Geography

Ozark Aquifer Geography: There used to be groundwater provinces consisting of physiographic regions associated with specific aquifers. The new terminology is the Ozark Aquifer System, which is used generally for the Salem Plateau, St. Francois Mountains, Springfield plateau, and Boston Mountains. The St. Francois Mountains are often included with the Salem Plateau (Hays et al., 2016). Usually the Springfield Plateau is used when discussing the Ozark Aquifer System with the top layer in Southwest Missouri and neighboring states. The Salem Plateau lacks that top aquifer layer. The geographical representation of the Ozark Aquifer System is illustrated in Figure 1. The surface streams and reservoirs within the aquifer system are illustrated in Figure 2. As can be seen in Figure 1, the aquifer is bounded on the north by the Missouri River, to the east by the Mississippi River and Alluvial Plain, to the south by the Arkansas River, and on the west by a regional lowland. The entire area is of the system is 69,000 miles². The project region of the St. Francois Mountains are 350 miles² (Denison et al., 1984) and the Salem Plateau area is 24,800 miles² (MoDNR1, 2020). Table 2 below lists prominent land uses in the Aquifer Wide System. Major rivers and reservoirs are illustrated in Figure 2. The regional aquifer system consists four aquifers (greater detail below). The effects of land use, climate, and physical geography on recharge will be discussed later.