Search USGS⌕ Search

Geology topics

Fred Kunkel

Publications and source records attributed to Fred Kunkel.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
USGS1966

Ground water in the San Joaquin Valley, California

Ladies and gentlemen, it is a pleasure to be invited to attend this Irrigation Institute conference and to describe the Geological Survey's program of ground-water studies in the San Joaquin Valley. The U.S. Geological Survey has been making water-resources studies in cooperation with the State of California and other agencies in California for more than 70 years. Three of the earliest Geological Survey Water-Supply Papers--numbers 17, 18, and 19--published in 1898 and 1899, describe "Irrigation near Bakersfield," "Irrigation near Fresno," and "Irrigation near Merced." However, the first Survey report on ground-water occurrence in the San Joaquin Valley was "Ground Water in the San Joaquin Valley," by Mendenhall and others. The fieldwork was done from 1905 to 1910, and the report was published in 1916 as U.S. Geological Survey Water-Supply Paper 398. The current series of ground-water studies in the San Joaquin Valley was begun in 1952 as part of the California Department of Water Resources-U.S. Geological Survey cooperative water-resources program. The first report of this series is Geological Survey Water-Supply Paper 1469, "Ground-Water Conditions and Storage Capacity in the San Joaquin Valley." Other reports are Water-Supply Paper 1618, "Use of Ground-Water Reservoirs for Storage of Surface Water in the San Joaquin Valley;" Water-Supply Paper 1656, "Geology and Ground-Water Features of the Edison-Maricopa Area;" Water-Supply Paper 1360-G, "Ground- Water Conditions in the Mendota-Huron Area;" Water-Supply Paper 1457, "Ground-Water Conditions in the Avenal-McKittrick Area;" and an open-file report, "Geology, Hydrology, and Quality of Water in the Terra Bella-Lost Hills Area." In addition to the preceding published reports, ground-water studies currently are being made of the Kern Fan area, the Hanford- Visalia area, the Fresno area, the Merced area, and of the clays of Tulare Lake. Also, detailed studies of both shallow and deep subsidence in the southern part of the San Joaquin Valley are being made by the Subsidence Research Section at Sacramento, and research on permeability and specific yield in the San Joaquin Valley is being done by our hydrologic laboratory at Denver.

California↗
USGS1963

Geology of the Terra Bella-Lost Hills Area, San Joaquin Valley, California

The Terra Bella-Lost Hills area in the southeastern part of the San Joaquin Valley includes about 1,700 square miles of Kings, Tulare and Kern Counties. This part of the San Joaquin Valley has mild winters, long hot summers, and little precipitating, almost all of which occurs during the fall and winter months. The area is a basin of interior drainage and the streams are tributary to Tulare Lake. The Terra Bella-Lost Hills area is characterized by dissected uplands, low alluvial plains and fans, river-flood plains and channels, and overflow land. and. lake bottoms.

California↗
USGS1963

Hydrologic and geologic reconnaissance of Pinto Basin, Joshua Tree National Monument, Riverside County, California

Pinto basin, in the north-central part of Riverside County, Calif., is a typical desert valley formed by downfaulting along several major fault zones. The valley is filled with alluvium, and ground water in the alluvium discharges as subsurface outflow through an alluvium-filled gap at the east end of the valley. Occasionally surface water from cloudburst floods also discharges in a wash through the gap at the east end of the valley. A northeastward extension of the major fault along the south side of the valley acts as a barrier to the discharge of ground water from the valley. The average ground-water gradient is less than 1 foot per mile across the main part of the valley above this barrier, but the water level drops abruptly across the fault. The ground-water storage capacity of the uppermost 100 feet of saturated alluvium beneath the central valley area is estimated to be about 230,000 acre-feet. All this water in storage occurs at depths greater than 95 feet below the land surface and cannot be reached by plants or animals. During 1959 virtually all the water pumped in the area was withdrawn from storage. However, the quantity of water pumped is small in relation to the total quantity in storage. Except for a small decline in head, no evidence indicates that the pumping will greatly impair the yield for many years or cause the water to deteriorate in quality.

California↗
USGS1960

Data on water wells, Naval Air Missile Test Center Area, Point Mugu, California

The entire water supply for the U. S. Naval Air Missile Test Center at Point Mugu, Calif., is pumped from wells located .within 2 miles of the Pacific Ocean. A large irrigation development inland from the Test Center has created a landward hydraulic gradient beneath the Test Center, causing sea-water encroachment into the water-yielding deposits. The encroaching sea water has not yet reached the Test Center well field; however, the encroachment poses a serious threat to the Test Center supply. To evaluate the adequacy of the water supply for the Naval Air Missile Test Center under these conditions and to suggest additional sources for future development, the U. S. Geological Survey has canvassed all wells and collected all available hydrologic dataat the Test Center and in the immediate vicinity. The data tabulated in this report include measurements of water levels in wells, well logs, and chemical analyses for all wells south of Hueneme Road collected through February 1959. This study was made by the Geological Survey, U. S. Department of the Interior, under the general supervision of H. L. Wilson, Jr., district engineer for California, and under the immediate supervision of Fred Kunkel, geologist in charge of the Long Beach subdistrict office.

California↗
USGS1960

Time, distance, and drawdown relationships in a pumped ground-water basin

Several reasonable values are assumed for coefficients of transmissibility and storage of lenticular alluvial deposits, These values when substituted in the Theis (1935) nonequilibrium formula as modified by Wenzel (1942) give curves from which time, distance, drawdown relationships are estimated.

Circular↗