A preliminary appraisal of the impact of agriculture on ground-water availability in southwest Georgia

TL;DRAbstract

Irrigated acreage in the 20-county study area in southwest Georgia increased from 130,000 acres in 1976 to 261,000 in 1977. Acreage irrigated entirely by ground water increased 85 percent for the same period. The largest quantity of ground water used for irrigation was in the Dougherty Plain district, where 92 percent of supplemental irrigation water comes from wells. The total amount of water pumped for irrigation in the Dougherty Plain in 1977 was more than 42 billion gallons, 30 billion gallons more than in 1976. There were no detectable concentrations of selected organic compounds and trace metals used in agricultural chemicals above the recommended limits for public consumption in 19 wells sampled for chemical analyses. Although nitrate concentrations were not above the recommended limits for drinking water, the presence of nitrate in amounts ranging from 0.3 to 7.8 milligrams per liter in wells in the Dougherty Plain possibly indicate the downward movement of soluble nitrate, a b

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