Tools to minimize interlaboratory variability in vitellogenin gene expression monitoring programs
Aaron Jastrow, Denise A. Gordon, Kasie M. Auger, Elizabeth C. Punska, Kathleen F. Arcaro, Kristen Keteles, Dana L. Winkelman, David Lattier, Adam Biales, James M. Lazorchak
2017, Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (36) 3102-3107
The egg yolk precursor protein vitellogenin is widely used as a biomarker of estrogen exposure in male fish. However, standardized methodology is lacking and little is known regarding the reproducibility of results among laboratories using different equipment, reagents, protocols, and data analysis programs. To address this data gap we tested...
Updated polychlorinated biphenyl mass budget for Lake Michigan
Jiehong Guo, Kevin Romanak, Stephen M. Westenbroek, An Li, Russell Kreis, Ronald A. Hites, Marta Venier
2017, Environmental Science & Technology (51) 12455-12465
This study revisits and updates the Lake Michigan Mass Balance Project (LMMBP) for polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) that was conducted in 1994–1995. This work uses recent concentrations of PCBs in tributary and open lake water, air, and sediment to calculate an updated mass budget. Five of the 11 LMMBP tributaries were...
Submersed aquatic vegetation in Chesapeake Bay: Sentinel species in a changing world
Robert J. Orth, William C. Dennison, Jonathon S. Lefcheck, Cassie Gurbisz, Michael P. Hannam, Jennifer L. Keisman, J. Brooke Landry, Kenneth A. Moore, Rebecca Murphy, Christopher J. Patrick, Jeremy Testa, Donald E. Weller, David J. Wilcox
2017, BioScience (67) 698-712
Chesapeake Bay has undergone profound changes since European settlement. Increases in human and livestock populations, associated changes in land use, increases in nutrient loadings, shoreline armoring, and depletion of fish stocks have altered the important habitats within the Bay. Submersed aquatic vegetation (SAV) is a critical foundational habitat and provides...
Defining a Safe Operating Space for inland recreational fisheries
Stephen R. Carpenter, William A. Brock, Gretchen J. A. Hansen, Jonathan F. Hansen, Joseph M. Hennessy, Daniel A. Isermann, Eric J. Pedersen, K. Martin Perales, Andrew L. Rypel, Greg G. Sass, Tyler D. Tunney, M. Jake Vander Zanden
2017, Fish and Fisheries (18) 1150-1160
The Safe Operating Space (SOS) of a recreational fishery is the multidimensional region defined by levels of harvest, angler effort, habitat, predation and other factors in which the fishery is sustainable into the future. SOS boundaries exhibit trade-offs such that decreases in harvest can compensate to some degree for losses...
Basis function models for animal movement
Mevin Hooten, Devin S. Johnson
2017, Journal of the American Statistical Association (112) 578-589
Advances in satellite-based data collection techniques have served as a catalyst for new statistical methodology to analyze these data. In wildlife ecological studies, satellite-based data and methodology have provided a wealth of information about animal space use and the investigation of individual-based animal–environment relationships. With the technology for data collection...
Potential for spatial displacement of Cook Inlet beluga whales by anthropogenic noise in critical habitat
Robert J. Small, Brian M. Brost, Mevin Hooten, Manuel Castellote, Jeffrey Mondragon
2017, Endangered Species Research (32) 43-57
The population of beluga whales in Cook Inlet, Alaska, USA, declined by nearly half in the mid-1990s, primarily from an unsustainable harvest, and was listed as endangered in 2008. In 2014, abundance was ~340 whales, and the population trend during 1999-2014 was -1.3% yr-1. Cook Inlet beluga whales are...
A model-based approach to wildland fire reconstruction using sediment charcoal records
Malcolm S. Itter, Andrew O. Finley, Mevin Hooten, Philip E. Higuera, Jennifer R. Marlon, Ryan Kelly, Jason S. McLachlan
2017, Environmetrics (28) 1-15
Lake sediment charcoal records are used in paleoecological analyses to reconstruct fire history, including the identification of past wildland fires. One challenge of applying sediment charcoal records to infer fire history is the separation of charcoal associated with local fire occurrence and charcoal originating from regional fire activity. Despite a...
Refined conservation strategies for Golden-winged Warblers in the West Virginia highlands with implications for the broader avian community
Kyle R. Aldinger, Petra B. Wood, Catherine M. Johnson
2017, The Condor (119) 762-786
Golden-winged Warbler (Vermivora chrysoptera) populations in the Appalachian Mountains region of North America are imperiled, warranting species-specific conservation. However, management for Golden-winged Warblers can affect both early-successional and forest species, many of which are also declining in the region. We conducted point counts in sites representing a range of successional...
The gold tegu, Tupinambis teguixin (Linnaeus, 1758) sensu lato (Squamata: Teiidae): evidence for an established population in Florida
Jake R. Edwards, Jennifer K. Ketterlin, Michael R. Rochford, Rodney Irwin, Kenneth L. Krysko, James G. Duquesnel, Frank J. Mazzotti, Robert Reed
2017, BioInvasions Records (6) 407-410
Gold tegus, Tupinambis teguixin (Linnaeus, 1758), are generalist predators from South America and are ecologically similar to Argentine black and white tegus (Salvator merianae), a successful invader in Florida. We trapped gold tegus in Broward and Miami-Dade counties, Florida, USA. In Miami-Dade County, collection occurred from 2008 through 2016. We combined new...
Age structure
Craig P. Paukert, Jonathan J. Spurgeon
2017, Book chapter, Age and growth of fishes: Principles and techniques
No abstract available....
Alternative pathways to landscape transformation: Invasive grasses, burn severity and fire frequency in arid ecosystems
Robert C. Klinger, Matthew L. Brooks
2017, Journal of Ecology (105) 1521-1533
Arid ecosystems are often vulnerable to transformation to invasive-dominated states following fire, but data on persistence of these states are sparse. The grass/fire cycle is a feedback process between invasive annual grasses and fire frequency that often leads to the formation of alternative vegetation states dominated by...
Drivers and environmental responses to the changing annual snow cycle of northern Alaska
Christopher J. Cox, Robert S. Stone, David C. Douglas, Diane Stanitski, George J. Divoky, Geoff S. Dutton, Colm Sweeney, J. Craig George, David U. Longenecker
2017, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society (98) 2559-2577
On the North Slope of Alaska, earlier spring snowmelt and later onset of autumn snow accumulation are tied to atmospheric dynamics and sea ice conditions, and result in environmental responses.Linkages between atmospheric, ecological and biogeochemical variables in the changing Arctic are analyzed using long-term measurements near...
High altitude flights by ruddy shelduck Tadorna ferruginea during trans-Himalayan migrations
N. Parr, S. Bearhop, David C. Douglas, J.Y. Takekawa, Diann J. Prosser, S.H. Newman, W.M. Perry, S. Balachandran, M.J. Witt, Y. Hou, Z. Lu, L.A. Hawkes
2017, Journal of Avian Biology (48) 1310-1315
Birds that migrate across high altitude mountain ranges are faced with the challenge of maintaining vigorous exercise in environments with limited oxygen. Ruddy shelducks are known to use wintering grounds south of the Tibetan Plateau at sea level and breeding grounds north of Himalayan mountain range. Therefore, it is likely...
Breeding biology of an endemic Bornean turdid, the Fruithunter (Chlamydochaera jefferyi), and life history comparisons with Turdus species of the world
Adam E. Mitchell, Fred Tuh, Thomas E. Martin
2017, Wilson Journal of Ornithology (129) 36-45
We present the first description of the breeding biology for the Fruithunter (Chlamydochaera jefferyi), a member of the cosmopolitan family Turdidae, and a montane endemic to the tropical Asian island of Borneo. We also compile breeding biology traits from the literature to make comparisons between the Fruithunter and the thrush...
Estimating the high-arsenic domestic-well population in the conterminous United States
Joseph D. Ayotte, Laura Medalie, Sharon L. Qi, Lorraine C. Backer, Bernard T. Nolan
2017, Environmental Science & Technology (51) 12443-12454
Arsenic concentrations from 20 450 domestic wells in the U.S. were used to develop a logistic regression model of the probability of having arsenic >10 μg/L (“high arsenic”), which is presented at the county, state, and national scales. Variables representing geologic sources, geochemical, hydrologic, and physical features were among the significant...
Concepts: Assessing tiger population dynamics using capture–recapture sampling
J. Andrew Royle, Arjun M. Gopalaswamy, Robert Dorazio, James D. Nichols, Devcharan Jathanna, Ravishankar Parameshwaran
2017, Book chapter, Methods for monitoring tiger and prey populations
Capture-recapture can be viewed as an animal survey method in which the count statistic is the total number of animals caught, and the associated detection probability is the probability of capture....
Skin and fur bacterial diversity and community structure on American southwestern bats: effects of habitat, geography and bat traits
Ara S. Winter, Jennifer J. M. Hathaway, Jason C. Kimble, Debbie C. Buecher, Ernest W. Valdez, Andrea Porras-Alfaro, Jesse M. Young, Kaitlyn J. H. Read, Diana E. Northup
2017, PeerJ (5)
Microorganisms that reside on and in mammals, such as bats, have the potential to influence their host’s health and to provide defenses against invading pathogens. However, we have little understanding of the skin and fur bacterial microbiota on bats, or factors that influence the structure of these communities. The southwestern...
The response of soil and stream chemistry to decreases in acid deposition in the Catskill Mountains, New York, USA
Michael McHale, Douglas A. Burns, Jason Siemion, Michael R. Antidormi
2017, Environmental Pollution (229) 607-620
The Catskill Mountains have been adversely impacted by decades of acid deposition, however, since the early 1990s, levels have decreased sharply as a result of decreases in emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides. This study examines trends in acid deposition, stream-water chemistry, and soil chemistry in the southeastern Catskill...
Detecting spatial patterns of rivermouth processes using a geostatistical framework for near-real-time analysis
Wenzhao Xu, Paris D. Collingsworth, Barbara Bailey, Martha L. Carlson Mazur, Jeff Schaeffer, Barbara Minsker
2017, Environmental Modelling and Software (97) 72-85
This paper proposes a geospatial analysis framework and software to interpret water-quality sampling data from towed undulating vehicles in near-real time. The framework includes data quality assurance and quality control processes, automated kriging interpolation along undulating paths, and local hotspot and cluster analyses. These methods are implemented in an interactive...
Regional geology and tectonics
Warren J. Nokleberg
Thomas K. Bundtzen, Warren J. Nokleberg, Raymond A. Price, David W. Scholl, David B. Stone, editor(s)
2017, Book chapter, Dynamic geology of the Northern Cordillera (Alaska and western Canada) and adjacent marine areas: Tectonics, hazards, and resources
This chapter describes the regional geology and tectonic origins of the major geologic units for the Northern Cordillera. The goals of the chapter are to: (1) provide a summary and regional overview of this vast region that contains a complicated geologic history; and (2) describe the major geologic units and...
Pleistocene glaciers, lakes, and floods in north-central Washington State
Richard B. Waitt
Ralph A. Haugerud, Harvey M. Kelsey, editor(s)
2017, Book chapter, From the Puget Lowland to east of the Cascade Range—Geologic excursions in the Pacific Northwest: Geological Society of America Field Guide 49
The Methow, Chelan, Wenatchee, and other terrane blocks accreted in late Mesozoic to Eocene times. Methow valley is excavated in an exotic terrane of folded Mesozoic sedimentary and volcanic rocks faulted between crystalline blocks. Repeated floods of Columbia River Basalt about 16 Ma drowned a backarc basin to the southeast. Cirques,...
Methodological considerations of terrestrial laser scanning for vegetation monitoring in the sagebrush steppe
Kyle E. Anderson, Nancy Glenn, Lucas Spaete, Douglas J. Shinneman, David S. Pilliod, Robert Arkle, Susan K. McIlroy, DeWayne R. Derryberry
2017, Environmental Monitoring and Assessment (189) 1-12
Terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) provides fast collection of high-definition structural information, making it a valuable field instrument to many monitoring applications. A weakness of TLS collections, especially in vegetation, is the occurrence of unsampled regions in point clouds where the sensor’s line-of-sight is blocked by intervening material. This problem, referred...
Simulation of groundwater flow and pumping scenarios for 1900–2050 near Mount Pleasant, South Carolina
Jason M. Fine, Matthew D. Petkewich, Bruce G. Campbell
2017, Scientific Investigations Report 2017-5128
Groundwater withdrawals from the Upper Cretaceous-age Middendorf aquifer in South Carolina have created a large, regional cone of depression in the potentiometric surface of the Middendorf aquifer in Charleston and Berkeley Counties, South Carolina. Groundwater-level declines of as much as 249 feet have been observed in wells over the past...
Small high-definition video cameras as a tool to resight uniquely marked Interior Least Terns (Sternula antillarum athalassos)
Dustin L. Toy, Erin Roche, Colin M. Dovichin
2017, Waterbirds (40) 180-186
Many bird species of conservation concern have behavioral or morphological traits that make it difficult for researchers to determine if the birds have been uniquely marked. Those traits can also increase the difficulty for researchers to decipher those markers. As a result, it is a priority for field biologists to...
Local-scale habitat associations of grassland birds in southwestern Minnesota
Lisa H. Elliott, Douglas H. Johnson
2017, American Midland Naturalist (178) 165-188
Conservation of obligate grassland species requires not only the protection of a sufficiently large area of habitat but also the availability of necessary vegetation characteristics for particular species. As a result land managers must understand which habitat characteristics are important for their target species. To identify the habitat associations of...
