The 2023 US National Seismic Hazard Model: Ground-motion characterization for the conterminous United States
Morgan P. Moschetti, Brad T. Aagaard, Sean Kamran Ahdi, Jason M. Altekruse, Oliver S. Boyd, Arthur D. Frankel, Julie A. Herrick, Mark D. Petersen, Peter M. Powers, Sanaz Rezaeian, Allison Shumway, James Andrew Smith, William J. Stephenson, Eric M. Thompson, Kyle Withers
2024, Earthquake Spectra (40) 1158-1190
We update the ground-motion characterization for the 2023 National Seismic Hazard Model (NSHM) for the conterminous United States. The update includes the use of new ground-motion models (GMMs) in the Cascadia subduction zone; an adjustment to the central and eastern United States (CEUS) GMMs to reduce misfits with observed data;...
Water resources inventory of the Las Cienegas National Conservation Area, southeastern Arizona
Jon P. Mason
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5131
The Las Cienegas National Conservation Area was established by the Las Cienegas National Conservation Area Establishment Act of 1999 (Public Law 106–538) and is managed by the Bureau of Land Management. Located in southeastern Arizona, the conservation area contains more than 45,000 acres of rolling grassland, wetlands, and woodlands surrounded...
Allochthonous marsh subsidies enhances food web productivity in an estuary and its surrounding ecosystem mosaic
Melanie J. Davis, Isa Woo, Susan E.W. De La Cruz, Christopher S. Ellings, Sayre Hodgson, Glynnis Nakai
2024, PLoS ONE (19)
Terrestrial organic matter is believed to play an important role in promoting resilient estuarine food webs, but the inherent interconnectivity of estuarine systems often obscures the origins and importance of these terrestrial inputs. To determine the relative contributions of terrestrial (allochthonous) and aquatic (autochthonous) organic matter...
Simulation of groundwater and surface-water interaction and lake resiliency at Crystal Lake, City of Crystal Lake, Illinois
Amy M. Gahala, Emilia L. Bristow, Jennifer B. Sharpe, Benjamin G Metcalf, Lisa A. Matson
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2024-5007
The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the City of Crystal Lake, Illinois, started a study to increase understanding of groundwater and surface-water interaction between the glacial aquifer and the city’s namesake lake, Crystal Lake, and the effect of higher and lower precipitation conditions on groundwater and lake levels. The...
Examining the connections between earthquake swarms, crustal fluids, and large earthquakes in the context of the 2020-2024 Noto Peninsula, Japan, earthquake sequence
David R. Shelly
2024, Geophysical Research Letters (51)
Earthquake swarms are most commonly composed of small-magnitude earthquakes – those that may in some cases be felt but without causing damage. However, a recent study by Yoshida et al. (2023, https://doi.org/10.1029/2023GL106023) analyzed a swarm beneath the Noto Peninsula in Japan that, after more than two years of moderate-magnitude...
Physics-based satellite-derived bathymetry (SDB) using Landsat OLI images
Minsu Kim, Jeffrey J. Danielson, Curt D. Storlazzi, Seonkyung Park
2024, Remote Sensing (16)
The estimation of depth in optically shallow waters using satellite imagery can be efficient and cost-effective. Active sensors measure the distance traveled by an emitted laser pulse propagating through the water with high precision and accuracy if the bottom peak intensity of the waveform is greater than the noise...
Wildfire probability estimated from recent climate and fine fuels across the big sagebrush region
Martin C. Holdrege, Daniel Rodolphe Schlaepfer, Kyle A. Palmquist, Michele R. Crist, Kevin E. Doherty, William K. Lauenroth, Thomas E. Remington, Karin L. Riley, Karen C. Short, John C. Tull, Lief A. Wiechman, John B. Bradford
2024, Fire Ecology (20)
BackgroundWildfire is a major proximate cause of historical and ongoing losses of intact big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata Nutt.) plant communities and declines in sagebrush obligate wildlife species. In recent decades, fire return intervals have shortened and area burned has increased in some areas, and habitat degradation is occurring where...
Polyphase stratabound scheelite-ferberite mineralization at Mallnock, Eastern Alps, Austria
Florian Altenberger, Joachim Krause, Niki E. Wintzer, Christoph Iglseder, Jasper Berndt, Kai Bachmann, Johann Raith
2024, Mineralium Deposita (59) 1109-1132
A peculiar type of stratabound tungsten mineralization in metacarbonate rocks was discovered and explored at Mallnock (Austria) during the late 1980s. It is the only tungsten occurrence in the Eastern Alps in which scheelite is associated with wolframite (96 mol% ferberite). The tungsten prospect is located...
Status of water-level altitudes and long-term and short-term water-level changes in the Chicot and Evangeline (undifferentiated) and Jasper aquifers, greater Houston area, Texas, 2023
Jason K. Ramage
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2024-5003
Since the early 1900s, groundwater withdrawn from the primary aquifers that compose the Gulf Coast aquifer system—the Chicot, Evangeline, and Jasper aquifers—has been an important source of water in the greater Houston area, Texas. This report, prepared by the U.S. Geological Survey in cooperation with the Harris-Galveston Subsidence District, City...
The past, present, and a future for native charr in Japan
K.D. Fausch, Kentaro Morita, Jun-ichi Tsuboi, Yoichiro Kanno, Shoichiro Yamamoto, Daisuke Kishi, Jason Dunham, Itsuro Koizumi, Koh Hasegawa, Mikio Inoue, Takuya Sato, Satoshi Kitano
2024, Ichthyological Research (71) 461-485
Charrs (Salvelinus) reach their southernmost distribution in Japan, and are uniquely adapted to the short, steep streams of this island archipelago. Southern Asian Dolly Varden (Salvelinus curilus) occur only in Hokkaido Island, whereas white-spotted charr (Salvelinus leucomaenis) range to southern Honshu. Both species diverged from an ancestral lineage during the...
Trends in colony sizes for five colonial waterbird species in the Atlantic Flyway
Zachary G. Loman, Cynthia S. Loftin, Caleb S. Spiegel, Ruth Boettcher
2024, Cooperator Science Series 155-2024
Robust estimates of colonial waterbird (CWB) breeding population trends are deficient owing to a lack of range wide, standardized survey efforts. Evaluating conservation priorities and effectiveness of management requires reliable trend estimates across multiple spatial scales. One potential data source for CWB trend estimation is the Colonial Waterbird Database, created...
Brief communication: Recent estimates of glacier mass loss for western North America from laser altimetry
Brian Menounos, Alex Gardner, Caitlyn Florentine, Andrew Fountain
2024, The Cryosphere (18) 889-894
Glaciers in western North American outside of Alaska are often overlooked in global studies because their potential to contribute to changes in sea level is small. Nonetheless, these glaciers represent important sources of freshwater, especially during times of drought. Differencing recent ICESat-2 data from a digital elevation model derived from...
Ursids evolved dietary diversity without major alterations in metabolic rates
Anthony M. Carnahan, Anthony M. Pagano, Amelia L. Christian, Karyn D. Rode, Charles T. Robbins
2024, Scientific Reports (14)
The diets of the eight species of ursids range from carnivory (e.g., polar bears, Ursus maritimus) to insectivory (e.g., sloth bears, Melursus ursinus), omnivory (e.g., brown bears, U. arctos), and herbivory (e.g., giant pandas, Ailuropoda melanoleuca). Dietary energy availability ranges from the high-fat, highly digestible, calorically dense diet of polar bears (~ 6.4 kcal digestible energy/g...
Geese migrating over the Pacific Ocean select altitudes coinciding with offshore wind turbine blades
Emily L. Weiser, Cory T. Overton, David C. Douglas, Michael L. Casazza, Paul L. Flint
2024, Journal of Applied Ecology (61) 951-962
Renewable energy facilities are a key part of mitigating climate change, but can pose threats to wild birds and bats, most often through collisions with infrastructure. Understanding collision risk and the factors affecting it can help minimize impacts on wild populations. For wind turbines, flight altitude is a major...
Sensitivity testing of marine turbidite age estimates along the Cascadia subduction zone
Lydia M. Staisch
2024, Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (114) 1739-1753
9 earthquakes ruptured the full Cascadia subduction zone (CSZ) in the past 10 kyr, a hypothesis that relies on concurrent turbidite deposition generated from seismogenic strong ground motion along the ∼1100 km margin. Correlation of marine turbidite deposits is based on petrophysical characteristics and...
Long-term occupancy monitoring reveals value of moderate disturbance for an open-habitat specialist, the Stephens' kangaroo rat (Dipodomys stephensi)
Cheryl S. Brehme, Philip Robert Gould, Denise Clark, Robert N. Fisher
2024, Conservation Science and Practice (6)
For species of conservation concern, long-term monitoring is vital to properly characterize changes in population distribution and abundance over time. In addition, long-term monitoring guides management decisions by informing and evaluating the efficacy of management actions. A long-term monitoring initiative for the federally threatened...
Development and calibration of HEC–RAS hydraulic, temperature, and nutrient models for the Mohawk River, New York
Thomas P. Suro, Michal J. Niemoczynski, Anna Boetsma
2024, Scientific Investigations Report 2024-5005
In support of a preliminary analysis performed by New York State Department of Environmental Conservation that found elevated nutrient levels along selected reaches of the Mohawk River, a one-dimensional, unsteady hydraulic and water-quality model (Hydrologic Engineering Center River Analysis System Nutrient Simulation Module 1 [HEC–RAS NSM I]) was developed by...
Invasive species research—Science for prevention, detection, containment, and control
Paul J. Heimowitz, Patrick M. Kocovsky, James J. English
2024, Fact Sheet 2024-3001
IntroductionInvasive species research within the U.S. Geological Survey’s (USGS) Ecosystems Mission Area focuses on invasive plants, animals, and pathogens throughout the United States. USGS scientists provide science support to help solve the problems posed by these nonnative species while working with partners in the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI),...
What waterfowl hunters want: Exploring heterogeneity in hunting trip preferences
Katherine A. Sainsbury, Howard W. Harshaw, David C. Fulton, Nicholas W. Cole, Ashley A. Dayer, Jennie N. Duberstein, Andrew H. Raedeke, Rudy Schuster, Mark P. Vrtiska
2024, Wetlands (44)
Canadian and American waterfowl hunters were surveyed to identify their hunting trip preferences. Respondents were individuals that were now participating or had participated in waterfowl hunting, and most had hunted the majority of the last five years. We identified four latent classes of waterfowl hunters that varied in their preferences for...
Sediment budget of a Maumee River headwater tributary: How streambank erosion, streambed-sediment storage, and streambed-sediment source inform our understanding of legacy phosphorus
Tanja N. Williamson, Faith Fitzpatrick, Rebecca M. Kreiling, James D. Blount, Diana L. Karwan
2024, Journal of Soils and Sediments (24) 1447-1463
ObjectiveWe described source and phosphorus (P) retention potential of soft, fine-grained, streambed sediment and associated phosphorus (sed-P) during summer low-flow conditions. Combining in-channel, sed-P storage with relative age provided context on relevance to western Lake Erie Basin management goals.MethodsIn 2019, rapid geomorphic assessment (30 reaches) compared...
Monthly variation in home range of a steppe-dwelling raptor
Georgia H. Isted, Robert J. Thomas, Kevin S. Warner, Matthew J. Stuber, Ethan A. Ellsworth, Todd E. Katzner
2024, Conference Paper, Conservation of biological diversity and development of the network of specially protected natural areas: Materials of the International Scientific and Practical Conference
Birds in steppe landscapes change their behaviour over the annual cycle. We used GPS telemetry to track 12 steppe-dwelling adult Ferruginous Hawks (Buteo regalis) to understand how their home ranges varied across the year. Home range sizes of territorial adult hawks showed strong intra-annual variation, being smallest from April to...
Abundance estimates of Gunnison’s prairie dogs compared to the number of active burrows
Aaron N. Facka, Robert Charles Lonsinger, Gary W. Roemer
2024, Wildlife Society Bulletin (48)
Reliable estimates of prairie dog (Cynomys spp.) population size and distribution are critical for assessing the status of prairie dogs and for selecting sites to reintroduce black-footed ferrets (Mustela nigripes). The density of active prairie dog burrows has commonly been used as an index of prairie dog abundance. Indices derived from...
Immunomodulation in adult largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides) exposed to a model estrogen or mixture of endocrine disrupting contaminants during early gonadal recrudescence
Jessica Kristin Leet, Catherine A. Richter, Rachel Claunch, Robert Gale, Donald E. Tillitt, Luke R. Iwanowicz
2024, Comparative Immunology Reports (6)
Disease outbreaks, skin lesions, fish kill events, and reproductive abnormalities have been observed in wild populations of Centrarchids in watersheds throughout the United States. Occurrence of synthetic and natural hormones from wastewater treatment plants and livestock operations, pesticides from agricultural land use, and phytoestrogens have been implicated as potential causes...
Fewer bowl traps and more hand netting can increase effective number of bee species and reduce excessive captures
Diane L. Larson, Nora P. Pennarola, Julia B. Leone, Jennifer L. Larson
2024, Ecology and Evolution (14)
Reports increasingly point to substantial declines in wild bee abundance and diversity, yet there is uncertainty about how best to measure these attributes in wild bee populations. Two commonly used methods are passive trapping with bee bowls or active netting of bees on flowers, but each of these has drawbacks....
Evaluating ecosystem protection and fragmentation of the world's major mountain regions
David M. Theobald, Aerin Jacobs, Paul R. Elsen, Erik A. Beever, Libby Ehlers, Jodi Hilty
2024, Conservation Biology (38)
Conserving mountains is important for protecting biodiversity because they have high beta diversity and endemicity, facilitate species movement, and provide numerous ecosystem benefits for people. Mountains are often thought to have lower levels of human modification and contain more protected area than surrounding lowlands. To...
