Assessing the relationship between groundwater nitrate and animal feeding operations in Iowa (USA)
Keith W. Zirkle, Bernard T. Nolan, Rena R. Jones, Peter J. Weyer, Mary H. Ward, David C. Wheeler
2016, Science of the Total Environment (566-567) 1062-1068
Nitrate-nitrogen is a common contaminant of drinking water in many agricultural areas of the United States of America (USA). Ingested nitrate from contaminated drinking water has been linked to an increased risk of several cancers, specific birth defects, and other diseases. In this research, we assessed the relationship between animal...
Isotopically constrained lead sources in fugitive dust from unsurfaced roads in the southeast Missouri mining district
Emitt C. Witt III, Michael Pribil, John P. Hogan, David Wronkiewicz
2016, Environmental Pollution (216) 450-459
The isotopic composition of lead (Pb) in fugitive dust suspended by a vehicle from 13 unsurfaced roads in Missouri was measured to identify the source of Pb within an established long-term mining area. A three end-member model using 207Pb/206Pb and concentration as tracers resulted in fugitive dust samples plotting in the...
Prospective earthquake forecasts at the Himalayan Front after the 25 April 2015 M 7.8 Gorkha Mainshock
Margaret Segou, Thomas E. Parsons
2016, Seismological Research Letters (87) 816-825
When a major earthquake strikes, the resulting devastation can be compounded or even exceeded by the subsequent cascade of triggered seismicity. As the Nepalese recover from the 25 April 2015 shock, knowledge of what comes next is essential. We calculate the redistribution of crustal stresses and implied earthquake probabilities for...
Chemical abrasion-SIMS (CA-SIMS) U-Pb dating of zircon from the late Eocene Caetano caldera, Nevada
Kathryn E. Watts, Matthew A. Coble, Jorge A. Vazquez, Christopher D. Henry, Joseph P. Colgan, David A. John
2016, Chemical Geology (439) 139-151
Zircon geochronology is a critical tool for establishing geologic ages and time scales of processes in the Earth's crust. However, for zircons compromised by open system behavior, achieving robust dates can be difficult. Chemical abrasion (CA) is a routine step prior to thermal ionization mass spectrometry (TIMS) dating of zircon...
Reevaluating geographic variation in life-history traits of a widespread Nearctic amphibian
Jon M. Davenport, Blake R. Hossack
2016, Journal of Zoology (299) 304-310
Animals from cold environments are usually larger than animals from warm environments, which often produce clines in body size. Because variation in body size can lead to trade-offs between growth and reproduction, life-history traits should also vary across climatic gradients. To determine if life-history traits of wood frogs Rana sylvatica vary with...
Macroinvertebrate and diatom metrics as indicators of water-quality conditions in connected depression wetlands in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain
Billy Justus, David Burge, Jennifer Cobb, Travis Marsico, Jennifer Bouldin
2016, Freshwater Science (35) 1049-1061
Methods for assessing wetland conditions must be established so wetlands can be monitored and ecological services can be protected. We evaluated biological indices compiled from macroinvertebrate and diatom metrics developed primarily for streams to assess their ability to indicate water quality in connected depression wetlands. We collected water-quality and biological...
Ground motions at the outermost limits of seismically triggered landslides
Randall W. Jibson, Edwin L. Harp
2016, Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (106) 708-719
Over the last few decades, we and our colleagues have conducted field investigations in which we mapped the outermost limits of triggered landslides in four earthquakes: 1987 Whittier Narrows, California (M 5.9), 1987 Superstition Hills, California (M 6.5), 1994 Northridge, California (M 6.7), and 2011 Mineral, Virginia (M 5.8). In an additional two earthquakes,...
Collaborations, research, and adaptive management to address nonnative Phragmites australis in the Great Lakes Basin
Kurt P. Kowalski
2016, Fact Sheet 2016-3031
Phragmites australis, also known as common reed, is a native North American wetland grass that has grown in North America for thousands of years. More recently, a nonnative, invasive variety of Phragmites from Eurasia is rapidly invading wetlands across the continental United States and other parts of North America, where...
Distribution of the Sonora Tiger Salamander (Ambystoma mavortium stebbinsi) in Mexico
Blake R. Hossack, Erin L. Muths, James C. Rorabaugh, Julio A. Lemos Espinal, Brent H. Sigafus, Thierry A. Chambert, Gerardo Carreon Arroyo, David Hurtado Felix, Daniel Toyos Martinez, Thomas R. Jones
2016, Herpetological Review (47) 177-180
The Sonoran Tiger Salamander (Ambystoma mavortium stebbinsi Lowe, 1954) was listed as federally endangered in the USA in 1997 (USFWS 1997). In the USA, the distribution of A. mavortium stebbinsi is limited to the San Rafael Valley (approximately 567 km2), between the Sierra San Antonio (called the Patagonia Mountains in...
Manual hierarchical clustering of regional geochemical data using a Bayesian finite mixture model
Karl J. Ellefsen, David Smith
2016, Applied Geochemistry (75) 200-210
Interpretation of regional scale, multivariate geochemical data is aided by a statistical technique called “clustering.” We investigate a particular clustering procedure by applying it to geochemical data collected in the State of Colorado, United States of America. The clustering procedure partitions the field samples for the entire survey area into...
On the sustainability of inland fisheries: Finding a future for the forgotten
Steven J. Cooke, Edward H. Allison, Beard Jr., Robert Arlinghaus, Angela Arthington, Devin Bartley, Ian G. Cowx, Carlos Fuentevilla, Nancy J. Leonard, Kai Lorenzen, Abigail Lynch, Vivian M. Nguyen, So-Jung Youn, William W. Tayor, Robin Welcomme
2016, Ambio (45) 753-764
At present, inland fisheries are not often a national or regional governance priority and as a result, inland capture fisheries are undervalued and largely overlooked. As such they are threatened in both developing and developed countries. Indeed, due to lack of reliable data, inland fisheries have never been part of...
Molecular detection of airborne Coccidioides in Tucson, Arizona
Nancy A. Chow, Dale W. Griffin, Bridget M. Barker, Vladimir N. Loparev, Anastasia P. Litvintseva
2016, Medical Mycology (54) 584-592
Environmental surveillance of the soil-dwelling fungus Coccidioides is essential for the prevention of Valley fever, a disease primarily caused by inhalation of the arthroconidia. Methods for collecting and detectingCoccidioides in soil samples are currently in use by several laboratories; however, a method utilizing current air sampling technologies has not been formally demonstrated for...
Year-round monitoring of contaminants in Neal and Rogers Creeks, Hood River Basin, Oregon, 2011-12, and assessment of risks to salmonids
Whitney B. Temple, Jennifer L. Morace, Elena B. Nilsen, David Alvarez, Kevin Masterson
2016, PLoS ONE (11)
Pesticide presence in streams is a potential threat to Endangered Species Act listed salmonids in the Hood River basin, Oregon, a primarily forested and agricultural basin. Two types of passive samplers, polar organic chemical integrative samplers (POCIS) and semipermeable membrane devices (SPMDs), were simultaneously deployed at four sites in the...
Yellowstone River Compact Commission sixty-fifth annual report, 2016
Seth Davidson
2016, Report
No abstract available....
The new Landsat 8 potential for remote sensing of colored dissolved organic matter (CDOM)
E. Terrence Slonecker, Daniel K. Jones, Brian A. Pellerin
2016, Marine Pollution Bulletin (107) 518-527
Due to a combination of factors, such as a new coastal/aerosol band and improved radiometric sensitivity of the Operational Land Imager aboard Landsat 8, the atmospherically-corrected Surface Reflectance product for Landsat data, and the growing availability of corrected fDOM data from U.S. Geological Survey gaging stations, moderate-resolution remote sensing of...
Effects of pulse and press drying disturbance on benthic stream communities
Dustin T. Lynch, Daniel D. Magoulick
2016, Freshwater Science (35) 998-1009
Natural disturbance is an integral component of most ecosystems and occurs in 3 different forms: pulse, press, and ramp. In lotic ecosystems, seasonal drought is a major form of disturbance, particularly in intermittent headwater streams, which often are reduced to pools that serve as refuges for biota. We used simulated...
Increased water deficit decreases Douglas fir growth throughout western US forests
Christina M Restaino, David L. Peterson, Jeremy S. Littell
2016, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (113) 9557-9562
Changes in tree growth rates can affect tree mortality and forest feedbacks to the global carbon cycle. As air temperature increases, evaporative demand also increases, increasing effective drought in forest ecosystems. Using a spatially comprehensive network of Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) chronologies from 122 locations that experience distinctly different climate in...
Digestive physiology comparisons of aquatic invertebrates in the Upper Mississippi River Basin
Blake W. Sauey, Jon Amberg, Scott T. Cooper, Sandra K. Grunwald, Roger J. Haro, Mark P. Gaikowski
2016, Journal of Freshwater Ecology (31) 303-314
Limited information is available on the composition of digestive enzymes present in unionid mussels and the zebra mussel, Dreissena polymorpha. Available information is nearly exclusive to species used for culture purposes. A commercially available enzyme assay kit was used to examine the effect of habitat within an ecosystem, season, and species...
Seasonal Variability in Vadose zone biodegradation at a crude oil pipeline rupture site
Natasha J. Sihota, Jared J. Trost, Barbara Bekins, Andrew M. Berg, Geoffrey N. Delin, Brent E. Mason, Ean Warren, K. Ulrich Mayer
2016, Vadose Zone Journal (15)
Understanding seasonal changes in natural attenuation processes is critical for evaluating source-zone longevity and informing management decisions. The seasonal variations of natural attenuation were investigated through measurements of surficial CO2 effluxes, shallow soil CO2 radiocarbon contents, subsurface gas concentrations, soil temperature, and volumetric water contents during a 2-yr period. Surficial...
Including land cover change in analysis of greenness trends using all available Landsat 5, 7, and 8 images: A case study from Guangzhou, China (2000–2014)
Zhe Zhu, Yingchun Fu, Curtis Woodcock, Pontus Olofsson, James Vogelmann, Christopher Holden, Min Wang, Shu Dai, Yang Yu
2016, Remote Sensing of Environment (185) 243-257
Remote sensing has proven a useful way of evaluating long-term trends in vegetation “greenness” through the use of vegetation indices like Normalized Differences Vegetation Index (NDVI) and Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI). In particular, analyses of greenness trends have been performed for large areas (continents, for example) in an attempt...
Spatiotemporal patterns of mercury accumulation in lake sediments of western North America
Paul Drevnick, Colin A. Cooke, Daniella Barraza, Jules M. Blais, Kenneth Coale, Brian F. Cumming, Chris Curtis, Biplob Das, William F. Donahue, Collin A. Eagles-Smith, Daniel R. Engstrom, William F. Fitzgerald, Chad V. Furl, John R. Gray, Roland I. Hall, Togwell A. Jackson, Kathleen R. Laird, W. Lyle Lockhart, Robie W. Macdonald, M. Alisa Mast, Callie Mathieu, Derek C.G. Muir, Peter Outridge, Scott Reinemann, Sarah E. Rothenberg, Ana Carolina Ruiz-Fernandex, Louis, Rhea Sanders, Hamed Sanei, Elliott Skierszkan, Peter C. Van Metre, Timothy Veverica, Johan A. Wiklund, Brent B. Wolfe
2016, Science of the Total Environment (568) 1157-1170
For the Western North America Mercury Synthesis, we compiled mercury records from 165 dated sediment cores from 138 natural lakes across western North America. Lake sediments are accepted as faithful recorders of historical mercury accumulation rates, and regional and sub-regional temporal and spatial trends were...
An assessment of mercury in estuarine sediment and tissue in Southern New Jersey using public domain data
Kara Ng, Zoltan Szabo, Pamela A. Reilly, Julia Barringer, Kelly L. Smalling
2016, Marine Pollution Bulletin (107) 22-35
Mercury (Hg) is considered a contaminant of global concern for coastal environments due to its toxicity, widespread occurrence in sediment, and bioaccumulation in tissue. Coastal New Jersey, USA, is characterized by shallow bays and wetlands that provide critical habitat for wildlife but share space with expanding urban landscapes. This study...
Hemidactylus parvimaculatus (Sri Lankan spotted house gecko)
Brad M. Glorioso
2016, Herpetological Review (47) 81-81
USA: LOUISIANA: St. Tammany Parish: private property ca. 4 km S of Abita Springs, E of State Hwy 59, and N of Interstate 12 (30.44000°N, 90.02000°W; WGS 84). 18 August 2013. Brad M. Glorioso. Verified by David Heckard. Florida Museum of Natural History (UF 176422, photo voucher). New parish record....
The role of ocean tides on groundwater-surface water exchange in a mangrove-dominated estuary: Shark River Slough, Florida Coastal Everglades, USA
Christopher G. Smith, Rene M. Price, Peter W. Swarzenski, Jeremy C. Stalker
2016, Estuaries and Coasts (39) 1600-1616
Low-relief environments like the Florida Coastal Everglades (FCE) have complicated hydrologic systems where surface water and groundwater processes are intimately linked yet hard to separate. Fluid exchange within these lowhydraulic-gradient systems can occur across broad spatial and temporal scales, with variable contributions to material transport and transformation. Identifying and assessing...
Genetic reconstruction of a bullfrog invasion to elucidate vectors of introduction and secondary spread
Pauline L. Kamath, Adam J. Sepulveda, Megan J. Layhee
2016, Ecology and Evolution (6) 5221-5233
Reconstructing historical colonization pathways of an invasive species is critical for uncovering factors that determine invasion success and for designing management strategies. The American bullfrog (Lithobates catesbeianus) is endemic to eastern North America, but now has a global distribution and is considered to be one of the worst invaders in...
