Rogue River Gaging Station

3rd one of the day. This was another Earth Cache. Read all about it..

Rogue River Gaging Station

This earthcache is designed to show you how today’s rivers are monitored/regulated. The above coordinates will take you to a United States Geological Survey (USGS) gage station for the Rogue River near Rockford.

A Gaging Station is a facility used by hydrologists and others to monitor streams, rivers, lakes, canals, reservoirs, and other bodies of water. Gaging stations typically collect information such as water height and discharge (flow) through a stilling well or a vertical pipe that is located beneath the gage house. Water enters this well through one or more inlet pipes which in turn makes the water level equal to the stream or river. This information is recorded and sent to the USGS via telephone or a satellite communication system in real-time.

It is very important to monitor, and control the river’s flow for several reasons. We can start with the control of flooding or at least the warning of flooding. Since the Rogue Rivers flow is regulated by damming downstream, these gauging stations relay the information to do the necessary regulating of the dam. Another important reason for this gauging and regulating of the river is to limit erosion of the river banks. Even though erosion will always take place, it can be held to a minimal. Ground water also depends on these regulated flows. Ground waters include some small lakes, marshes and wetlands.

Gaging Station History
In the 1880's, John Wesley Powell, the second director of the USGS, requested that stream flow be monitored in eight river basins in the West. It was his idea to measure the flow of streams and rivers and determine the viability of irrigation systems for this acrid region. In 1889, the first U.S. stream gaging station was established on the Rio Grande River in New Mexico. At this station, standard stream flow measurement procedures were devised.

Today, the USGS operates and maintains more than 85% of the nation's stream gaging stations. There are over 7,000 stream gaging stations in the United States, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Territories of the Pacific Islands.

The USGS uses its stream gaging network to provide a free continuous source of well documented and archived water data. This data is used by government agencies and private companies to forecast flooding, design bridges, allocate drinking and irrigation water, for recreational use, and to manage our valuable surface water resources.

Paige with the Gage Station..


Pretty view near by..