How's my waterway?
Click on the button below to learn more about the water quality in your community, state and nationally!
what is a watershed?
So, what exactly is a watershed? Think of a watershed like a funnel. If you place a drop of water anywhere in the funnel, it will fall out through the spout. A watershed works much the same way, and is the land and drainage area where water runs downhill into a body of water. Hills, mountains, and sloping topography separate watersheds and act like the walls of the funnel, and the rivers, streams, and stormwater drains represent the spout that concentrates the water flowing over the land, channeling it elsewhere.
Picture a drop of water falling on a hill, miles from the nearest stream. When the rain falls, some of the water soaks into the soil and some evaporates into the air. Everything else runs off the land. That water joins small streams and wetlands that drain into lakes and rivers, and eventually flows to the ocean. This is how trash, chemicals or bacteria miles from a water body can still end up in our rivers and lakes, and it's why we all need to understand how our actions impact things downstream!
Michigan’s inland freshwater resources include over 11,000 inland lakes as well as 36,000 miles of streams, rivers and creeks that are hosted by sixty three major watersheds and two hundred sixty seven sub‐watershed areas.
The overall water quality of your favorite lake or stream is often a direct reflection of the land use activities such as agriculture, mining, logging as well as the level of commercial and residential development that is occurring within your watershed. A watershed is defined as the land that water flows across or through on its way to a common stream, river, or lake. Michigan’s watershed areas flow directly into the Lake Michigan, Lake Superior, Lake Huron or Lake Erie basins.
By exploring the wetlands, streams, rivers and other natural features within your watershed, you will begin to develop an understanding of how these natural features directly affect the overall quality of your inland lake or stream and ultimately, the water quality of our Great Lakes and oceans. We encourage you to learn more about what you can do to protect our water resources so we can drink clean water and also recreate in clean water.
Go to https://www.mywatersheds.org/about to learn more about your watershed and what you can do to protect our valuable water resources.
Picture a drop of water falling on a hill, miles from the nearest stream. When the rain falls, some of the water soaks into the soil and some evaporates into the air. Everything else runs off the land. That water joins small streams and wetlands that drain into lakes and rivers, and eventually flows to the ocean. This is how trash, chemicals or bacteria miles from a water body can still end up in our rivers and lakes, and it's why we all need to understand how our actions impact things downstream!
Michigan’s inland freshwater resources include over 11,000 inland lakes as well as 36,000 miles of streams, rivers and creeks that are hosted by sixty three major watersheds and two hundred sixty seven sub‐watershed areas.
The overall water quality of your favorite lake or stream is often a direct reflection of the land use activities such as agriculture, mining, logging as well as the level of commercial and residential development that is occurring within your watershed. A watershed is defined as the land that water flows across or through on its way to a common stream, river, or lake. Michigan’s watershed areas flow directly into the Lake Michigan, Lake Superior, Lake Huron or Lake Erie basins.
By exploring the wetlands, streams, rivers and other natural features within your watershed, you will begin to develop an understanding of how these natural features directly affect the overall quality of your inland lake or stream and ultimately, the water quality of our Great Lakes and oceans. We encourage you to learn more about what you can do to protect our water resources so we can drink clean water and also recreate in clean water.
Go to https://www.mywatersheds.org/about to learn more about your watershed and what you can do to protect our valuable water resources.
