Water Facts for Montana

More than 170,000 miles of streams and rivers meander through Montana. The state ranks third in total stream miles in the continental U.S (not including Alaska and Hawaii).
- Source: Headwaters to a Continent and US EPA state reports
(As a side-note "continental", in this case, is an antiquated US government term also popularly used with private businesses to mean the US not including AK and HI. It would more accurately be stated "continuous US".) See US stream miles table below.

Montana contains the headwaters for three continental watersheds: the St. Mary's River, the Columbia River, and the Missouri River.
-Sources: Headwaters to a Continent and DEQ non-point management plan

Wetlands and riparian areas (streamside green zones) cover 1-4% of Montana. These places support half of Montana’s plant species and 38% of amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals of special concern.
-Sources: Montana Audubon and 1997 USGS summary on wetlands

Water withdrawn for irrigation accounts for more than 97.6% of water withdrawn in Montana each year and waters 2.82 million acres.
-Source: DEQ non-point source management plan

35% of Montanans rely on groundwater for their drinking water. The remaining 65% use surface water.
-Update: According to the USGS 2000 estimated water use survey, these numbers have changed. Now 43.8% of domestic water supply is from groundwater and 56% is from surface water. See below for actual summarized data.

-Another way of looking at the numbers is to say 38% of public supply and 93% of self-supplied domestic water is from groundwater. (Public supply is a water company which may supply domestic, industrial and commercial uses. "Self-supplied domestic" is water for in-home use only but not from a public system.) See NRIS site.

Supply in Montana (2000 data)	Ground-water (mgd)	Surface-water (mgd)	Total (mgd)
Public water supply	56.1	92.4	149
Self supplied domestic	17.3	1.29	18.6
Totals	73.4	93.69	167.6

*mgd is million gallons per day

The average total home water use for each person in Montana is 100 gallons per day.
-Source: Safe Drinking Water Trust, AWWA

Producing a typical lunch--hamburger, French fries, and a soft drink--uses 1500 gallons of water. This includes the water needed to raise the potatoes, the grain for the bun, the grain needed to feed the cattle, and the production of the soda.
-Source: This is a widely quoted fact, but finding the true source proves to be very difficult. At best it is a rough estimate given the amount of water it takes to make the components of lunch. Consider this fact simply "food for thought." City of Brantford, University of Wisconsin, World Wildlife Fund, Colorado Farm Bureau testimony for US House, King County, WA Green Works publication

One gallon of used motor oil can contaminate up to one million gallons of water.
-Sources: EPA factsheet and Mississippi Department of Env. Quality