershed size, geology, gradient). For the
purposes of this report, these high quality rivers will be referred to as reference rivers.
The mainstem fish communities were compared to their respective TFCs by a percent
similarity index. This index measures, on a scale of zero (no similarity) to 100 percent
(complete similarity), the degree to which the current and Target Fish Communities
coincide based on species presence and relative abundance.
We used the percent similarity scores, in conjunction with species scarcity measures to
categorize the studied rivers into good, fair, or poor condition (see below).
Watershed
Fish Community Status
Good
Westfield
Fair
Poor
Farmington
Blackstone
Hoosic
Charles
Housatonic
Concord
Nashua
Ipswich
Quinebaug
Shawsheen
Westfield
Hoosic
Quinebaug
Nashua
Housatonic
Farmington
Concord
Shawsheen
Charles
Ipswich
Blackstone
76(0)
68(1)
62(1)
50(1)
44(0)
39(1)
38(1)
32(1)
28(3)
23(2)
22(4)
0
20
40
60
Percent
Unassessed rivers are in blue
Page 4 of 10
80
100
STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
USGS/DEP Massachusetts Sustainable Yield Estimator (SYE): a
decision-support tool to assess water availability at ungaged sites
in Massachusetts (USGS SIR 2009-xxxx)
Federal, state, and local water supply, regulatory, and planning agencies require easyto-use, technically-defensible, decision-support tools that can evaluate effects of
existing and proposed water withdrawals, compute any number of flow statistics,
determine baseline streamflow conditions needed for sustainability of aquatic habitat,
and estimate inflows to drinking-water-supply reservoirs for safe yield analyses at
ungaged locations. An interactive, point-and-click, decision-support tool was developed
in combination with a geographic-information system to address these needs. The
decision-support tool estimates time series of unregulated and regulated daily
streamflows at any user-selected location on a perennial stream in Massachusetts using
an index-streamflow station selected by the tool as most similar to the chosen location.
The SYE incorporates a spatially-referenced database of ground- and surface-water
withdrawals, ground-water discharges, and National Pollutant Discharge Elimination
System (NPDES) return flows statewide. For a user-selected basin, the water-use
database is queried to obtain these water-use locations within the basin. The effects of
ground- and surface-water withdrawals and discharges are subtracted and added,
respectively, from the unregulated, daily streamflow to obtain a time series of
regulated, daily streamflow at an ungaged location. Estimated unregulated daily
streamflows show remarkably good agreement with observed unregulated daily
streamflows and are generally comparable to the agreement obtained from a calibrated
rainfall-runoff model. The user can also input environmental flow targets for
comparison to the modeled streamflows.
2009: USGS/DEP SYE Application
Sustainable yield
STREAMFLOW
Unimpacted
streamflow
User-specified
instream-flow
targets
USER-SPECIFIED TIME PERIOD
WELL 1
Impacted
streamflow
PROPOSED
WELL
STREAMFLOW
WWTP 1
User-specified
instream-flow
targets
USER-SPECIFIED TIME PERIOD
Page 5 of 10
STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
USGS Indicators of Stream alteration, impounded storage, water
quality, and impervious cover for Massachusetts stream basins
(USGS SIR 2009-xxxx)
Massachusetts streams and stream basins have been subjected to a wide variety of
human alteration since colonial times. These alterations include water withdrawals,
wastewater discharges, construction of dams, forest clearing, and urbanization—all of
which have the potential to affect streamflow regimes, water quality, and habitat
integrity for fish and other aquatic biota. A set of indicators were developed to
characterize these major types of alteration for 1,429 subbasins across the
Commonwealth. Indicators were also assessed at the HUC-12 scale for 183 basins in
Massachusetts. All withdrawal and discharge data used in the study were reported to
the state for the 2000-2004 period, except domestic-well withdrawals and septic-system
discharges, which were estimated for this study. The study utilized the USGS/DEP
Sustainable Yield Estimator (SYE) tool.
Indicators of flow alteration included: monthly January, April, August, and October
flows; annual 7-day minimum flows; and low-flow pulse and duration. Other analyses
include annual relative net demand and water-use intensity based on comparison to
average annual flows. The subbasin storage ratio indicates the potential for alteration
of subbasin flow, sediment-transport, and temperature regimes by dams. Dam density
was also analyzed as an indicator of stream habitat fragmentation by dams.
Impervious cover, an indicator of urban land use, has been shown to be negatively
correlated with the health of aquatic ecosystems. The water quality status of
Massachusetts streams assessed by the Massachusetts Department of Environmental
Protection pursuant to the requirements of Section 303(d) of the federal Clean Water
Act were also mapped as part of this project.
Habitat Fragmentation Indicator
Dam Density, dams per stream mile
~3,500 dams
Riverways/DCR
database
DRAFT
August Median Flow Alteration
Dam Density
Page 6 of 10
STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
Fish Community Response to Flow Alterations, Land Use,
Impoundments, and Water Quality in Massachusetts
(USGS SIR 2011-xxxx) (Statewide Fish-Flow-Habitat Study)
A recent assessment of fish community composition at Massachusetts
Department of Fish and Wildlife (MDFW) fish-sampling sites in the Ipswich, SudburyAssabet, and Blackstone River basins showed that scatterplots of relations between
percent fluvial-specialist fish and percent flow alteration had a wedge-shaped data
distribution. This wedge-shaped distribution indicates that flow alteration sets an upper
limit, or ceiling, for the percentage of fluvial fish in a fish community, and that other
unmeasured factors, such as water quality, connectivity, or habitat may also limit fish
community composition. In other words, regardless of other conditions, when flow
alteration is high, the percentage of fluvial fish will be low, but when flow alteration is
low, the percentage of fluvial fish may or may not be high, depending on the influence
of the other factors. The response of fish community composition may be difficult to
detect at high levels of alteration because few flow-sensitive fish species remain once
alterations exceed certain thresholds. Identification of the upper limits and thresholds in
these relations would be useful to Massachusetts agencies managing the state’s waterresources.
A statewide assessment relating fish community composition at MDFW fishsampling sites to disturbance factors and basin characteristics will allow the response of
fish communities to these factors to be evaluated over a wide range of conditions.
Disturbance factors to be evaluated include flow alteration, imperviousness,
impoundment, and water-quality. Fish communities are also strongly influenced by their
habitat. Relations between fish-community composition and physical basin
characteristics will be evaluated at fish sample sites. Physical basin characteristics to be
evaluated include drainage area, elevation, slope, and surficial geology. Fish
communities integrate the effects of many stressors, many of which are highly
correlated. Consequently, a multivariate statistical analysis will be used to evaluate
relations between fish communities and various disturbance factors.
Approach (1): Use quantile regression to identify upper limits
on fish community composition
• Fish community metrics will be plotted against disturbance factors
100
pFS
80
60
pabsaugiu
40
Prediction
20
0
0
50
100
150
pabsaugiu
100
pFS
80
60
pnimpv
40
Prediction
20
0
0
5
10
15
20
25
pimpv
Source: Rich Vogel (Tufts University)
Source: Cade, B.S., and Noon, B.R., 2003:
A gentle introduction to quantile regression For ecologists
We are working with R. Vogel to develop quantitative
methods for Identifying envelope curves
using quantile regression
Page 7 of 10
STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
Factors Affecting Firm Yield and the Estimation of Firm Yield for
Selected Streamflow-Dominated Drinking-Water-Supply
Reservoirs in Massachusetts
USGS SIR 2006-5044 (Firm Yield I)
Factors affecting reservoir firm yield, as determined by application of the Massachusetts
Department of Environmental Protection’s Firm Yield Estimator (FYE) model, were
evaluated, modified, and tested on 46 streamflow-dominated reservoirs representing 15
Massachusetts drinking-water supplies. The model uses a mass-balance approach to
determine the maximum average daily withdrawal rate that can be sustained during a
period of record that includes the 1960s drought-of-record.
The FYE methodology to estimate streamflow to the reservoir at an ungaged site was
tested by simulating streamflow at two streamflow-gaging stations in Massachusetts
and comparing the simulated streamflow to the observed streamflow. In general, the
FYE-simulated flows agreed well with observed flows. There were substantial deviations
from the measured values for extreme high and low flows. A sensitivity analysis
determined that the model’s streamflow estimates are most sensitive to input values for
average annual precipitation, reservoir drainage area, and the soil-retention number-a
term that describes the amount of precipitation retained by the soil in the basin.
Firm yields for 25 (14 single-reservoir
systems and 11 multiple-reservoir
systems) reservoir systems were
determined by using the historical
records of streamflow and precipitation.
Current water-use data indicate that, on
average, 20 of the 25 reservoir systems
in the study were operating below their
estimated firm yield; during months with
peak demands, withdrawals exceeded
the firm yield for 8 reservoir systems.
Page 8 of 10
STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
Ground-Water Contributions to Reservoir Storage and the Effect
on Estimates of Firm Yield for Reservoirs in Massachusetts
USGS SIR 2006-5045 (Firm Yield II)
Potential ground-water contributions to reservoir storage were determined for nine
reservoirs in Massachusetts that had shorelines in contact with sand and gravel
aquifers. The effect of ground water on firm yield was not only substantial, but
furthermore, the firm yield of a reservoir in contact with a sand and gravel aquifer was
always greater when the ground-water contribution was included in the water balance.
Increases in firm yield ranged from 2 to 113 percent, with a median increase in firm
yield of 10 percent. Additionally, the increase in firm yield in two reservoirs was greater
than 85 percent.
This study identified a set of equations that are based on an analytical solution to the
ground-water-flow equation for the case of one-dimensional flow in a finite-width
aquifer bounded by a linear surface-water feature such as a stream. These equations,
which require only five input variables, were incorporated into an existing firm-yieldestimator (FYE) model, and the potential effect of ground water on firm yield was
evaluated. To apply the FYE model to a reservoir in Massachusetts, the model requires
that the drainage area to the reservoir
be clearly defined and that some
surface water flows into the reservoir.
For surface-water-body shapes having
a more realistic representation of a
reservoir shoreline than a stream, a
comparison of ground-water-flow rates
simulated by the ground-water
equations with flow rates simulated by
a two-dimensional, finite-difference
ground-water-flow model indicate that
the agreement between the simulated
flow rates is within ±10 percent when
the ratio of the distance from the
reservoir shoreline to the aquifer
boundary to the length of shoreline in
contact with the aquifer is between
values of 0.5 and 3.5.
Page 9 of 10
STREAMFLOW and AQUATIC HABITAT RESEARCH in MASSACHUSETTS
2000 to Present
Refinement and Further Evaluation of the Massachusetts FirmYield-Estimator Model, v 2.0.
(USGS SIR 2010-xxxx) (Firm Yield III)
This study addresses problem statements not taken up in the two prior firm yield
studies. This research study will focus on improvements to the calculation of the
groundwater contribution in the Firm-Yield-Estimator (FYE) model; validation of the FYE
model and estimation of reservoir-aquifer characteristics; address uncertainty in firm
yield estimates determined from the historical record; conduct simulations on the effect
of different drought conditions on calculations of firm yield; and conduct simulations on
the effects of release scenarios and demand management on firm yield.
In addition, this project will research the effects of water-depth measurements on
estimates of reservoir storage and firm yield, which in effect, will provide guidance on
bathymetry for data collection on reservoir storage capacity and analysis for stagestorage relationships for future firm yield analysis.
A further deliverable of this project is to develop a user-friendly FYE Model, Version 2.0,
along with a user manual. The new model code will incorporate the research findings
from all three firm yield studies and the model and manual will be posted on the
MassDEP webpage for all to use.
Finally, as a result of improvements made to the basic model code, Firm Yield III will
also publish revised estimates for the firm yields previously reported in Firm Yield
Reports I and II, in addition to firm yield estimates determined for added research
reservoirs.
Page 10 of 10