CERP Picayune Strand - NRCS Groundwater Monitoring

This hydrologic monitoring study was a component of a 1996 cooperative agreement between the Big Cypress Basin of the South Florida Water Management District (District) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) to procure data and analyses of the soils, vegetation, topography, and water table fluctuations in the Picayune Strand State Forest (PSSF) and the Ten Thousand Islands National Wildlife Refuge (TTINWR). The goal of the study was to update an earlier analysis of the proposed hydrologic restoration strategy using more detailed site-specific data and to predict the effects of the proposed strategy on the existing plant communities in the study area. In addition, data acquired during this study can serve as a “baseline” that can be augmented to track hydrological and biological changes that occur in the PSSF and TTINWR over the duration of the hydrologic restoration process.

Field surveys of plant communities, soils, and surficial aquifer levels were conducted at 39 selected sites; the enclosed dataset encompasses the first 27 sites. In order to show fluctuations in the shallow water table at the survey sites, shallow surficial aquifer monitoring wells were installed at all study area sites and at a comparison site within the Belle Meade tract. Well water levels were monitored by Conservancy of Southwest Florida volunteers (NRCS Earth Team volunteers) until October 2000, when monitoring duties were transferred to Picayune Strand State Forest (PSSF).

A copy of the final report for this study can be found in DOCUMENTUM SOUTH at the following location: Cabinets/CERP Project/Picayune Strand Restoration/11 Project Implementation Monitoring/11.02 Inland Monitoring/Hydrology/Ground Water/NRCS/Report