Warm Springs Reservoir is a

reservoir A reservoir (; from French ''réservoir'' ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam. Such a dam may be either artificial, built to store fresh water or it may be a natural formation. Reservoirs can be created in a number of ways, including contro ...

on the boundary between Harney and Malheur counties in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...

Oregon Oregon () is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of its eastern boundary with Idaho. T ...

. It is located southwest of Juntura at an elevation of . The lake's primary inflow and outflow are both the

Malheur River The Malheur River (local pronunciation: "MAL-hyure") is a tributary of the Snake River in eastern Oregon in the United States. It drains a high desert area, between the Harney Basin and the Blue Mountains and the Snake. Despite the similari ...

. The tall and long thin-arch concrete Warm Springs Dam was built from 1918 to 1919 by the Warm Springs Irrigation District, and was later modified in 1930 and 1939 with the help of the

United States Bureau of Reclamation The Bureau of Reclamation, and formerly the United States Reclamation Service, is a federal agency under the U.S. Department of the Interior, which oversees water resource management, specifically as it applies to the oversight and opera ...

. It was constructed from of material on top of a series of

olivine The mineral olivine () is a magnesium iron silicate with the chemical formula . It is a type of nesosilicate or orthosilicate. The primary component of the Earth's upper mantle, it is a common mineral in Earth's subsurface, but weathers quickl ...

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the surface of a rocky planet or moon. More than 90 ...

lava flows. The resultant reservoir has a maximum area of , a maximum volume of , and a maximum depth of . It has a shore length of about and a

residence time The residence time of a fluid parcel is the total time that the parcel has spent inside a control volume (e.g.: a chemical reactor, a lake, a human body). The residence time of a set of parcels is quantified in terms of the frequency distributi ...

of about 2.2 years. Warm Springs Reservoir's watershed covers approximately of

eastern Oregon Eastern Oregon is the eastern part of the U.S. state of Oregon. It is not an officially recognized geographic entity; thus, the boundaries of the region vary according to context. It is sometimes understood to include only the eight easternmost ...

. It receives an average precipitation of . As of the 2000 Census, there were 157 people living within the watershed's boundaries. The predominant wildlife in the region is

mule deer The mule deer (''Odocoileus hemionus'') is a deer indigenous to western North America; it is named for its ears, which are large like those of the mule. Two subspecies of mule deer are grouped into the black-tailed deer. Unlike the related whi ...

and various

waterfowl Anseriformes is an order of birds also known as waterfowl that comprises about 180 living species of birds in three families: Anhimidae (three species of screamers), Anseranatidae (the magpie goose), and Anatidae, the largest family, which i ...

. Bass, bluegill, and rainbow trout are the main fish found in the reservoir. The reservoir is classified as

eutrophic Eutrophication is the process by which an entire body of water, or parts of it, becomes progressively enriched with minerals and nutrients, particularly nitrogen and phosphorus. It has also been defined as "nutrient-induced increase in phytoplan ...

, with a transparency of about .

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* * {{authority control Reservoirs in Oregon Lakes of Harney County, Oregon Lakes of Malheur County, Oregon Buildings and structures in Harney County, Oregon Buildings and structures in Malheur County, Oregon Protected areas of Harney County, Oregon Protected areas of Malheur County, Oregon Dams in Oregon United States Bureau of Reclamation dams Dams completed in 1919 1919 establishments in Oregon

See also

References

External links