WHAT'S HAPPENING NOW
—— ft above typical
Finding the top signal on the water…
Live river level, flow, historical records and forecast for Little Calumet River at Burr Street at Gary, in in IN, United States, built from official government gauge data.
Little Calumet River at Burr Street at Gary, in is a gauged river in the Chicago watershed, Indiana.
The record high is 11.57 ft (3.53 m), reached in February 2018. The record low is 4.25 ft (1.3 m), reached in July 2026. That spread matters at the bank: the river can sit several feet above its lowest recorded level and still stay within the range this gauge has seen.
Seasonally, the highest typical month is March at 6.06 ft (1.85 m), while the lowest typical month is August at 5.01 ft (1.53 m). The typical annual swing is 12.6 in (32 cm). For cottagers and dock owners, that is a modest but real change in waterline through the year. For anglers, it means access and edge habitat shift gradually rather than all at once.
This station has 16 years on record, so the pattern is useful even when a single day looks ordinary.
This gauge drains 5.2 sq mi (13.4 km2) above the station. That is the area feeding this reach, not the whole Chicago watershed. In this part of Indiana, the seasonal rhythm is familiar: winter and spring can bring rain floods on saturated or frozen ground, summer often turns on convective storms, and fall tends toward lower flows.
That matters here because a small catchment can still rise quickly after a strong storm, and the river’s normal seasonal range is not large. A short stretch of heavy rain can push the level well above what a calm August day suggests.
This page’s hero number should be read against the median for this calendar day, not as a raw stage by itself. That comparison tells you whether the river is running high or low for the season at this station.
The station is published by the USGS. With more than 16 years on record, the day-by-day median is a better local guide than a single elevation, because it puts today’s reading beside the level this river usually carries at this time of year.
Readings come from official government gauges and are rolled into daily records: the daily mean, high and low for every day on record. Each calendar day gets its own baseline from the full history, so the level you see is compared against what this specific date usually looks like rather than an annual average.
Real-time water levels, forecasts, and alerts for lakes and rivers across Canada, the US and the UK. Built on official government data.
Nibi Metrics tracks more than 13,000 gauged lakes and rivers across Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom, reading directly from official federal monitoring networks: the Water Survey of Canada, the United States Geological Survey, Quebec's provincial hydrometric network, and the Environment Agency for England. Every number on the platform is measured, not modelled - taken from a government gauge on the water itself and compared against that location's own historical record for this exact date.
The level right now, in feet or metres, updated as the source agency publishes new readings - for many stations that is every five to fifteen minutes. How today compares to typical: every location carries its own typical-for-this-date band built from its historical record, so a reading is never just a number - it is above, below, or near what this water usually does on this calendar day. Which way it is moving: a measured RISING, FALLING, or STEADY verdict computed from the gauge's own recent readings, with the rate of change - the difference between a flood ending and one beginning. What comes next: level forecasts up to 72 hours ahead, driven by the gauge's recent behaviour, upstream water, and quantitative precipitation forecasts, alongside live radar, lightning, and weather for the surrounding region.
Set a threshold on any location - a level, a distance above typical, or a rate of climb - and Nibi emails or notifies you the moment the gauge crosses it. Cottagers use it for spring freshet, anglers for river conditions, marinas and municipalities for operations. The scanning runs around the clock against the same measured data shown on every page.
Nibi means water in Anishinaabemowin. The platform began at a family cottage on Lake Muskoka, Ontario, where the spring melt floods the shoreline most years and the only forecast was standing on the dock, looking, and guessing. It grew into an independent, member-funded platform run by Muskoka Research Inc. - no investors, no data resale, and a privacy policy shorter than most cookie banners. The core data is free for everyone, forever; paid plans add automation like multi-location alerts, deep history, and reports.
Nibi spans the continent: every Canadian province and territory with active federal gauges - from Vancouver Island rivers to the Muskoka lakes, prairie reservoirs, and Quebec's hydrometric network - and the United States from Maine to the Texas Hill Country, the Ohio Valley, and the Pacific Northwest. Coverage grows where the water news is: when a basin floods, its gauges join the platform with their full historical records attached. Many stations report every five to fifteen minutes; most report at least hourly; every page states exactly when its gauge last spoke.
The core promise is simple: the water data is free, for everyone, forever. Live levels, maps, radar, and recent history never sit behind a paywall. Paid plans fund the platform by adding automation - multi-location alerts, decades of history, longer forecasts, and PDF reports - so the people who need more carry the cost for everyone who just needs to check the lake before driving up. There are no investors and no advertising deals shaping what the data says.
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