Black River Assessment
1. Berry Drain Deckerville 2. Elk Creek 3. Arnot Creek 4. Black Creek 1 5. Silver Creek Carsonville 6. Plum Creek 7. Mill Creek Sandusky 8. Stocks Creek Applegate N 2 3 Croswell Peck 0 5 10
Miles Brown City 4 Melvin
Yale 5 7 Lake Huron 6
8 Port Huron St. Clair River
Figure 1.–Major tributaries to the Black River.
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Figure 2.–Three dimensional map of the Black River watershed showing glacial features that shape the Black River valley. Black lines show boundaries of the major subwatersheds.
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Minden Bog
Minden Twp
Wheatland Twp Segment 1
Custer Twp Bridgehamton Twp Segment 2
Sanilac Twp
Elmer Twp Watertown Twp Washington Twp Lapeer Sanilac N County County Lexington Twp Buel Twp Elk Twp Flynn Twp Worth Twp 0 5 10 Maple Valley Twp Speaker Twp Fremont Twp Burnside Twp Miles Sanilac County St. Clair County Segment 3 Goodland Twp Greenwood Grant Twp Twp Lake Huron Arcadia Twp Brockway Lynn Twp Twp
Kenockee Twp Clyde Twp Segment 4 Mussey Twp Emmett Twp Attica Twp Fort Gratiot Imlay Twp Twp
Kimball Twp St. Clair Port Huron Lapeer Twp St. Clair River County County
Figure 3.–Segments of the Black River main stem. Subwatersheds are bounded by solid gray lines. 67 Black River Assessment
Figure 4.– Graph of late Holocene time span showing some important historical and environmental events as they relate to Lake Huron lake level. Graph courtesy of Dr. Douglas Wilcox, United States Geological Survey, Great Lakes Science Center. 68 Black River Assessment
Archeaological site
Sanilac County
N
0 5 10
Miles Lapeer County
Lake Huron
St. Clair County St. Clair River
Figure 5.–Spatial distribution of archaeological sites within the Black River watershed indicating strong association between rivers and settlement by prehistoric Native Americans.
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Figure 6.– Early photographs (1864 top; 1904 bottom) of logjams from lumbering operations in the Black River watershed.
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Figure 7.– Early photographs (1917) of agricultural drain construction in the Black River watershed. A very large portion of the river courses in this watershed have been similarly channelized.
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Figure 8.– Limit of the ice readvances of 15.5, 13.0, 11.8 and 10.0 thousand years ago from Larson et al. (1994) (upper figure) and locations of shorelines of prominent proglacial lakes in the Great Lakes watershed, and their spillways and outlets from Karrow (1984) (lower figure). 72 Black River Assessment
900 N. Br. Mill Ck. County Line 850 Kenny Drain Willoughyby & Toman Drain 800 Livergood & Ext. Drain East watershed boundary
West edge of Black River Black River valley Mill Ck. 750 Mill Ck.
Madison Drain watershed and transect Teels Drain Elevation (ft)
700 Furlong Drain Silver Ck. West watershed boundary Neil Drain
650
600 Black River Water level in Lake Huron (581 ft)
4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 Distance (mi)
Figure 9.– Three dimensional map (top) showing distribution of glacial end moraines and lacustrine silt and clay within the Black River watershed. Graph shows vertical profile of land elevations along a transect across the watershed. The geographic location of the transect is shown on a surface map and on graph inset. Vertical dotted lines show where the transect line intersects tributaries and the Black River. 73 Black River Assessment
End Moraines End Moraines of Coarse Till of Medium Till
End Moraines Coarse of Fine Till Glacial Till
Medium Fine Glacial Till Glacial Till
Figure 10.– Distribution of eleven glacial deposits within the Black River watershed shown as crosshatching. Gray lines show boundaries of subwatersheds, black lines show the Black River and major tributaries (Michigan Resource Information System, Michigan Department of Natural Resources, Real Estate Division, Lansing). 74 Black River Assessment
Glacial Lacustrine Sand Outwash and Gravel
Lacustrine Clay Dune Sand and Silt
Peat and Muck
Figure 10.–Distribution of eleven glacial deposits within the Black River watershed shown as crosshatching. Gray lines show boundaries of subwatersheds, black lines show the Black River and major tributaries (Michigan Resource Information System, Michigan Department of Natural Resources, Real Estate Division, Lansing). 75 Black River Assessment
Sandusky
N
0 5 10
Miles
1 3
Yale Lake Huron 4 5 2
6 Port Huron St. Clair River Sandusky weather station (207350 – 1909 to present) Yale weather station (209188 – 1926 to present, partial data) Port Huron weather station (206680 – 1948 to present) 1 – Black River gauge near Jeddo (04159492 - 1/1/1978 to present) 2 – Mill Creek gauge near Avoca (04159900 - 3/1/1944 to present) 3 – Silver Creek gauge (04159488 - 1/1/1978 to 9/30/1982) 4 – Black River gauge near Fargo (04159500 - 3/1/1944 to 9/30/1991) 5 – Mill Creek gauge near Abbottsford (04160000 - 6/1/1947 to 9/30/1964) 6 – Black River gauge near Port Huron (04160050 - 10/1/1932 to 12/31/1943)
Figure 11.– Locations for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration weather stations (solid dots) and United States Geological Survey river gauge stations (black triangles indicate contemporary, gray triangles historic). The text gives station names, numbers, and period of record. Gray lines show boundaries of subwatersheds, black lines show the Black River and major tributaries. 76 Black River Assessment
4.0
3.5
3.0
2.5
2.0 Port Huron (32.2 in)
Mean total precipitation (in) Sandusky (29.4 in) 1.5
1.0 Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Month 90
80
70
60
50
40
Tmax - Port Huron Mean air temperature (F) 30 Tmin - Port Huron Tmax - Sandusky 20 Tmin - Sandusky
10 Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Month
Figure 12.– Average monthly precipitation (inches, upper graph) and average maximum and minimum air temperature (lower graph) across the Black River watershed for periods of record.
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70 70
65 60 Average maximum temperature 60 50 55 40 50 Annual precipitation
45 30
40 20 Annual precipitation (in) Average air temperature (F) Average minimum temperature
35 10
0 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 Year 70 70
65 60 Average maximum temperature 60 50 55 Annual precipitation 40 50
45 30
40 20 Annual precipitation (in) Average air temperature (F)
35 Average minimum temperature 10
30 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 Year
Figure 13.– Average annual maximum (solid line) and minimum (dotted line) air temperature and total precipitation (dashed line) at Port Huron (upper graph) and Sandusky (lower graph). Temperature values are associated with left axis and precipitation with the right axis. 78 Black River Assessment
50
Pre-impact 1944-1979 Post-impact 1980-2005 40 Median 25th percentile 75th percentile /sec)
3 30
20 Discharge (ft
10
0 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 Year
Figure 14.– Change in base flow at the Black River near Jeddo gauge, based on the Indicators of Hydrologic Alteration model (The Nature Conservancy 2007). 79 Black River Assessment
10000
9000
/sec) 8000 3 7000
6000 Median
5000
4000
3000
2000 Annual peak streamflow (ft
1000
0 1945 1950 1955 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 Year
600
/sec) 500 3
400
300
200
Annual mean streamflow (ft 100
0 1945 1950 1955 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 Year
Figure 15.– Peak annual discharge (top graph) and average annual daily discharge (bottom graph) for the Black River measured at the Jeddo Road gauge. 80 Black River Assessment
1200 Black River at Jeddo
1000 /sec) 3 800
600
400
Mean daily discharge (ft 200
0
Jan 31 Mar 3 Apr 3 May 4 4Aug Jul 5Jun 5 Sep 5 Oct 6 Nov 6 Dec 7 Calendar day 500 Mill Creek 450
400 /sec)
3 350
300
250
200
150
100 Mean daily discharge (ft 50
0
Jan 31 Mar 3 Apr 3 May 4 4Aug Jul 5Jun 5 Sep 5 Oct 6 Nov 6 Dec 7 Calendar day
Figure 16.– Average daily discharge at the Black River gauge at Jeddo (top graph) and Mill Creek gauges (bottom graph where solid line is Avoca gauge and dotted line is Abbottsford gauge) over years 1944 to 2006. 81 Black River Assessment
35
Black River near Jeddo 30 Mill Creek at Avoca Silver Creek near Jeddo Black River near Fargo 25 Clinton River in Mt. Clemens, MI Au Sable River near Au Sable, MI Jordan River near East Jordan, MI 20
15
10 Standardized discharge
5
0
5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 Percent exceedence 1.2
1.0
0.8
0.6
0.4 Black River, Jeddo (1944-2006) Mill Creek, Avoca (1963-2006) Standardized discharge Silver Creek, Jeddo (1978-1982) 0.2 Black River, Fargo (1944-1991) Clinton River in Mt. Clemens, MI Au Sable River near Au Sable, MI 0.0 Jordan River near East Jordan, MI
50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 Percent exceedence
Figure 17.– Standardized high flow exceedence (top graph) and low flow exceedence (bottom graph) at four gauge sites on the Black River, Mill Creek, and Silver Creek. Data are plotted for the Clinton, Au Sable, and Jordan rivers for comparison purposes. 82