The Challenge

The presence of year-round surface water in streams (i.e., streamflow permanence) is an important factor for identifying aquatic habitat availability, determining the regulatory status of streams, managing land use change, allocating water resources, and designing scientific studies. However, accurate, high resolution, and dynamic prediction of streamflow permanence that accounts for year-to-year variability at a regional extent is a major gap in modeling capability. The USGS PROSPER model was modified from its original implementation in the Pacific Northwest (PROSPERPNW) to the upper Missouri River basin (PROSPERUM), a geographical region that includes mountain and prairie ecosystems of the northern United States. PROSPERUM is an empirical model used to estimate the probability that a stream channel has year-round flow in response to climatic conditions (monthly and annual) and static physiographic predictor variables of the upstream basin. The PROSPERum development team needed a way to allow users to interact with PROSPER DATA in context with selected climate and other data.

Our Solution

IHDS developers designed an interactive mapping application that allows users to interact with different model layers including time period and streamflow permanence. Query results from the climate grid also can be added as well as a series of overlays.