Alluvial aquifer of the Cache and St. Francis River basins, northeastern Arkansas

Abstract

The alluvial aquifer underlies about 9,000 square miles of the study area. Well yields from the aquifer commonly are from 1,000 to 2,000 gallons per minute. Flow toward the main area of pumping stress is eastward from the Cache River and westward from the St. Francis River. The Memphis aquifer acts as a conduit through Crowleys Ridge for induced flow from the St. Francis River basin to the Cache River basn. Water use from the alluvial aquifer since the early 1900 's has been mostly for rice irrigation. Total pumpage for rice in 1978 was about 1,650 ,000 acre-feet, of which about 88 percent was pumped from the aquifer west of Crowleys Ridge. Water levels in wells west of the ridge in parts of Poinsett, Cross, and Craighead Counties in 1978 were 75 feet below land surface and declining about 2 feet per year. Digital-model analysis indicated that at the end of 1978 water was being removed from aquifer storage at the rate of 540,000 acre-feet per year, and streamflow, mostly from the Cache River and Bayou DeView, was being captured at the rate of 430,000 acre-feet per year. Projecting the 1978 pumping rate of 1,460,000 acre-feet per year, the pumping rate would have to be reduced by about 110,000 acre-feet per year by 1990 to sustain sufficient aquifer saturation for water needs through the year 2000 in all parts of Poinsett, Craighead, and Cross Counties west of Crowleys Ridge.