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Natural wetlands once were abundant in California's San Joaquin Valley, but are now rare. This aerial photograph from the 1960's shows encroachment of agriculture into wetlands of the Fresno Slough. Concern about selenium contamination is not limited to areas that recycle agricultural drainage water. Existing and former wetland sites and impounded water of the arid West may show selenium enrichment.

image, aerial photograph of wetlands near fresno, california

Further Readings

Death in the Marsh by Tom Harris (1991), published by Island Press gives a popular account of his investigative reporting for the Sacramento Bee. This books chronicles the selenium problem at Kesterson National Wildlife Refuge and other sites across the West.

USGS Professional Paper 1566 (1995), Geochemistry of Minor Elements in the Monterey Formation, California: Sea-Water Chemistry of Deposition.

USGS Circular 1180 (1999) identifies areas of the arid West that are susceptible to selenium contamination.

USGS Water-Resources Investigations Report 90-4070 (1990) provides details on the sources, mobilization, and transport of selenium in California's Coast Ranges.

References Cited in Website

Adriano, D.C., 1986, Trace elements in the terrestrial environment: Springer-Verlag, New York, 533 p.

Barnes, Ivan,1985, Sources of Selenium, pp. 41-51, in Selenium and Agricultural Drainage: Implications for San Francisco Bay and the California Environment: Proceedings of the Second Selenium Symposium, March 23, 1985, Berkeley, CA.

Beyer, L.A., and Bartow, J.A., 1988, Summary of geology and petroleum plays used to assess undiscovered recoverable petroleum resources, San Joaquin Basin Province, California: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 87-450Z, 80 p.

Bohacs, K. M., 1990, Sequence stratigraphy of the Monterey Formation, Santa Barbara County: Integration of physical, chemical, and biofacies data from outcrop and subsurface, in M. A. Keller and M. K. McGowen, eds., Miocene and Oligocene petroleum reservoirs of the Santa Maria and Santa Barbara-Ventura basins, California: Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists Core Workshop 14, p. 139-200.

Fonseca, Carlos, 1997, Late Cretaceous-Early Tertiary Paleoceanography and Cyclic Sedimentation along the California margin: evidence from the Moreno Formation: Stanford University, unpublished Ph.D. thesis, 449 p.

Frankenberger, W.T. Jr., and Engberg, Richard A., eds., 1998, Environmental Chemistry of Selenium: New York, Marcel Dekker, Inc., 713 p.

Herring, J.R., 1991, Selenium geochemistry - A conspectus, in Severson, R.C., Fisher, S.E. Jr., and Gough, L.P., eds., Proceedings of the 1990 Billings Land Reclamation Symposium on Selenium in Arid and Semiarid Environments, Western United States: U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1064, p. 5-24.

Isaacs, C.M., 1987, Use of well cuttings for facies models of the Monterey Formation, California [abs.]: American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin, v. 71, p. 570-571.

Isaacs, C.M., 1992, Uranium, thorium, and other trace elements in strip samples from Cores 128- 798B-13H through -15H, in Tamaki, K., Suyehiro, K., Allan, J., McWilliams, M., and others, eds., Proceedings, Ocean Drilling Program, Scientific Results, Volume 127/128, Part 2: College Station, Texas, Ocean Drilling Program, p. 1367-1372.

Isaacs, C.M., Keller, M.A., and Bird, K.J., 1999, Potentially hazardous trace elements in the Monterey Formation, California [abstract]: American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin, v. 83, no. 4, p. 691.

Isaacs, C.M., Stewart, K.C., and Jackson, L.L., 1986, Evaluating compositional trends in Miocene- Pliocene strata of south-central coastal California [abs.], in Carter, L.M.H., ed., USGS Research on Energy Resources - 1986 Program and Abstracts: V.E. McKelvey Forum on Mineral and Energy Resources, U.S. Geological Survey Circular 974, p. 30.

Isaacs, C.M., Tomson, J.H., Stewart, K.C., and Jackson, L.L., 1990, Abundances of major elements and sedimentary components of cuttings from the Foxen Mudsone and the Sisquoc, Monterey, and Point Sal Formations in the Union Hobbs 22 well, and preliminary comparison with cores from the Union Newlove 51 well, Orcutt oil field, onshore Santa Maria basin, California: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 89-466, 22 p.

King, P.B., and Beikman, H.M., compilers, 1974, Geologic Map of the United States (exclusive of Alaska and Hawaii): U.S. Geological Survey, three sheets, scale 1:2,500,000.

Lakin, H.W.,1961, Vertical and lateral distribution of selenium in sedimentary rocks of western United States, in Selenium in Agriculture: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agriculture Handbook No. 200, p. 12-23.

Landis, E.R., 1959, Radioactivity and uranium content, Sharon Springs member of the Pierre Shale, Kansas and Colorado: U.S.G.S. Bulletin 1046-L, 21 p.

Luoma, S.N., and Presser, T., 2000, Forecasting selenium discharges to the San Francisco Bay-Delta Estuary: Ecological effects of a proposed San Luis drain extension: U.S.G.S. Open-File Report 00-46, 129 p. + illustrations and appendices.

McGuire, Douglas J., 1988, Stratigraphy, depositional history, and hydrocarbon source-rock potential of the Upper Cretaceous-Lower Tertiary Moreno Formation, central San Joaquin Basin, California: Stanford University, unpublished Ph.D. thesis, 309 p.

National Research Council, 1989, Irrigation Induced Water Quality Problems: What can be learned from the San Joaquin Valley Experience: National Academy Press, 157 p.

Oster, J.D., Tracy, J.E., Meyer, J.L., and Snyder, M.J., 1988, Selenium in or near the Southern Coast Range: Well waters and vegetable crops, in Tanji, K.K., Valoppi, L., and Woodring, R.C., eds., Selenium Contents in Animal and Human Food Crops Grown in California: University of California Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources Publication 3330, p. 51-55.

Pais, Istvan, and Jones, J.B. Jr., 1997, The Handbook of Trace Elements: St. Lucie Press, Boca Raton, Florida, 223 p.

Piper, D.Z., 1994, Seawater as the source of minor elements in black shales, phoshorites and other sedimentary deposits: Chemical Geology, v. 114, p. 95-114.

Piper, D.Z., and Isaacs, C.M., 1995a, Geochemistry of minor elements in the Monterey Formation, California: Seawater chemistry of deposition: U.S. Geological Professional Paper 1566, 41 p.

Piper, D.Z., and Isaacs, C.M., 1995b, Minor elements in Quaternary sediment from the Sea of Japan: A record of surface-water productivity and intermediate-water redox conditions: Geological Society of America Bulletin, v. 107, p. 54-67.

Piper, D.Z., and Medrano, M.D., 1994, Geochemistry of the Phosphoria Formation at Montpelier Canyon, Idaho; environment of deposition: U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin 2023-B, p. B1-B28.

Presser, T.S., 1994a, Geologic origin and pathways of selenium from the California Coast Ranges to the west-central San Joaquin Valley, in Frankenberger, W.T. Jr., and Benson Sally, eds., Selenium in the Environment, New York, Marcel Dekker, Inc., p. 139-155.

Presser, T.S., 1994b, "The Kesterson Effect": Environmental Management, v. 18, p. 437-454.

Presser, T.S., and Ohlendorf, H.M., 1987, Biogeochemical cycling of selenium in the San Joaquin Valley, California, USA: Environmental Management, v. 11, p. 805-821.

Presser, T.S., and Piper, D.Z., 1998, Mass balance approach to selenium cycling through the San Joaquin Valley: from source to river to bay, in Frankenberger, W.T. Jr., and Engberg, Richard A., eds., Environmental Chemistry of Selenium, New York, Marcel Dekker, Inc., p. 153-182.

Presser, T.S., and Swain, W.C., 1990, Geochemical evidence for Se mobilization by the weathering of pyritic shale, San Joaquin Valley, California, U.S.A.: Applied Geochemistry, v. 5, p. 703-717.

Presser, T.S., Swain, W.C., Tidball, R.R., and Severson, R.C., 1990, Geologic sources, mobilization, and transport of selenium from the California Coast Ranges to the western San Joaquin Valley: A reconnaissance study: U.S. Geological Survey Water-Resources Investigations Report 90-4070, 66 p.

Presser, T.S., Sylvester, M.A., and Low, W.H., 1994, Bioaccumulation of selenium from natural geologic sources in western states and its potential consequences: Environmental Management, v. 18, p. 423-436.

Seiler, R.L., 1998, Prediction of lands susceptible to irrigation-induced selenium contamination of water, in Frankenberger, W.T. Jr., and Engberg, Richard A., eds., Environmental Chemistry of Selenium, New York, Marcel Dekker, Inc., p. 397-418.

Seiler, R.L., Skorupa, J.P., and Peltz, L.A., 1999, Areas susceptible to irrigation-induced selenium contamination of water and biota in the western United States: U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1180, 36p.

Tidball, R.R., Grundy, W.D., and Sawatzky, K.L., 1986, Kriging techniques applied to element distribution in soils of the San Joaquin Valley, California: HAZTECH International Conference, Denver, Colorado, August 15-16, 1986, Proceedings, p. 992-1009.

Tourtelot, H.A., 1956, Radioactivity and uranium content of some Cretaceous shales, central Great Plains: Americam Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin, v. 40, p. 62-83.

Tourtelot, H.A., Schutlz, L.G., and Gill, J.R., 1960, Stratigraphic variations in mineralogy and chemical composition of the Pierre Shale in South Dakota and adjacent parts of North Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming and Montana: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 400-B, p. 447-452.

Trelease, S.F., 1942, Selenium in soils, plants and animals: Soil Science, v. 60, p. 125-131.

Turekian, K.K., and Wedepohl, K.H., 1961, Distribution of the elements in some major units of the earth's crust: Geological Society of America Bulletin, v. 72, p. 175-192.

Vine, J.D., and Tourtelot, H.A., 1970, Geochemistry of black shales deposits - A summary report: Economic Geology, v. 65, p. 253-272.

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Contact: Margaret A. Keller (mkeller@usgs.gov)
Western Region Energy Group–Environmental Studies
Modified: November 15, 2002

 

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