Observations of acrobat ants (Crematogaster sp.) preying on the eggs of the invasive giant applesnail (Pomacea maculata)
Jacoby Carter, Jennifer Wilson, Susan Mopper
2021, Southeastern Naturalist (1) N15-N18
Herein we provide direct evidence for the consumption of Pomacea maculata (Giant Applesnail) eggs by ants in the genus Crematogaster. The observations were made during removal of snail egg masses at the Hudson Woods Unit of the Texas Mid-Coast National Wildlife Refuge, TX. We observed acrobat ants (Crematogaster sp.) removing snail eggs from an...
Seasonal impoundment alters patterns of tidal wetland plant diversity across spatial scales
Scott Jones, Christopher N. Janousek, Michael L. Casazza, John Y. Takekawa, Karen M. Thorne
2021, Ecosphere (12)
Understanding patterns of biodiversity is a key goal of ecology and is especially pressing in the current human‐caused biodiversity crisis. In wetland ecosystems, human impacts are centered around hydrologic manipulation including the common practice of wetland diking and impoundment. Constraining how wetland management influences plant biodiversity patterns across spatial scales...
Microbial and viral indicators of pathogens and human health risks from recreational exposure to waters impaired by fecal contamination
Anna M. McKee, Marcella A. Cruz
2021, Journal of Sustainable Water in the Built Environment (7)
Fecal indicator bacteria (FIB) (e.g., fecal coliforms, Escherichia coli, and enterococci) have been used for decades to monitor for and protect the public from waterborne pathogens from fecal contamination. However, FIB may not perform well at predicting the presence of waterborne pathogens or human health outcomes from recreational exposure...
Landsat 8 thermal infrared sensor scene select mechanism open loop operations
Michael J. Choate, R. Rengarajan, James C. Storey, Tim Beckmann
2021, MDPI Remote Sensing (13)
The Landsat 8 (L8) spacecraft and its two instruments, the operational land imager (OLI) and thermal infrared sensor (TIRS), have been consistently characterized and calibrated since its launch in February 2013. These performance metrics and calibration updates are determined through the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Landsat image assessment system...
Improving remotely sensed river bathymetry by image-averaging
Carl J. Legleiter, Paul J. Kinzel
2021, Water Resources Research (57)
Basic data on river bathymetry is critical for numerous applications in river research and management and is increasingly obtained via remote sensing, but the noisy, pixelated appearance of image‐derived depth maps can compromise subsequent analyses. We hypothesized that this noise originates from reflectance from an irregular...
Enzootic plague reduces survival of Mexican woodrats (Neotoma mexicana) in Colorado
Dean E. Biggins, Shantini Ramakrishnan, Tonie E. Rocke, Judy L. Williamson, Jeffrey Wimsatt
2021, Ecosphere (12)
Plague is a flea-vectored disease introduced to North America c. 1900. It is lethal to many American mammal species, causes major die-offs (epizootics) in some populations, and may be ecologically disruptive even at lower interepizootic (enzootic) levels of transmission. We sought to determine the effects of...
Winter roost selection of Lasiurine tree bats in a pyric landscape
Marcelo H. Jorge, W. Mark Ford, Sara E. Sweeten, Samuel R. Freeze, Michael C. TRUE, Michael J. St. Germain, Hila Taylor, Katherine M. Gorman, Michael J. Cherry, Elina P. Garrison
2021, PLoS ONE (16)
Day-roost selection by Lasiurine tree bats during winter and their response to dormant season fires is unknown in the southeastern United States where dormant season burning is widely applied. Although fires historically were predominantly growing season, they now occur in the dormant season in this part...
Estimation of suspended sediment at a discontinued streamgage on the lower Minnesota River at Fort Snelling State Park, Minnesota
Joel T. Groten, Jon S. Hendrickson, Linda R. Loomis
2021, Open-File Report 2021-1005
In the spring of 2019, ice sheets transported down-stream during a large streamflow rise event in the lower Minnesota River destroyed an index-velocity streamgage at the Minnesota River at Fort Snelling State Park, Minnesota (U.S. Geological Survey station 05330920; hereafter referred to as “Ft. Snelling”). The streamgage previously used an...
Book review: Replacing GDP by 2030: Towards a common language for the well-being and sustainability community, Rutger Hoekstra, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (2019)
Kenneth J. Bagstad, Mairi-Jane Fox
2021, Ecological Economics (183)
Critiques of gross domestic product (GDP) as the economy's primary measuring stick have emanated from the feminist and ecological economics communities for decades (Kubiszewski et al., 2013) and have grown to include mainstream economists (Stiglitz, Sen, and Fitousi, 2009) and national accountants...
The critical minerals initiative of the U.S. Geological Survey’s mineral deposit database project: USMIN
Jeffrey L. Mauk, Nick A Karl, Carma A. San Juan, Liam Dandurand Knudsen, German Schmeda, Clayton Robert Forbush, Bradley S. Van Gosen, Morgan Mullins, Patrick Christopher Scott
2021, Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration (MME) (38) 775-797
The objective of the US Geological Survey’s mineral deposit database project (USMIN) is to develop a comprehensive twenty-first century geospatial database that is the authoritative source of the most important mines, mineral deposits, and mineral districts of the US. Since May 2017, the project has focused...
Forecasting the frequency and magnitude of postfire debris flows across southern California
Jason W. Kean, Dennis M. Staley
2021, Earth's Future (9)
Southern California has a long history of damaging debris flows after wildfire. Despite recurrent loss, forecasts of the frequency and magnitude of postfire debris flows are not available for the region like they are for earthquakes. Instead, debris flow hazards are typically assessed in a reactive manner after wildfires. Such...
Integrating sequence capture and restriction-site associated DNA sequencing to resolve recent radiations of pelagic seabirds
Joan Ferrer Obiol, Helen F. James, R. Terry Chesser, Vincent Bretagnolle, Jacob Gonzalez-Solis, Julio Rozas, Marta Riutort, Andreanna J. Welch
2021, Systematic Biology (70) 976-996
The diversification of modern birds has been shaped by a number of radiations. Rapid diversification events make reconstructing the evolutionary relationships among taxa challenging due to the convoluted effects of incomplete lineage sorting (ILS) and introgression. Phylogenomic data sets have the potential to detect patterns of phylogenetic incongruence, and to...
Intraspecific variation in incubation behaviors along a latitudinal gradient is driven by nest microclimate and selection on neonate quality
Carl G. Lunblad, Courtney J. Conway
2021, Functional Ecology (35) 1028-1040
The strategies by which animals allocate reproductive effort across their lifetimes vary, and the causes of variation in those strategies are actively debated. In birds, most research has focused heavily on variation in clutch size and fecundity, but incubation behaviour and other functionally related traits have received less attention....
Only sun-lit leaves of the uppermost canopy exceed both air temperature and photosynthetic thermal optima in a wet tropical forest
Benjamin D. Miller, Kelsey R. Carter, Sasha C. Reed, Tana E. Wood, Molly A. Cavaleri
2021, Agricultural and Forest Meteorology (301-302)
Tropical forests have evolved under relatively narrow temperature regimes, and therefore may be more susceptible to climatic change than forests in higher latitudes. Recent evidence shows that lowland tropical forest canopies may already be exceeding thermal maxima for photosynthesis. Height can strongly...
Occurrence, resource use, and demography of the common raven in North America: A research synthesis
William C. Webb, Peter S. Coates, Seth J. Dettenmaier, David J. Delehanty
2021, Human–Wildlife Interactions (15) 304-317
We reviewed the scientific literature to inventory existing studies of common raven (Corvus corax; raven) ecology in western North America. We conducted an intial literature review between June 2015 and March 2018. Prior to completing our review, we revisited the published literature for any additional relevant studies in...
Reduced recruitment of Chinook salmon in a leveed bar-built estuary
Emily K. Chen, Mark J. Henderson
2021, Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (78) 894-904
Estuaries are commonly touted as nurseries for salmonids, providing numerous advantages for smolts prior to ocean entry. In bar-built estuaries, sandbars form at the mouth of rivers during periods of low stream flow, closing access to the ocean and preventing outmigration. We evaluated how summer residency in a leveed bar-built...
Water-level conditions in the confined aquifers of the New Jersey Coastal Plain, 2013
Alison D. Gordon, Glen B. Carleton, Robert Rosman
2021, Scientific Investigations Report 2019-5146
The Coastal Plain aquifers of New Jersey provide an important source of water for more than 3.5 million people. In 2013, groundwater withdrawals from 10 confined aquifers of the New Jersey Coastal Plain totaled about 190 million gallons per day. Steadily increasing withdrawals from the late 1800s to the early...
A Tennessee Warbler (Leiothlypis peregrina) captured in the web of a golden silk orb-weaver (Trichonephila clavipes)
Theodore J. Zenzal Jr., Liliana Calderon, Joshua Lefever, Vincent Weber
2021, Wilson Journal of Ornithology (132) 456-459
During migration, transient birds usually find themselves stopping in unfamiliar habitats in order to rest and refuel before resuming migratory flight. Here we document the first case, to our knowledge, of a Tennessee Warbler (Leiothlypis peregrina) entrapped in a spiderweb. The warbler's tarsus became caught in the mooring thread of...
A regional spatio-temporal analysis of large magnitude snow avalanches using tree rings
Erich H. Peitzsch, Jordy Hendrikx, Daniel Kent Stahle, Gregory T. Pederson, Karl W. Birkeland, Daniel B. Fagre
2021, Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences (21) 533-557
Snow avalanches affect transportation corridors and settlements worldwide. In many mountainous regions, robust records of avalanche frequency and magnitude are sparse or non-existent. However, dendrochronological methods can be used to fill this gap and infer historical avalanche patterns. In this study, we developed a tree-ring-based avalanche chronology for large magnitude...
Ground‐penetrating radar, electromagnetic induction, terrain, and vegetation observations coupled with machine learning to map permafrost distribution at Twelvemile Lake, Alaska
S. Campbell, Martin A. Briggs, S.P. Roy, T. A. Douglas, S. Saari
2021, Permafrost and Periglacial Processes (32) 407-426
We collected ground‐penetrating radar (GPR) and frequency‐domain electromagnetic induction (FDEM) profiles in 2011 and 2012 to identify the extent of permafrost relative to surface biomass and solar insolation around Twelvemile Lake near Fort Yukon, Alaska. We compared a Landsat‐derived biomass estimate and modeled solar insolation from...
Identifying geomorphic process domains in the synthetic landscapes of West Virginia, USA
Kristin L. Jaeger, Matthew V Ross
2021, Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface (126)
Human activities such as mining, agriculture, and urbanization have resulted in severe, large‐scale alteration to landform organization and associated geomorphic processes. The mountaintop mining (MTM) region of West Virginia, USA has experienced dramatic topographic alteration, by removing steep slopes and introducing plateau‐like areas at ridgelines and benches...
Geological Surveys unite to improve critical mineral security
Poul Emsbo, Christopher Lawley, Karol Czarnota
2021, Eos Science News
The global economy is unprepared to meet the exploding demand for critical minerals. These materials, many of which were of little economic interest until recently, are required to fuel a proliferation of technologies and industries that have become vital for social and economic well-being the world over. But supplies of...
Songbird use of interior and edge floodplain forest sites along the Upper Mississippi River, USA, during spring migration and breeding seasons
Eileen M. Kirsch, Brian R. Gray
2021, Wilson Journal of Ornithology (132) 355-378
Floodplain forests of large rivers in the midwestern United States are naturally fragmented by sloughs, backwaters, wetlands, and shrub carr. On the highly altered Upper Mississippi River (UMR), resource managers want to protect and manage floodplain forests to benefit forest “interior” bird species. To discover bird relations with interior and...
Can modeling the geologic record contribute to constraining the tectonic source of the AD 1755 Great Lisbon earthquake?
Francisco Dourado, Pedro JM Costa, SeanPaul La Selle, Caesar Andrade, Ivana Bosnic, Guy R. Gelfenbaum
2021, Earth and Space Science (8)
The precise location of the seismic source of 1755 CE Great Lisbon earthquake is still uncertain. The aim of this work is to use an onland sedimentary record in southern Portugal to test and validate seismic sources for the earthquake. To achieve this, tsunami deposit thicknesses from...
Effects of surveying for the federally endangered Spruce-fir Moss Spider (Microhexura montivaga Crosby & Bishop) on its bryophyte habitat
Corinne A. Diggins, W. Mark Ford
2021, Southeastern Naturalist (20) 77-91
Microhexura montivaga (Spruce-fir Moss Spider) is a federally endangered arachnid endemic to high-elevation montane conifer forests of the southern Appalachian Mountains. The spider is cryptic and difficult to monitor because this species lives in the interface between the bryophyte mat and the rock surface. Since temporary...
