Collections management plan for the U.S. Geological Survey Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center Samples Repository
Brian J. Buczkowski
2018, Open-File Report 2018-1100
Since 2002, the Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center Samples Repository has been supporting research by providing secure storage for geological, biological, and geochemical samples; maintaining organization and an active inventory of these sample collections; and providing researchers access to these scientific collections for study and reuse.Over the years,...
A database of biodiversity and habitat quantification tools used in market-based conservation
Scott J. Chiavacci, Emily Pindilli
2018, Fact Sheet 2018-3039
Market-based conservation uses economic incentives to leverage market forces in ways that encourage and improve efficiency in the restoration, enhancement, and preservation of species and habitats. Biodiversity and habitat quantification tools are vital to the operation of this conservation strategy, as they are used to measure the quality and functionality...
The flathead catfish invasion of the Great Lakes
Pamela L. Fuller, Gary Whelan
2018, Journal of Great Lakes Research (44) 1081-1092
A detailed review of historical literature and museum data revealed that flathead catfish were not historically native in the Great Lakes Basin, with the possible exception of a relict population in Lake Erie. The species has invaded Lake Erie, Lake St. Clair, Lake Huron, nearly all drainages in Michigan, and the...
Rapid, remote assessment of Hurricane Matthew impacts using four-dimensional structure-from-motion photogrammetry
Christopher R. Sherwood, Jonathan A. Warrick, Andrew D. Hill, Andrew C. Ritchie, Brian D. Andrews, Nathaniel G. Plant
2018, Journal of Coastal Research (34) 1303-1316
Timely assessment of coastal landforms and structures after storms is important for evaluating storm impacts, aiding emergency response and restoration, and initializing and assessing morphological models. Four-dimensional multiview photogrammetry, also known as structure from motion (4D SfM), provides a method for generating three-dimensional reconstructions of landscapes at two times (before...
Breaching of strike-slip faults and successive flooding of pull-apart basins to form the Gulf of California seaway from ca. 8–6 Ma
Paul J. Umhoefer, Michael H. Darin, Scott E.K. Bennett, Lisa A. Skinner, Rebecca J. Dorsey, Michael E. Oskin
2018, Geology (46) 695-698
The geologic record of the formation of marine basins during continental rifting is uncommonly preserved. Using GIS-based paleotectonic maps, we show that marine basin formation in the Gulf of California–Salton trough oblique rift (Mexico and the United States) occurred in a stepwise manner as crustal thinning lowered elevations within the...
Flood-inundation maps for the Pawtuxet River in West Warwick, Warwick, and Cranston, Rhode Island
Gardner C. Bent, Pamela J. Lombard
2018, Scientific Investigations Report 2018-5043
A series of 15 digital flood-inundation maps was developed for a 10.2-mile reach of the Pawtuxet River in the municipalities of West Warwick, Warwick, and Cranston, Rhode Island, by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in cooperation with the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers....
Limited nitrate retention capacity in the Upper Mississippi River
Luke C. Loken, John T. Crawford, Mark M. Dornblaser, Robert G. Striegl, Jeffrey N. Houser, Peter A Turner, Emily H. Stanley
2018, Environmental Research Letters (13)
The Mississippi River and other large rivers have the potential to regulate nitrogen export from terrestrial landscapes, and thus mitigate eutrophication in downstream aquatic ecosystems. In large rivers, human-constructed impoundments and connected backwaters may facilitate nitrogen removal; however, the capacity of these features is poorly quantified and...
A comparison of synthetic flowpaths derived from light detection and ranging topobathymetric data and National Hydrography Dataset High Resolution Flowlines
Cynthia Miller-Corbett
2018, Open-File Report 2018-1058
Bathymetric and topobathymetric light detection and ranging (lidar) digital elevation models created for the Delaware River were provided to the National Geospatial Program and used to evaluate synthetic flowpath extraction from bathymetric/topobathymetric lidar survey data as a data source for improving the density, distribution, and connectivity of the National Hydrography...
Pesticide inputs to the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta, 2015–16: Results from the Delta Regional Monitoring Program
Matthew D. De Parsia, James L. Orlando, Megan M. McWayne, Michelle L. Hladik
2018, Data Series 1089
Emergent hypotheses about causes of the pelagic organism decline in the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta (Delta) indicate that a more complete understanding of the quality of water entering the Delta is needed. Less than half of all pesticides used in the Delta watershed are measured in samples collected for routine monitoring,...
An update on Toxoplasma gondii infections in northern sea otters (Enhydra lutris kenyoni) from Washington State, USA
Shiv K. Verma, Susan Knowles, Camila K. Cerqueira-Cezar, Oliver C. Kwok, Tiantian Jiang, Chunlei Su, Jitender P. Dubey
2018, Veterinary Parasitology (258) 133-137
Toxoplasmosis in marine mammals is epidemiologically and clinically important. Toxoplasma gondii antibodies (by modified agglutination test, cut-off ≥1:25) were detected in serum of 65 of 70 (92.9%) northern sea otters (Enhydra lutris kenyoni) from Washington State, USA. Brains and/or muscles of 44 sea otters were bioassayed in mice (INF-γ knock-out...
Temporal and spatial monitoring of cyanobacterial blooms at Willow Creek Reservoir, North-Central Oregon
Cassandra D. Smith
2018, Scientific Investigations Report 2018-5083
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) investigated the spatial and temporal dynamics of cyanobacterial (blue-green algal) blooms in Willow Creek Reservoir in north-central Oregon in 2015–16. A combination of cameras and water-quality monitoring equipment was used to assess the frequency and duration of blooms...
Implicit decision framing as an unrecognized source of confusion in endangered species classification
Jonathan Cummings, Sarah J. Converse, David R. Smith, Steve Morey, Michael C. Runge
2018, Conservation Biology (32) 1246-1254
Legal classification of species requires scientific and values‐based components, and how those components interact depends on how people frame the decision. Is classification a negotiation of trade‐offs, a decision on how to allocate conservation efforts, or simply a comparison of the biological status of a species to a legal standard?...
Long Island South Shore Estuary Reserve Coordinated Water Resources Monitoring Strategy
Shawn C. Fisher, Robert J. Welk, Jason S. Finkelstein
2018, Open-File Report 2017-1161
Executive SummaryThe Long Island South Shore Estuary Reserve Coordinated Water Resources Monitoring Strategy (CWRMS) provides an overview of the water-quality and ecological monitoring within the Reserve and presents suggestions from stakeholders for future data collection, data management, and coordination among monitoring programs. The South Shore Estuary Reserve, hereafter referred to...
Reestablishing a host–affiliate relationship: Migratory fish reintroduction increases native mussel recruitment
Heather S. Galbraith, Julie L. Devers, Carrie J. Blakeslee, Jeffrey C. Cole, Barbara St. John White, Steven Minkkinen, William A. Lellis
2018, Ecological Applications (28) 1841-1852
Co‐extirpation among host–affiliate species is thought to be a leading cause of biodiversity loss worldwide. Freshwater mussels (Unionida) are at...
Evaluating anthropogenic landscape alterations as wildlife hazards, with wind farms as an example
Peter R. Law, Mark R. Fuller
2018, Ecological Indicators (34) 380-385
Anthropogenic alterations to landscape are indicators of potential compromise of that landscape’s ecology. We describe how alterations can be assessed as ‘hazards’ to wildlife through a sequence of three steps: diagnosing...
Santa Barbara and Foothill groundwater basins Geohydrology and optimal water resources management—Developed using density dependent solute transport and optimization models
Scott R. Paulinski, Tracy Nishikawa, Geoffrey Cromwell, Scott E. Boyce, Zachary P. Stanko
Tracy Nishikawa, editor(s)
2018, Scientific Investigations Report 2018-5059
Groundwater has been a part of the city of Santa Barbara’s water-supply portfolio since the 1800s; however, since the 1960s, the majority of the city’s water has come from local surface water, and the remainder has come from groundwater, State Water Project, recycled water, increased water conservation, and as needed,...
Preliminary evaluation of the hydrogeology and groundwater quality of the Mississippi River Valley alluvial aquifer and Memphis aquifer at the Tennessee Valley Authority Allen Power Plants, Memphis, Shelby County, Tennessee
John K. Carmichael, James A. Kingsbury, Daniel Larsen, Scott Schoefernacker
2018, Open-File Report 2018-1097
The hydrogeology, groundwater quality, and potential for hydraulic connection between the Mississippi River Valley alluvial aquifer and the Memphis aquifer in the area of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) Allen Combined Cycle and Allen Fossil Plants in southwestern Memphis, Tennessee, were evaluated from September through December 2017. The study was...
Bat community response to silvicultural treatments in bottomland hardwood forests managed for wildlife in the Mississippi Alluvial Valley
Loraine P. Ketzler, Christopher E. Comer, Daniel J. Twedt
2018, Forest Ecology and Management (417) 40-48
Silvicultural treatments (e.g., selective timber harvests) that are prescribed to promote wildlife habitat are intended to alter the physical structure of forests to achieve conditions deemed beneficial for wildlife. Such treatments have been advocated for management of bottomland hardwood forests on public conservation lands in the Mississippi Alluvial Valley. Although...
Quantifying variance across spatial scales as part of fire regime classifications
Scholtz Rheinhardt, Samuel D. Fuhlendorf, Sherry A. Leis, Joshua J. Picotte, Dirac Twidwell
2018, Ecosphere (9)
The emergence of large‐scale fire classifications and products informed by remote sensing data has enabled opportunities to include variability or heterogeneity as part of modern fire regime classifications. Currently, basic fire metrics such as mean fire return intervals are calculated without considering spatial variance in a management context. Fire return...
Quality of surface water in Missouri, Water Year 2016
Miya N. Barr, Katherine A. Bartels
2018, Data Series 1086
The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, designed and operates a series of monitoring stations on streams and springs throughout Missouri known as the Ambient Water-Quality Monitoring Network. During water year 2016 (October 1, 2015, through September 30, 2016), data presented in this report...
Candidate products for operational earthquake forecasting illustrated using the HayWired planning scenario, including one very quick (and not‐so‐dirty) hazard‐map option
Edward H. Field, Kevin R. Milner
2018, Seismological Research Letters (89) 1420-1434
In an effort to help address debates on the usefulness of operational earthquake forecasting (OEF), we illustrate a number of OEF products that could be automatically generated in near‐real time. To exemplify, we use an M">M 7.1...
A novel technique for precision geometric correction of jitter distortion for the Europa Imaging System and other rolling shutter cameras
Randolph L. Kirk, Makayla Shepherd, Stuart Sides
2018, Conference Paper
We use simulated images to demonstrate a novel technique for mitigating geometric distortions caused by platform motion (“jitter”) as two-dimensional image sensors are exposed and read out line by line (“rolling shutter”). The results indicate that the Europa Imaging System (EIS) on NASA’s Europa Clipper can likely meet its...
Juvenile salmonid monitoring following removal of Condit Dam in the White Salmon River Watershed, Washington, 2017
Ian G. Jezorek, Jill M. Hardiman
2018, Open-File Report 2018-1106
Condit Dam, at river kilometer 5.3 on the White Salmon River, Washington, was breached in 2011, and removed completely in 2012, providing anadromous salmonids with the opportunity to recolonize habitat blocked for nearly 100 years. Prior to dam removal, a multi-agency workgroup concluded that the preferred salmonid restoration alternative...
A simple method for partitioning total solar radiation into diffuse/direct components in the United States
Jingjing Fan, Qiang Huang, David M. Sumner, Dingbao Wang
2018, International Journal of Green Energy (15) 497-506
Solar radiation is a major sustainable and clean energy resource, and use of solar radiation is expected to increase. The utilization efficiency of solar energy varies with the relative proportions of the direct and diffuse components that compose total solar radiation and with the slope and aspect of the irradiated...
On the reliability of N‐mixture models for count data
Richard J. Barker, Matthew J. Schofield, William A. Link, John R. Sauer
2018, Biometrics (74) 369-377
N‐mixture models describe count data replicated in time and across sites in terms of abundance N and detectability p. They are popular because they allow inference about N while controlling for factors that influence p without the need for marking animals. Using a capture–recapture perspective, we show that the loss...
