User:Deckberg/sandbox

Brazos Watershed
The Brazos River watershed covers a total area of 119,174 square kilometers. Within the watershed lie 42 lakes and rivers which have a combined storage capacity of 2.5 million acre-feet. The Brazos watershed also has an estimated ground water availability of 119,275 acre-feet per year. Approximately 31% of the land use within the watershed is cropland. Approximately 61% is grassland (30%) shrubland (19.8%) and forest (11%) while urban use only makes up 4.6%. The population density within the watershed is 19.5 people per square kilometer.

Water Quality Concerns
The main water quality issues within the Brazos Watershed are high nutrient loads, high bacterial and salinity levels and low dissolved oxygen. These water quality issues can be attributed to live stock, fertilizer and chemical run off. Sources of run off are croplands, pastures, and industrial sites among others. Fracking is also cause for concern regarding water quality within the Brazos Watershed. The Barnett Shale lies partially within the watershed which is the second largest source of natural gas in the US. Studies have shown that the watershed receiving the most toxic pollution as a result of fracking is the lower Brazos river which received 33.4 million pounds of toxic waste in 2012.