84 Kansas Academy of Science. 



LOWERING OF THE GROUND-WATER TABLE. 



By W. A. Cook, Baker University, Baldwin, Kan. 



SINCE the dry season of 1901 the people of the eastern half 

 of Kansas have been more or less concerned about the 

 water supply; and the dry weather of 1910 and the drouth of 

 last summer have increased the growing anxiety about water 

 for domestic purposes. For the past three years the streams 

 of eastern Kansas have been low, at times very low, and for 

 the greater part of that time many have been dry; in face, 

 in some localities creeks and wells which went dry in 1901 have 

 never recovered their former stability. This statement holds 

 good in spite of the fact that the major streams of this part 

 of the state have passed through two of the greatest flood areas 

 known in their history. 



Surface wells and water courses dependent on surface water 

 are likely to go dry during any period of decreased rainfall. 

 Such cases are of more or less local extent in their happening. 

 However, when the eastern half or two-thirds of the state 

 begins to experience such a condition, it becomes more than a 

 local question, the seriousness of which, like the cause of the 

 condition, seems to be little understood by the people in gen- 

 eral. Creeks and rivers that were seldom dry or very lov/ 

 in former years are now dry a large part of the time. Wells 

 that were inexhaustible now have only a meager supply of 

 water, and many have had to be dug deeper. Thus, many 

 people ask : "Why do the creeks go dry in two or three weeks 

 after a rain has filled them bank full?" The answer is easy, 

 but hard to get the average person to understand and believe. 

 The ground-water has been perceptibly lowered, and the 

 ground-water table has sunk below the beds of the streams. 

 Hence, instead of the ground-water flowing through the ground 

 and feeding the streams, causing a continuous flow, the water 

 from the streams in a very short time soaks into the banks 

 and bottoms of the streams and settles to the level of the 

 ground-water table, leaving the streams dry except in the 

 deepest pools. 



In the western part of the state the wells and springs and 

 creeks fed by springs which are connected with the under- 



