Welcome to the newsletter about all things water in Montana!

MONTANA WATER NEWS will come your way via email every month with fresh news about meetings and water topics we hope are of interest to you. If you do not want to receive this newsletter, please scroll down and follow the directions to unsubscribe. If you are seeing only text in this email, or if it's not easy to read, please make sure your email program is set to view "HTML" messages, or view the newsletter online in the newsletter archives.

Visit the Virtual Library

Final report has you up a creek? Drowning in watershed questions? Help is just a click away! Visit the Montana Water Center Online Lending Library. The library is housed in the Montana Water Center on the campus of Montana State University, and contains more than 300 books and reports, reference guides and fact sheets, videos, and CD-ROMs on water-resource topics, many Montana-specific. Can't come to Bozeman? No problem! The library's searchable database and many publications in PDF format are available 24-7 from the web site. If you have an interest in water issues - check out the MWC Online Library!

For more information or library assistance, email Lara Dando, outreach liaison, or call (406) 994-6690.

Job Announcement

The Montana Water Center announces a new professional position, Associate Director of Research. Applications are due on February 23, 2004. For more information see the posting on MSU web site.

Ask MSU Geology Professor Steve Custer about assessing water availability in areas of urban and rural growth and he'll tell you that "WHERE matters." Seasonal and long-term drought patterns, local underlying geologic formations, existing water rights, and stream characteristics all play a significant role.

With long-term research interests in ground water, streams, snow, and water quality, Custer has focused lately on projects that assess:

• contamination of ground water below rural subdivisions;
• the potential of the Madison aquifer for Bozeman city water supply;
• nitrate and microbial contamination of ground water in the Gallatin Local Water Quality district using Geographic Information System-based risk assessment; and
• data needed for Assessment of Septic System Sitting in Gallatin LWQD.

For the City of Bozeman, he has recommended several new water supply alternatives, including investigation of its underlying aquifer in the Hyalite Creek drainage, monitoring discharge of Sourdough Creek, investigating the feasibility of stream loss prevention on Sourdough Creek, and using a new test well to monitor the effects of pumping on the flows of Two Springs and Sourdough Creek.

Thesis titles containing these recommendations can be found at:

http://www.montana.edu/wwwes/programs/geographytheses.htm and http://www.montana.edu/wwwes/programs/geologytheses.htm.

With the Gallatin Valley population growing 34% between 1990 and 2000, primarily in rural subdivisions, the work of Dr. Custer and his graduate students applies to the problems currently faced by growing municipalities and rural water users alike. New trends in urban growth - pond-building, changes of water use, lack of public storage, and enforcement issues - are contentious concerns among adjacent landowners. Even so, reliable scientific research is helping to assure informed water-use decisions.

So many meetings, so little time. Even so, there are a few that water folks just shouldn't miss! Find more information on these and other upcoming events on the Events Calendar at MONTANA WATER.

Montana Watershed Coordination Council Meeting, Helena, February 18, 2004 [INFO]

Montana Natural Resource Professional Association - No Host Social, Bozeman, February 19, 2004 [INFO]

The Economic Benefits of Protecting Open Space, Bozeman, February 24, 2004 [INFO]

DEQ Public Meeting/Open House - Draft 2004 Integrated Water Quality Report, Helena, February 26, 2004 [INFO]

Native Fish Management: Politics, Policies and Practices, Salt Lake City, February 29 - March 4, 2004 [INFO]

Gallatin Watershed Network Brown Bag Lunch: Economics of Water, Bozeman, March 3, 2004 [INFO]

10th Symposium on Individual and Small Community Sewage Systems & 8th International Drainage Symposium, Sacramento, March 21 - 24, 2004 [INFO]