Factors affecting the thermal environment of Agassiz’s Desert Tortoise (Gopherus agassizii) cover sites in the Central Mojave Desert during periods of temperature extremes
Jeremy S. Mack, Kristin H. Berry, David M. Miller, Andrea S. Carlson
2015, Journal of Herpetology (49) 405-414
Agassiz's Desert Tortoises (Gopherus agassizii) spend >95% of their lives underground in cover sites that serve as thermal buffers from temperatures, which can fluctuate >40°C on a daily and seasonal basis. We monitored temperatures at 30 active tortoise cover sites within the Soda Mountains, San Bernardino County, California, from February...
Effects of elevated water temperature on physiological responses in adult freshwater mussels
Alissa M. Ganser, Teresa J. Newton, Roger J. Haro
2015, Freshwater Biology (60) 1705-1715
Freshwater mussels (order Unionoida) face multiple environmental stressors, which pose serious conservation challenges to this diverse assemblage of aquatic invertebrates. Of these stressors, elevated water temperature from global climate change and other anthropogenic sources may be the most ubiquitous and could be placing many mussel populations dangerously close...
Shifts in the eruptive styles at Stromboli in 2010–2014 revealed by ground-based InSAR data
Federico Di Traglia, Maurizio Battaglia, Teresa Nolesini, Daniela Lagomarsino, Nicola Casaglia
2015, Scientific Reports
Ground-Based Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (GBInSAR) is an efficient technique for capturing short, subtle episodes of conduit pressurization in open vent volcanoes like Stromboli (Italy), because it can detect very shallow magma storage, which is difficult to identify using other methods. This technique allows the user to choose the optimal...
Demersal fish distribution and habitat use within and near Baltimore and Norfolk Canyons, U.S. Middle Atlantic Slope
Steve W. Ross, Mike Rhode, Andrea M. Quattrini
2015, Deep-Sea Research Part I: Oceanographic Research Papers (103) 137-154
Numerous submarine canyons along the United States middle Atlantic continental margin support enhanced productivity, diverse and unique habitats, active fisheries, and are vulnerable to various anthropogenic disturbances. During two cruises (15 Aug–2 Oct 2012 and 30 Apr–27 May 2013), Baltimore and Norfolk canyons and nearby areas (including two cold seeps)...
Re-colonization by common eiders Somateria mollissima in the Aleutian Archipelago following removal of introduced arctic foxes Vulpes lagopus
Margaret R. Petersen, Sarah A. Sonsthagen, Matthew G. Sexson
2015, Journal of Avian Biology (46) 538-549
Islands provide refuges for populations of many species where they find safety from predators, but the introduction of predators frequently results in elimination or dramatic reductions in island-dwelling organisms. When predators are removed, re-colonization for some species occurs naturally, and inter-island phylogeographic relationships and current movement patterns can illuminate processes...
Groundwater availability in the United States: the value of quantitative regional assessments
Kevin F. Dennehy, Thomas E. Reilly, William L. Cunningham
2015, Hydrogeology Journal (23) 1629-1632
The sustainability of water resources is under continued threat from the challenges associated with a growing population, competing demands, and a changing climate. Freshwater scarcity has become a fact in many areas. Much of the United States surface-water supplies are fully apportioned for use; thus, in some areas the only...
Mineral Resource of the Month: Bromine
Emily Schnebele
2015, Earth (September 2015)
Bromine, along with mercury, is one of only two elements that are liquid at room temperature. Bromine is a highly volatile and corrosive reddish-brown liquid that evaporates easily and converts to a metal at extreme pressures — above about 540,000 times atmospheric pressure. Bromine occurs in seawater, evaporitic (salt) lakes...
On critiques of “Stationarity is dead: Whither water management?”
Paul C.D. Milly, Julio L. Betancourt, Malin Falkenmark, Robert M. Hirsch, Zbigniew W. Kundzewicz, Dennis P. Lettenmaier, Ronald J. Stouffer, Michael D. Dettinger, Valentina Krysanova
2015, Water Resources Research (51) 7785-7789
We review and comment upon some themes in the recent stream of critical commentary on the assertion that “stationarity is dead,” attempting to clear up some misunderstandings; to note points of agreement; to elaborate on matters in dispute; and to share further relevant thoughts....
Modelling multi-hazard hurricane damages on an urbanized coast with a Bayesian Network approach
H.C.W. van Verseveld, A. R. Van Dongeren, Nathaniel G. Plant, W.S. Jager, C. den Heijer
2015, Coastal Engineering (103) 1-14
Hurricane flood impacts to residential buildings in coastal zones are caused by a number of hazards, such as inundation, overflow currents, erosion, and wave attack. However, traditional hurricane damage models typically make use of stage-damage functions, where the stage is related to flooding depth only. Moreover, these models are...
Heat flux from magmatic hydrothermal systems related to availability of fluid recharge
M. C. Harvey, J.V. Rowland, G. Chiodini, C.F. Rissmann, S. Bloomberg, P.A. Hernandez, A. Mazot, F. Viveiros, Cynthia A. Werner
2015, Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research (302) 225-236
Magmatic hydrothermal systems are of increasing interest as a renewable energy source. Surface heat flux indicates system resource potential, and can be inferred from soil CO2 flux measurements and fumarole gas chemistry. Here we compile and reanalyze results from previous CO2 flux surveys worldwide to compare heat flux from a...
Amphibole reaction rims as a record of pre-eruptive magmatic heating: An experimental approach
S. H. De Angelis, J. Larsen, Michelle L. Coombs, A. Dunn, Leslie A. Hayden
2015, Earth and Planetary Science Letters (426) 235-245
Magmatic minerals record the pre-eruptive timescales of magma ascent and mixing in crustal reservoirs and conduits. Investigations of the mineral records of magmatic processes are fundamental to our understanding of what controls eruption style, as ascent rates and magma mixing processes are well known to control and/or trigger potentially hazardous...
Estimating annualized earthquake losses for the conterminous United States
Kishor S. Jaiswal, Douglas Bausch, Rui Chen, Jawhar Bouabid, Hope Seligson
2015, Earthquake Spectra (31) 221-243
We make use of the most recent National Seismic Hazard Maps (the years 2008 and 2014 cycles), updated census data on population, and economic exposure estimates of general building stock to quantify annualized earthquake loss (AEL) for the conterminous United States. The AEL analyses were performed using the Federal Emergency...
An evaluation of a bed instability index as an indicator of habitat quality in mountain streams of the northwestern United States
Paul C. Kusnierz, Christopher M. Holbrook, David L. Feldman
2015, Environmental Monitoring and Assessment
Managers of aquatic resources benefit from indices of habitat quality that are reproducible and easy to measure, demonstrate a link between habitat quality and biota health, and differ between human-impacted (i.e., managed) and reference (i.e., nonimpacted or minimally impacted) conditions. The instability index (ISI) is an easily measured index that...
Groundwater quality data in 15 GAMA study units: results from the 2006–10 Initial sampling and the 2009–13 resampling of wells, California GAMA Priority Basin Project
Robert Kent
2015, Data Series 919
The Priority Basin Project (PBP) of the Groundwater Ambient Monitoring and Assessment (GAMA) program was developed in response to the Groundwater Quality Monitoring Act of 2001 and is being conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in cooperation with the California State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB). From May...
Soil carbon storage following road removal and timber harvesting in redwood forests
Joseph Seney, Mary Ann Madej
2015, Earth Surface Processes and Landforms (40) 2084-2092
Soil carbon storage plays a key role in the global carbon cycle and is important for sustaining forest productivity. Removal of unpaved forest roads has the potential for increasing carbon storage in soils on forested terrain as treated sites revegetate and soil properties improve on the previously compacted road surfaces....
Tree mortality from drought, insects, and their interactions in a changing climate
William R.L. Anderegg, Jeffrey A. Hicke, Rosie A. Fisher, Craig D. Allen, Juliann E. Aukema, Barbara Bentz, Sharon Hood, Jeremy W. Lichstein, Alison K. Macalady, Nate G. McDowell, Yude Pan, Kenneth Raffa, Anna Sala, John D. Shaw, Nathan L. Stephenson, Christina L. Tague, Melanie Zeppel
2015, New Phytologist (208) 674-683
Climate change is expected to drive increased tree mortality through drought, heat stress, and insect attacks, with manifold impacts on forest ecosystems. Yet, climate-induced tree mortality and biotic disturbance agents are largely absent from process-based ecosystem models. Using data sets from the western USA and associated studies, we present a...
Baseline Coastal Oblique Aerial Photographs Collected from Navarre Beach, Florida, to Breton Island, Louisiana,
September 1, 2014
Karen L. M. Morgan
2015, Data Series 952
Summary The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), as part of the National Assessment for Coastal Change Hazards Project, conducts baseline and storm response photography missions to document and understand the changes in vulnerability of the Nation's coasts to extreme storms (Morgan, 2009). On September...
Volcano monitoring from space
Michael P. Poland
2015, Book chapter, Global Volcanic Hazards and Risk
Unlike many natural hazards, volcanoes usually give warnings of impending eruptions that can be detected from hours to years prior to any hazardous activity [Sparks et al., 2012]. The Eyjafjallajökull eruption, for example, was preceded by several discrete episodes of subsurface magma accumulation that highlighted the potential for future...
Modeling the complex impacts of timber harvests to find optimal management regimes for Amazon tidal floodplain forests
Lucas B. Fortini, Wendell P. Cropper, Daniel J. Zarin
2015, PLoS ONE (10) 1-17
At the Amazon estuary, the oldest logging frontier in the Amazon, no studies have comprehensively explored the potential long-term population and yield consequences of multiple timber harvests over time. Matrix population modeling is one way to simulate long-term impacts of tree harvests, but this approach has often ignored common impacts...
Late Pleistocene ages for the most recent volcanism and glacial-pluvial deposits at Big Pine volcanic field, California, USA, from cosmogenic 36Cl dating
Jorge A. Vazquez, Jeff M Woolford
2015, Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems (16) 1-17
The Big Pine volcanic field is one of several Quaternary volcanic fields that poses a potential volcanic hazard along the tectonically active Owens Valley of east-central California, and whose lavas are interbedded with deposits from Pleistocene glaciations in the Sierra Nevada Range. Previous geochronology indicates an ∼1.2 Ma history of...
Controls on the breach geometry and flood hydrograph during overtopping of non-cohesive earthen dams
Joseph S. Walder, Richard M. Iverson, Jonathan W. Godt, Matthew Logan, Stephen A. Solovitz
2015, Water Resources Research (51) 6701-6724
Overtopping failure of non-cohesive earthen dams was investigated in 13 large-scale experiments with dams built of compacted, damp, fine-grained sand. Breaching was initiated by cutting a notch across the dam crest and allowing water escaping from a finite upstream reservoir to form its own channel. The channel developed a stepped...
Predicting watershed post-fire sediment yield with the InVEST sediment retention model: Accuracy and uncertainties
Joel B. Sankey, Jason McVay, Jason R. Kreitler, Todd Hawbaker, Nicole Vaillant, Scott Lowe
2015, Conference Paper
Increased sedimentation following wildland fire can negatively impact water supply and water quality. Understanding how changing fire frequency, extent, and location will affect watersheds and the ecosystem services they supply to communities is of great societal importance in the western USA and throughout the world. In this work we assess...
Summary of oceanographic measurements for characterizing light attenuation and sediment resuspension in the Barnegat Bay-Little Egg Harbor Estuary, New Jersey, 2013
Patrick J. Dickhudt, Neil K. Ganju, Ellyn T. Montgomery
2015, Open-File Report 2015-1146
The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, measured suspended-sediment concentrations, currents, waves, light attenuation, and a variety of other water-quality parameters in the summer of 2013 in Barnegat Bay-Little Egg Harbor, New Jersey. These measurements quantified light attenuation and sediment resuspension in three...
Age-related mortality explains life history strategies of tropical and temperate songbirds
Thomas E. Martin
2015, Science (349) 966-970
Modelling regional land change scenarios to assess land abandonment and reforestation dynamics in the Pyrenees (France)
Laure Vacquie, Thomas Houet, Terry L. Sohl, Ryan R. Reker, Kristi L. Sayler
2015, Journal of Mountain Science (12) 905-920
Over the last decades and centuries, European mountain landscapes have experienced substantial transformations. Natural and anthropogenic LULC changes (land use and land cover changes), especially agro-pastoral activities, have directly influenced the spatial organization and composition of European mountain landscapes. For the past sixty years, natural reforestation has been occurring due...
