Desert wetlands—Archives of a wetter past
Jeffery S. Pigati, Kathleen B. Springer, Craig R. Manker
2015, Fact Sheet 2015-3077
Scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) are finding evidence of a much wetter past in the deserts of the American Southwest using a most unlikely source—wetlands. Wetlands form in arid environments where water tables approach or breach the ground surface. Often thought of as stagnant and unchanging, new evidence...
The petroleum geologist and the insurance policy
Susan E. Hough, Morgan T. Page
2015, Seismological Research Letters (87) 171-176
In a recent study, Hough and Page (2015) presented several lines of evidence suggesting that most of the significant earthquakes in Oklahoma during the twentieth century, including the Mw 5.7 El Reno earthquake of 9 April 1952, were likely induced by wastewater injection and possibly secondary oil recovery operations. We...
Reintroduction of Lake Sturgeon (Acipenser fulvescens) into the St. Regis River, NY: Post-release assessment of habitat use and growth
Dawn E. Dittman, Marc A. Chalupnicki, James H. Johnson, James Snyder
2015, Northeastern Naturalist (22) 704-716
One of the depleted endemic fish species of the Great Lakes, Acipenser fulvescens (Lake Sturgeon), has been the target of extensive conservation efforts. One strategy is reintroduction into historically productive waters. The St. Regis River, NY, represents one such adaptive-management effort, with shared management between New York and the St....
California State Waters map series — Offshore of Pigeon Point, California
Guy R. Cochrane, Janet Watt, Peter Dartnell, H. Gary Greene, Mercedes D. Erdey, Bryan E. Dieter, Nadine E. Golden, Samuel Y. Johnson, Charles A. Endris, Stephen R. Hartwell, Rikk G. Kvitek, Clifton W. Davenport, Lisa M. Krigsman, Andrew C. Ritchie, Ray W. Sliter, David P. Finlayson, Katherine L. Maier
Guy R. Cochrane, Susan A. Cochran, editor(s)
2015, Open-File Report 2015-1232
Introduction In 2007, the California Ocean Protection Council initiated the California Seafloor Mapping Program (CSMP), designed to create a comprehensive seafloor map of high-resolution bathymetry, marine benthic habitats, and geology within the 3-nautical-mile limit of California’s State Waters. The CSMP approach is to create highly detailed seafloor maps through collection, integration,...
Qualitative assessment of selected areas of the world for undiscovered sediment-hosted stratabound copper deposits: Chapter Y in Global mineral resource assessment
Michael L. Zientek, Niki E. Wintzer, Timothy S. Hayes, Heather L. Parks, Deborah A. Briggs, J. Douglas Causey, Shyla A. Hatch, M. Christopher Jenkins, David J. Williams
Michael L. Zientek, Jane M. Hammarstrom, Kathleen M. Johnson, editor(s)
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2010-5090-Y
A qualitative mineral resource assessment of sediment-hosted stratabound copper mineralized areas for undiscovered copper deposits was performed for 10 selected areas of the world. The areas, in alphabetical order, are (1) Belt-Purcell Basin, United States and Canada; (2) Benguela and Cuanza Basins, Angola; (3) Chuxiong Basin, China; (4) Dongchuan Group...
Assessing local population vulnerability to wind energy development with branching process models: an application to wind energy development
Richard A. Erickson, Eric A. Eager, Jessica C. Stanton, Julie A. Beston, James E. Diffendorfer, Wayne E. Thogmartin
2015, Ecosphere (6)
Quantifying the impact of anthropogenic development on local populations is important for conservation biology and wildlife management. However, these local populations are often subject to demographic stochasticity because of their small population size. Traditional modeling efforts such as population projection matrices do not consider this source of variation whereas individual-based...
Air- and stream-water-temperature trends in the Chesapeake Bay region, 1960-2014
John D. Jastram, Karen C. Rice
2015, Open-File Report 2015-1207
Water temperature is a basic, but important, measure of the condition of all aquatic environments, including the flowing waters in the streams that drain our landscape and the receiving waters of those streams. Climatic conditions have a strong influence on water temperature, which is therefore naturally variable both in time...
Sediment transport and evaluation of sediment surrogate ratings in the Kootenai River near Bonners Ferry, Idaho, Water Years 2011–14
Molly S. Wood, Ryan L. Fosness, Alexandra B. Etheridge
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2015-5169
The Kootenai River white sturgeon (Acipenser transmontanus) and other native fish species are culturally important to the Kootenai Tribe of Idaho, but their habitat and recruitment have been affected by anthropogenic changes to the river. Although the interconnections among anthropogenic changes and their impacts on fish are complex, the Kootenai...
Comparison of U.S. net import reliance for nonfuel mineral commodities—A 60-year retrospective (1954–1984–2014)
Steven M. Fortier, DeYoung Jr., Elizabeth S. Sangine, Emily K. Schnebele
2015, Fact Sheet 2015-3082
Introduction The economic vitality and national security of the United States depend on the reliable supply of numerous nonfuel mineral commodities. Over the past six decades, many of these commodities have been sourced increasingly from outside the United States. The mix of commodities for which the United States is import dependent...
Characterization of the extremely arsenic-resistant Brevibacterium linens strain AE038-8 isolated from contaminated groundwater in Tucumán, Argentina
Daniela Maizel, Jodi S. Blum, Marcela A. Ferrero, Sagar M. Utturkar, Steven D. Brown, Barry P. Rosen, Ronald S. Oremland
2015, International Biodeterioration and Biodegradation (107) 147-153
Brevibacterium linens AE038-8, isolated from As-contaminated groundwater in Tucumán (Argentina), is highly resistant to arsenic oxyanions, being able to tolerate up to 1 M As(V) and 75 mM As(III) in a complex medium. Strain AE038-8 was also able to reduce As(V) to As(III) when grown in complex medium but paradoxically it could not...
Infecting Pacific Herring with Ichthyophonus sp. in the laboratory
Paul Hershberger, Lucas Hart, Ashley MacKenzie, M.L. Yanney, Carla M. Conway, Diane G. Elliott
2015, Journal of Aquatic Animal Health (27) 217-221
The protistan parasite Ichthyophonus sp. occurs in coastal populations of Pacific Herring Clupea pallasii throughout the northeast Pacific region, but the route(s) by which these planktivorous fish become infected is unknown. Several methods for establishing Ichthyophonus infections in laboratory challenges were examined. Infections were most effectively established after intraperitoneal (IP)...
Mapping geoelectric fields during magnetic storms: Synthetic analysis of empirical United States impedances
Paul A. Bedrosian, Jeffrey J. Love
2015, Geophysical Research Letters (42) 10160-10170
Empirical impedance tensors obtained from EarthScope magnetotelluric data at sites distributed across the midwestern United States are used to examine the feasibility of mapping magnetic storm induction of geoelectric fields. With these tensors, in order to isolate the effects of Earth conductivity structure, we perform a synthetic analysis—calculating geoelectric field...
Wildlife Habitat Restoration: Chapter 12
Courtney J. Conway, Kathi L. Borgmann
Michael L. Morrison, Heather A. Mathewson, editor(s)
2015, Book chapter, Wildlife habitat conservation : concepts, challenges, and solutions
As the preceding chapters point out, many wildlife species and the habitat they depend on are in peril. However, opportunities exist to restore habitat for many imperiled wildlife species. But what is wildlife habitat restoration? We begin this chapter by defining habitat restoration and then provide recommendations on how to...
The role of dynamic surface water-groundwater exchange on streambed denitrification in a first-order, low-relief agricultural watershed
Mina N. Rahimi Kazerooni, Hedeff I. Essaid, John T. Wilson
2015, Water Resources Research (51) 9514-9538
The role of temporally varying surface water-groundwater (SW-GW) exchange on nitrate removal by streambed denitrification was examined along a reach of Leary Weber Ditch (LWD), Indiana, a small, first-order, low-relief agricultural watershed within the Upper Mississippi River basin, using data collected in 2004 and 2005. Stream stage, GW heads (H),...
Shift in Global Tantalum Mine Production, 2000–2014
Donald I. Bleiwas, John F. Papp, Thomas R. Yager
2015, Fact Sheet 2015-3079
Introduction Tantalum has a unique set of properties that make it useful in a number of diverse applications. The ability of the metal to store and release electrical energy makes it ideally suited for use in certain types of capacitors that are widely used in modern electronics. Approximately 60 percent of...
Complex interactions in Lake Michigan’s rapidly changing ecosystem
Henry A. Vanderploeg, David B. Bunnell, Hunter J. Carrick, Tomas O. Hook
2015, Journal of Great Lakes Research (41) 1-6
For over 30 years, Lake Michigan’s food web has been in a constant state of transition from reductions in nutrient loading and proliferation of invasive species at multiple trophic levels. In particular, there has been concern about impacts from the invasive predatory cercopagids (Bythotrephes longimanus and Cercopagis pengoi) and expanding dreissenid mussel and...
A new method to generate a high-resolution global distribution map of lake chlorophyll
Michael J Sayers, Amanda G. Grimm, Robert A. Shuchman, Andrew M. Deines, David B. Bunnell, Zachary B Raymer, Mark W. Rogers, Whitney Woelmer, David Bennion, Colin N. Brooks, Matthew A. Whitley, David M. Warner, Justin G. Mychek-Londer
2015, International Journal of Remote Sensing (36) 1942-1964
A new method was developed, evaluated, and applied to generate a global dataset of growing-season chlorophyll-a (chl) concentrations in 2011 for freshwater lakes. Chl observations from freshwater lakes are valuable for estimating lake productivity as well as assessing the role that these lakes play in carbon budgets. The standard 4 km...
Hydrologic data for the Walker River Basin, Nevada and California, water years 2010–14
Michael T. Pavelko, Erin L. Orozco
2015, Data Series 967
Walker Lake is a threatened and federally protected desert terminal lake in western Nevada. To help protect the desert terminal lake and the surrounding watershed, the Bureau of Reclamation and U.S. Geological Survey have been studying the hydrology of the Walker River Basin in Nevada and California since 2004. Hydrologic...
Status and trends of land change in the Midwest–South Central United States—1973 to 2000
Roger F. Auch, Krista A. Karstensen
Roger F. Auch, Krista A. Karstensen, editor(s)
2015, Professional Paper 1794-C
U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Professional Paper 1794–C is the third in a four-volume series on the status and trends of the Nation’s land use and land cover, providing an assessment of the rates and causes of land-use and land-cover change in the Midwest–South Central United States between 1973 and 2000....
Potentiometric surface of the Catahoula aquifer in central Louisiana, 2013
Fendick, Kayla Carter
2015, Scientific Investigations Map 3339
The Catahoula aquifer is an important source of fresh groundwater in central Louisiana. In 2010, about 3.96 million gallons per day (Mgal/d) were withdrawn from the Catahoula aquifer in Louisiana. In 2012, the U.S. Geological Survey in cooperation with the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources began a study to document current...
smwrBase—An R package for managing hydrologic data, version 1.1.1
David L. Lorenz
2015, Open-File Report 2015-1202
This report describes an R package called smwrBase, which consists of a collection of functions to import, transform, manipulate, and manage hydrologic data within the R statistical environment. Functions in the package allow users to import surface-water and groundwater data from the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Water Information System database...
Acadia National Park climate change scenario planning workshop summary
Jonathan Star, Nicholas Fisichelli, Alexander Bryan, Amanda Babson, Rebecca Cole-Will, Abraham J. Miller-Rushing
2015, Conference Paper
This report summarizes outcomes from a two-day scenario planning workshop for Acadia National Park, Maine. The primary objective of the workshop was to help Acadia senior leadership make management and planning decisions based on up-to-date climate science and assessments of future uncertainty. The workshop was also designed as a training...
Indicators of climate impacts for forests: Recommendations for the U.S. National Climate Assessment Indicators system
Linda S. Heath, Sarah M. Anderson, Marla R. Emery, Jeffrey A. Hicke, Jeremy S. Littell, Alan Lucier, Jeffrey G. Masek, David L. Peterson, Richard Pouyat, Kevin M. Potter, Guy Robertson, Jinelle Sperry, A. Bytnerowicz, Sarah E. Jovan, Miranda H. Mockrin, Robert Musselman, Bethany K. Schulz, Robert J. Smith, Susan I. Stewart
2015, Report
The Third National Climate Assessment (NCA) process for the United States focused in part on developing a system of indicators to communicate key aspects of the physical climate, climate impacts, vulnerabilities, and preparedness to inform decisionmakers and the public. Initially, 13 active teams were formed to recommend indicators in...
Estimating mercury exposure of piscivorous birds and sport fish using prey fish monitoring
Joshua T. Ackerman, C. Alex Hartman, Collin A. Eagles-Smith, Mark P. Herzog, Jay Davis, Gary Ichikawa, Autumn Bonnema
2015, Environmental Science & Technology (49) 13596-13604
Methylmercury is a global pollutant of aquatic ecosystems, and monitoring programs need tools to predict mercury exposure of wildlife. We developed equations to estimate methylmercury exposure of piscivorous birds and sport fish using mercury concentrations in prey fish. We collected original data on western grebes (Aechmophorus occidentalis) and Clark’s grebes...
A statistical learning framework for groundwater nitrate models of the Central Valley, California, USA
Bernard T. Nolan, Michael N. Fienen, David L. Lorenz
2015, Journal of Hydrology (531) 902-911
We used a statistical learning framework to evaluate the ability of three machine-learning methods to predict nitrate concentration in shallow groundwater of the Central Valley, California: boosted regression trees (BRT), artificial neural networks (ANN), and Bayesian networks (BN). Machine learning methods can learn complex patterns in the data but because...
