The importance of the Northeastern Gulf of Mexico to foraging loggerhead sea turtles
Kristen M. Hart, Margaret M. Lamont, Autumn Iverson, Brian Smith
2020, Frontiers in Marine Science (7)
Identification of high-use foraging sites where imperiled sea turtles are resident remains a globally-recognized conservation priority. In the biodiverse Gulf of Mexico (GoM), recent telemetry studies highlighted post-nesting foraging sites for federally threatened loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta). Our aim here was to discern loggerhead use of additional northern GoM regions...
Regime change in a large-floodplain river ecosystem: Patterns in body-size and functional biomass indicate a shift in fish communities
Kristen L. Bouska
2020, Biological Invasions (22) 3371-3389
Changes in species dominance may drive regime shifts because dominant biotic feedbacks reflect functional traits of a community. Changes in species dominance has been documented by a 25-year fish community dataset encompassing six reaches of the Upper Mississippi and Illinois Rivers. Specifically, common carp (Cyprinus carpio)...
2019 fiscal year state of the Survey
U.S. Geological Survey, Office of Budget, Planning, and Integration
2020, Report
This first of its kind publication, the USGS “2019 Fiscal Year State of the Survey” report, highlights notable USGS accomplishments over the past year that have contributed to meeting our goals and priorities in support of the Department of the Interior Strategic Plan. The activities summarized in this report demonstrate...
The remarkable volcanism of Shastina, a stratocone segment of Mount Shasta, California
Robert L. Christiansen, Andrew T. Calvert, Duane E. Champion, Cynthia A. Gardner, Judith E. Fierstein, Jorge A. Vazquez
2020, Geosphere (16) 1153-1178
Mount Shasta, a 400 km3 volcano in northern California (United States), is the most voluminous stratocone of the Cascade arc. Most Mount Shasta lavas vented at or near the present summit; relatively smaller volumes erupted from scattered vents on the volcano’s flanks. An apron of pyroclastic and debris flows surrounds it.Shastina,...
Plant biomass and rates of carbon dioxide uptake are enhanced by successful restoration of tidal connectivity in salt marshes
Fanning Wang, Meagan J. Eagle, Kevin D. Kroeger, Amanda C. Spivak, Jianwu Tang
2020, Science of the Total Environment (750)
Salt marshes, due to their capability to bury soil carbon (C), are potentially important regional C sinks. Efforts to restore tidal flow to former salt marshes have increased in recent decades in New England (USA), as well as in some other parts of the...
Risk of predation on offspring reduces parental provisioning, but not flight performance or survival across early life stages
James C. Mouton, Bret W. Tobalske, Natalie A. Wright, Thomas E. Martin
2020, Functional Ecology (34) 2147-2157
Developmental responses can help young animals reduce predation risk but can also yield costs to performance and survival in subsequent life stages with major implications for lifetime fitness. Compensatory mechanisms may evolve to offset such costs, but evidence from natural systems is largely lacking.In songbirds, increased nest predation risk...
Postfire growth of seeded and planted big sagebrush - Strategic designs for restoring Greater Sage-grouse nesting habitat
David A. Pyke, Robert K. Shriver, Robert S. Arkle, David S. Pilliod, Cameron L. Aldridge, Peter S. Coates, Matthew Germino, Julie A. Heinrichs, Mark A. Ricca, Scott Shaff
2020, Restoration Ecology (28) 1495-1504
Wildfires change plant community structure and impact wildlife habitat and population dynamics. Recent wildfire‐induced losses of big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) in North American shrublands are outpacing natural recovery and leading to substantial losses in habitat for sagebrush‐obligate species such as Greater Sage‐grouse. Managers are considering restoration strategies that include planting...
Using genetic data to estimate capture rate of Wisconsin and Leech Lake strains of Muskellunge stocked in four Wisconsin Lakes
Wesley Larson, Thompson Hill, David Rowe, Daniel Oele, Joseph Gerbyshak, Jennifer Bergman
2020, North American Journal of Fisheries Management (40) 1302-1312
Many inland fisheries are supported by stocking of hatchery-produced fish, and fisheries managers often face difficult decisions regarding strain selection. Stocking evaluations designed to quantify differences in strain performance provide valuable data for designing stocking programs. Here, we use genetic tools to investigate capture rate of two strains of Muskellunge...
Integrating airborne remote sensing and field campaigns for ecology and Earth system science
K. Dana Chadwick, Philip G. Brodrick, Kathleen Grant, Tristan Goulden, Amanda Henderson, Nicola Falco, Haruko Wainwright, Kenneth Williams, Markus Bill, Ian Breckheimer, Eoin Brodie, Heidi Steltzer, C. F. Rick Williams, Benjamin Blonder, Jiancong Chen, Baptiste Dafflon, Joan Damerow, Matt Hancher, Aizah Khurram, Jack Lamb, Corey R. Lawrence, Maeve McCormick, John Musinsky, Samuel Pierce, Alexander Polussa, Maceo Hastings Porro, Andea Scott, Hans Wu Singh, Patrick O. Sorensen, Charuleka Varadharajan, Bizuayehu Whitney, Katharine Maher
2020, Methods in Ecology and Evolution (11) 1492-1508
In recent years, the availability of airborne imaging spectroscopy (hyperspectral) data has expanded dramatically. The high spatial and spectral resolution of these data uniquely enable spatially explicit ecological studies including species mapping, assessment of drought mortality and foliar trait distributions. However, we have barely begun to unlock the potential...
Small mammals and ungulates respond to and interact with revegetation processes following dam removal
Rebecca McCaffery, Kurt J. Jenkins, Sara Cendejas-Zarelli, Patricia J. Happe, K.A. Sager-Fradkin
2020, Food Webs (25)
Terrestrial wildlife communities are often overlooked as components of ecosystem restoration following dam removal. However, a diverse mammalian fauna colonizes habitat on dewatered reservoirs and may influence restoration processes. We studied mammalian colonization and ungulate herbivory from 2014 to 2018 following the removal of two large dams on the Elwha...
Sources, fate, and flux of riverine solutes in the Southwest Yellowstone Plateau Volcanic Field, USA
R. Blaine McCleskey, Shaul Hurwitz, Erin B White, David A. Roth, David Susong, Jefferson Hungerford, Lonnie A. Olson
2020, Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research (403)
Since the 1970s, temporal variations of hydrothermal discharge and thermal output from the numerous hydrothermal features in the Yellowstone Plateau Volcanic Field (YPVF) have been studied by measuring the chloride flux in the major rivers. In this study, the sources, fate, and flux of solutes in the Fall River and...
Genesis and spread of multiple reassortants during the 2016/2017 H5 avian influenza epidemic in Eurasia
Samantha Lycett, Anne Pohlmann, Christoph Staubach, Valentina Caliendo, Mark Woolhouse, Martin Beer, Thijs Kuiken, The Global Consortium for H5N8 and Related Influenza Viruses, Steven van Borm, Andrew Breed, Francois-Xavier Briand, Ian Brown, Adam Dan, Thomas J. DeLiberto, Sophie von Dobschuetz, Ron A. M. Fouchier, Marius Gilbert, Sarah Hill, Charlotte Kristiane Hjulsager, S. Ip, Marion Koopmans, Lars Erik Larsen, Dong-Hun Lee, Mahmoud Mohamed Naguib, I. Monne, Oliver Pybus, Andrew M. Ramey, Vladmir Savic, Kirill Sharshov, Alexander Shestopalov, Chang-Seon Song, Mieke Steensels, David Swayne, Edyta Swieton, Xiu-Feng Wan, Siamak Zohari
Peter Palese, editor(s)
2020, PNAS (117) 20814-20825
Highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) viruses of the H5 A/goose/Guangdong/1/96 lineage can cause severe disease in poultry and wild birds, and occasionally in humans. In recent years, H5 HPAI viruses of this lineage infecting poultry in Asia have spilled over into wild birds and spread via bird migration to countries...
Ancient Martian aeolian sand dune deposits recorded in the stratigraphy of Valles Marineris and implications for past climates
Matthew Chojnacki, Lori K. Fenton, Aaron R Weintraub, Lauren A. Edgar, Mohini Jeetendra Jodhpurkar, Christopher S. Edwards
2020, Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets (125)
Aeolian sediment transport, deposition, and erosion have been ongoing throughout Mars's history. This record of widespread aeolian processes is preserved in landforms and geologic units that retain important clues about past environmental conditions including wind patterns. In this study we describe landforms within Melas Chasma, Valles Marineris, that occur in...
Ecosystem services of riparian restoration: A review of rock detention structures in the Madrean Archipelago Ecoregion
Laura M. Norman
2020, Air, Soil and Water Research (13)
In northwestern Mexico and the southwestern United States, limited water supplies and fragile landscapes jeopardize world-renowned biological diversity. Simple rock detention structures have been used to manage agricultural water for over a thousand years and are now being installed to restore ecohydrological functionality but with little scientific evidence of their...
Focused fluid flow along the Nootka Fault Zone and continental slope, Explorer-Juan de Fuca plate boundary
M. Riedel, K .M. M. Rohr, G. D. Spence, D. Kelley, J. Delaney, L. Lapham, John Pohlman, R.D. Hyndman, E.C. Willoughby
2020, Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems (21)
Geophysical and geochemical data indicate there is abundant fluid expulsion in the Nootka fault zone (NFZ) between the Juan de Fuca and Explorer plates and the Nootka continental slope. Here we combine observations from > 20 years of investigations to demonstrate the nature of fluid-flow along the NFZ, which is the...
Comparative performance and trend of remotely sensed phenology and productivity metrics across the Western United States
Tabitha A. Graves, Ethan Edward Berman, Nathaniel Mikle, Jerod Merkle, Aaron N. Johnston, Geneva W. Chong
2020, Remote Sensing (12)
Vegetation phenology and productivity play a crucial role in surface energy balance, plant and animal distribution, and animal movement and habitat use and can be measured with remote sensing metrics including start of season (SOS), peak instantaneous rate of green-up date (PIRGd), peak of...
Bidirectional connectivity via fish ladders in a large Neotropical river: Response to a comment
L.F. Celestino, F.J. Sanz-Ronda, Leandro E. Miranda, M. C. Makrakis, J. H. Pinheiro Dias, S. Makrakis
2020, River Research and Applications (36) 1377-1381
In a recent article, we described fitting electronic tags to the fish Prochilodus lineatus to document how a fishway connected aquatic habitats downstream and upstream of a major dam. Moreover, given that tagged fish remained upstream or downstream for periods extending months and years before returning to the fishway, and that observed...
Data-driven, multi-model workflow suggests strong influence from hurricanes on the generation of turbidity currents in the Gulf of Mexico
Courtney K. Harris, Jaia Syvitski, H.G. Arango, E. H. Meiburg, Sagy Cohen, C.J. Jenkins, Justin J. Birchler, E. W. H. Hutton, T. A. Kniskern, S. Radhakrishnan, Guillermo Auad
2020, Journal of Marine Science and Engineering (8)
Turbidity currents deliver sediment rapidly from the continental shelf to the slope and beyond; and can be triggered by processes such as shelf resuspension during oceanic storms; mass failure of slope deposits due to sediment- and wave-pressure loadings; and localized events that grow into sustained currents via self-amplifying ignition. Because...
U.S. Geological Survey—Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center 2018 research activity report
Mark H. Sherfy, editor(s)
2020, Circular 1465
The mission of Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center is to provide scientific information needed to conserve and manage the Nation’s natural capital for current and future generations, with an emphasis on migratory birds, Department of the Interior trust resources, and ecosystems of the Nation’s interior. This report provides an overview...
Evaluation of acute and chronic toxicity of nickel and zinc to 2 sensitive freshwater benthic invertebrates using refined testing methods
Ning Wang, James L. Kunz, Danielle M. Cleveland, Jeffery A. Steevens, Edward J. Hammer, Eric Van Genderen, Adam C. Ryan, Christian E. Schlekat
2020, Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (39) 2256-2268
The US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) is reviewing the protectiveness of the national ambient water quality criteria (WQC) for nickel (Ni) and zinc (Zn) and compiling toxicity databases to update the WQC. An amphipod (Hyalella azteca) and a unionid mussel (Lampsilis siliquoidea) have shown high sensitivity to Ni and Zn...
A hybrid approach for predictive soil property mapping using conventional soil survey data
Travis W. Nauman, Michael C. Duniway
2020, Soil Science Society of America Journal (84) 170-1194
Soil property maps are important for land management and earth systems modeling. A new hybrid point-disaggregation predictive soil property mapping strategy improved mapping in the Colorado River Basin, and can be applied to other areas with similar data (e.g. conterminous United States). This new approach increased sample size ~6-fold over...
Evaluation of genetic structuring within GIS‐derived Brook Trout management units
Lucas Nathan, Y. Kanno, Benjamin Letcher, Amy B. Welsh, Andrew R. Whiteley, Jason C. Vokoun
2020, Transactions of the American Fisheries Society (149) 681-694
Delineation of management units across broad spatial scales can help to visualize population structuring and identify conservation opportunities. Geographical information system (GIS) approaches can be useful for developing broad‐scale management units, especially when paired with field data that can validate the GIS‐based delineations. Genetic data can be useful for evaluating...
The freshwater mysid Mysis diluviana (Audzijonyte and Väinölä, 2005) (Mysida: Mysidae) consumes detritus in the presence of Daphnia (Cladocera: Daphniidae)
Jessica E. Griffin, Brian O’Malley, Jason D. Stockwell
2020, Journal of Crustacean Biology
Freshwater mysids of the Mysis relicta group are omnivorous macroinvertebrates that form an important link between fishes and lower trophic levels in many north temperate to Arctic lakes, where they exhibit diel vertical migration (DVM) to exploit subsurface food-rich layers at night. Benthic food resources have been assumed to be...
Dynamics of lake trout production in the main basin of Lake Huron
Ji X. He, James R. Bence, Charles P. Madenjian, Randall M. Claramunt
2020, ICES Journal of Marine Science (77) 975-987
To inform lake trout (Salvelinus namaycush) fishery management in Lake Huron that has undergone rapid ecosystem changes, we quantified lake trout production dynamics by coupling age-structured stock assessment and fish bioenergetics models. Our approach revealed the connection between piscivore production and prey consumption, included growth compensation to reproduction losses,...
Methods for rapid quality assessment for national-scale land surface change monitoring
Qiang Zhou, Christopher Barber, George Z. Xian
2020, Remote Sensing (12)
Providing rapid access to land surface change data and information is a goal of the U.S. Geological Survey. Through the Land Change Monitoring, Assessment, and Projection (LCMAP) initiative, we have initiated a monitoring capability that involves generating a suite of ten annual land cover and land surface change datasets...
