Temperature and hydrology affect methane emissions from Prairie Pothole Wetlands
Sheel Bansal, Brian Tangen, Raymond Finocchiaro
2016, Wetlands (36) 371-381
The Prairie Pothole Region (PPR) in central North America consists of millions of depressional wetlands that each have considerable potential to emit methane (CH4). Changes in temperature and hydrology in the PPR from climate change may affect methane fluxes from these wetlands. To assess the potential effects of changes in...
Do water level fluctuations influence production of walleye and yellow perch young-of-the-year in large northern lakes?
James H. Larson, David F. Staples, Ryan P. Maki, Jon M. Vallazza, Brent C. Knights, Kevin E. Peterson
2016, North American Journal of Fisheries Management (36) 1425-1436
Many ecological processes depend on the regular rise and fall of water levels (WLs), and artificial manipulations to WL regimes can impair important ecosystem services. Previous research has suggested that differences in WL between late summer and early spring may alter the suitability of shoals used by Walleyes Sander vitreus...
Filling the interspace—restoring arid land mosses: source populations, organic matter, and overwintering govern success
Lea Condon, David A. Pyke
2016, Ecology and Evolution (6) 7623-7632
Biological soil crusts contribute to ecosystem functions and occupy space that could be available to invasive annual grasses. Given disturbances in the semiarid shrub steppe communities, we embarked on a set of studies to investigate restoration potential of mosses in sagebrush steppe ecosystems. We examined establishment and growth of two...
Effects of model complexity and priors on estimation using sequential importance sampling/resampling for species conservation
Kylee Dunham, J. Barry Grand
2016, Ecological Modelling (340) 28-36
We examined the effects of complexity and priors on the accuracy of models used to estimate ecological and observational processes, and to make predictions regarding population size and structure. State-space models are useful for estimating complex, unobservable population processes and making predictions about future populations based on limited data. To...
Western Lake Erie Basin: Soft-data-constrained, NHDPlus resolution watershed modeling and exploration of applicable conservation scenarios
Haw Yen, Michael J. White, Jeffrey G. Arnold, S. Conor Keitzer, Mari-Vaughn V. Johnson, Jay D. Atwood, Prasad Daggupati, Matthew E. Herbert, Scott P. Sowa, Stuart A. Ludsin, Dale M. Robertson, Raghavan Srinivasan, Charles A. Rewa
2016, Science of the Total Environment (569-570) 1265-1281
Complex watershed simulation models are powerful tools that can help scientists and policy-makers address challenging topics, such as land use management and water security. In the Western Lake Erie Basin (WLEB), complex hydrological models have been applied at various scales to help describe relationships between land use and water, nutrient,...
When winners become losers: Predicted nonlinear responses of arctic birds to increasing woody vegetation
Sarah J. Thompson, Colleen M. Handel, Rachel M. Richardson, Lance B. McNew
2016, PLoS ONE (11) 1-17
Climate change is facilitating rapid changes in the composition and distribution of vegetation at northern latitudes, raising questions about the responses of wildlife that rely on arctic ecosystems. One widely observed change occurring in arctic tundra ecosystems is an increasing dominance of deciduous shrub vegetation. Our goals were to examine...
A survey of uncertainty in stage-discharge rating curves and streamflow records in the United States
Julie E. Kiang, Robert R. Mason, Jr., Timothy A. Cohn
2016, Conference Paper, River Flow 2016
No abstract available....
Prediction of pesticide toxicity in Midwest streams
Megan E. Shoda, Wesley W. Stone, Lisa H. Nowell
2016, Journal of Environmental Quality (45) 1856-1864
The occurrence of pesticide mixtures is common in stream waters of the United States, and the impact of multiple compounds on aquatic organisms is not well understood. Watershed Regressions for Pesticides (WARP) models were developed to predict Pesticide Toxicity Index (PTI) values in unmonitored streams in the Midwest and are...
Shrinking windows of opportunity for oak seedling establishment in southern California mountains
Frank W. Davis, Lynn C. Sweet, Josep M. Serra-Diaz, Janet Franklin, Ian M. McCullough, Alan L. Flint, Lorraine E. Flint, John Dingman, Helen M. Regan, Alexandra D. Syphard, Lee Hannah, Kelly Redmond, Max A. Moritz
2016, Ecosphere (7) 1-18
Seedling establishment is a critical step that may ultimately govern tree species’ distribution shifts under environmental change. Annual variation in the location of seed rain and microclimates results in transient “windows of opportunity” for tree seedling establishment across the landscape. These establishment windows vary at fine spatiotemporal scales that are...
Estimation of time-variable fast flow path chemical concentrations for application in tracer-based hydrograph separation analyses
Scott C. Kronholm, Paul D. Capel
2016, Water Resources Research (52) 6881-6896
Mixing models are a commonly used method for hydrograph separation, but can be hindered by the subjective choice of the end-member tracer concentrations. This work tests a new variant of mixing model that uses high-frequency measures of two tracers and streamflow to separate total streamflow into water from slowflow and...
Seismic imaging of the metamorphism of young sediment into new crystalline crust in the actively rifting Imperial Valley, California
Liang Han, John Hole, Joann Stock, Gary S. Fuis, Colin F. Williams, Jonathan Delph, Kathy Davenport, Amanda Livers
2016, Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems (17) 4566-4584
Plate-boundary rifting between transform faults is opening the Imperial Valley of southern California and the rift is rapidly filling with sediment from the Colorado River. Three 65–90 km long seismic refraction profiles across and along the valley, acquired as part of the 2011 Salton Seismic Imaging Project, were analyzed to...
Dynamic social networks based on movement
Henry Scharf, Mevin Hooten, Bailey K. Fosdick, Devin S. Johnson, Joshua M. London, John W. Durban
2016, The Annals of Applied Statistics (10) 2182-2202
Network modeling techniques provide a means for quantifying social structure in populations of individuals. Data used to define social connectivity are often expensive to collect and based on case-specific, ad hoc criteria. Moreover, in applications involving animal social networks, collection of these data is often opportunistic and can be invasive. Frequently, the...
Rapid fluvial incision of a late Holocene lava flow: Insights from LiDAR, alluvial stratigraphy, and numerical modeling
Kristin Sweeney, Joshua J. Roering
2016, GSA Bulletin (129) 500-512
Volcanic eruptions fundamentally alter landscapes, paving over channels, decimating biota, and emplacing fresh, unweathered material. The fluvial incision of blocky lava flows is a geomorphic puzzle. First, high surface permeability and lack of sediment should preclude geomorphically effective surface runoff and dissection. Furthermore, past work has demonstrated the importance of...
Do rivermouths alter nutrient and seston delivery to the nearshore?
James H. Larson, Paul C. Frost, Jon M. Vallazza, John C. Nelson, William B. Richardson
2016, Freshwater Biology (61) 1935-1949
Tributary inputs to lakes and seas are often measured at riverine gages, upstream of lentic influence. Between these riverine gages and the nearshore zones of large waterbodies lie rivermouths, which may retain, transform and contribute materials to the nearshore zone. However, the magnitude and timing of these...
Assessing the role of climate and resource management on groundwater dependent ecosystem changes in arid environments with the Landsat archive
Justin Huntington, Kenneth C. McGwire, Charles Morton, Keirith A. Snyder, Sarah Peterson, Tyler Erickson, Richard G. Niswonger, Rosemary W.H. Carroll, Guy Smith, Richard Allen
2016, Remote Sensing of Environment (185) 186-197
Groundwater dependent ecosystems (GDEs) rely on near-surface groundwater. These systems are receiving more attention with rising air temperature, prolonged drought, and where groundwater pumping captures natural groundwater discharge for anthropogenic use. Phreatophyte shrublands, meadows, and riparian areas are GDEs that provide critical habitat for many sensitive species, especially in arid...
Past and predicted future effects of housing growth on open space conservation opportunity areas and habitat connectivity around National Wildlife Refuges
Christopher M. Hamilton, Matthias Baumann, Anna M. Pidgeon, David P. Helmers, Wayne E. Thogmartin, Patricia J. Heglund, Volker C. Radeloff
2016, Landscape Ecology (31) 2175-2186
ContextHousing growth can alter suitability of matrix habitats around protected areas, strongly affecting movements of organisms and, consequently, threatening connectivity of protected area networks.ObjectivesOur goal was to quantify distribution and growth of housing around the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service...
Effectiveness of vegetation buffers surrounding playa wetlands at contaminant and sediment amelioration
David A. Haukos, Lacrecia A. Johnson, Loren M. Smith, Scott T. McMurry
2016, Journal of Environmental Management (181) 552-562
Playa wetlands, the dominant hydrological feature of the semi-arid U.S. High Plains providing critical ecosystem services, are being lost and degraded due to anthropogenic alterations of the short-grass prairie landscape. The primary process contributing to the loss of playas is filling of the wetland through accumulation of soil eroded and...
Sagebrush, greater sage-grouse, and the occurrence and importance of forbs
Victoria E. Pennington, Daniel R. Schlaepfer, Jeffrey L. Beck, John B. Bradford, Kyle A. Palmquist, William K. Lauenroth
2016, Western North American Naturalist (76) 298-312
Big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata Nutt.) ecosystems provide habitat for sagebrush-obligate wildlife species such as the Greater Sage-Grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus). The understory of big sagebrush plant communities is composed of grasses and forbs that are important sources of cover and food for wildlife. The grass component is well described in the...
Responses of a 58-story RC dual core shear wall and outrigger frame building inferred from two earthquakes
Mehmet Çelebi
2016, Earthquake Spectra (32) 2449-2471
Responses of a dual core shear-wall and outrigger-framed 58-story building recorded during the Mw6.0 Napa earthquake of 24 August 2014 and the Mw3.8 Berkeley earthquake of 20 October 2011 are used to identify its dynamic characteristics and behavior. Fundamental frequencies are 0.28 Hz (NS), 0.25 Hz (EW), and 0.43 Hz...
Annual elk calf survival in a multiple carnivore system
Daniel R. Eacker, Mark Hebblewhite, Kelly M. Proffitt, Benjamin S. Jimenez, Michael S. Mitchell, Hugh S. Robinson
2016, Journal of Wildlife Management (80) 1345-1359
The realized effect of multiple carnivores on juvenile ungulate recruitment may depend on the carnivore assemblage as well as compensation from forage and winter weather severity, which may mediate juvenile vulnerability to predation in ungulates. We used a time-to-event approach to test for the effects of risk factors on annual...
Active faulting on the Wallula fault zone within the Olympic-Wallowa lineament, Washington State, USA
Brian L. Sherrod, Richard J. Blakely, John P. Lasher, Andrew P. Lamb, Shannon A. Mahan, Franklin F. Foit, Elizabeth Barnett
2016, GSA Bulletin (128) 1636-1659
The Wallula fault zone is an integral feature of the Olympic-Wallowa lineament, an ∼500-km-long topographic lineament oblique to the Cascadia plate boundary, extending from Vancouver Island, British Columbia, to Walla Walla, Washington. The structure and past earthquake activity of the Wallula fault zone are important because of nearby infrastructure, and...
Bedrock morphology and structure, upper Santa Cruz Basin, south-central Arizona, with transient electromagnetic survey data
Mark W. Bultman, William R. Page
2016, Open-File Report 2016-1152
The upper Santa Cruz Basin is an important groundwater basin containing the regional aquifer for the city of Nogales, Arizona. This report provides data and interpretations of data aimed at better understanding the bedrock morphology and structure of the upper Santa Cruz Basin study area which encompasses the Rio Rico...
Time-lapse gravity data for monitoring and modeling artificial recharge through a thick unsaturated zone
Jeffrey R. Kennedy, Ty P.A. Ferre, Benjamin Creutzfeldt
2016, Water Resources Research (52) 7244-7261
Groundwater-level measurements in monitoring wells or piezometers are the most common, and often the only, hydrologic measurements made at artificial recharge facilities. Measurements of gravity change over time provide an additional source of information about changes in groundwater storage, infiltration, and for model calibration. We demonstrate that for an artificial...
Bayesian cross-validation for model evaluation and selection, with application to the North American Breeding Bird Survey
William A. Link, John R. Sauer
2016, Ecology (97) 1746-1758
The analysis of ecological data has changed in two important ways over the last 15 years. The development and easy availability of Bayesian computational methods has allowed and encouraged the fitting of complex hierarchical models. At the same time, there has been increasing emphasis on acknowledging and accounting for model uncertainty....
Uncertainty in biological monitoring: a framework for data collection and analysis to account for multiple sources of sampling bias
Viviana Ruiz-Gutierrez, Melvin B. Hooten, Evan H. Campbell Grant
2016, Methods in Ecology and Evolution (7) 900-909
Biological monitoring programmes are increasingly relying upon large volumes of citizen-science data to improve the scope and spatial coverage of information, challenging the scientific community to develop design and model-based approaches to improve inference.Recent statistical models in ecology have been developed to accommodate false-negative errors, although current...
