Recent stability of resident and migratory landbird populations in National Parks of the Pacific Northwest
Chris Ray, James Saracco, Mandy Holmgren, Robert Wilkerson, Rodney Siegel, Kurt J. Jenkins, Jason I. Ransom, Patricia J. Happe, John Boetsch, Mark Huff
2017, Ecosphere (8)
Monitoring species in National Parks facilitates inference regarding effects of climate change on population dynamics because parks are relatively unaffected by other forms of anthropogenic disturbance. Even at early points in a monitoring program, identifying climate covariates of population density can suggest vulnerabilities to future change. Monitoring landbird populations in...
Restoring monarch butterfly habitat in the Midwestern US: 'All hands on deck'
Wayne E. Thogmartin, Laura Lopez-Hoffman, Jason J. Rohweder, James E. Diffendorfer, Ryan G. Drum, Darius J. Semmens, Scott Black, Iris Caldwell, Donita Cotter, Pauline Drobney, Laura L. Jackson, Michael Gale, Doug Helmers, Steven B. Hilburger, Elizabeth Howard, Karen S. Oberhauser, John M. Pleasants, Brice X. Semmens, Orley R. Taylor, Patrick Ward, Jake F. Weltzin, Ruscena Wiederholt
2017, Conservation Letters (12)
The eastern migratory population of monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus plexippus) has declined by >80% within the last two decades. One possible cause of this decline is the loss of ≥1.3 billion stems of milkweed (Asclepias spp.), which monarchs require for reproduction. In an effort to restore monarchs to a population goal...
Interpreting surveys to estimate the size of the monarch butterfly population: Pitfalls and prospects
John M. Pleasants, Myron P. Zalucki, Karen S. Oberhauser, Lincoln P. Brower, Orley R. Taylor, Wayne E. Thogmartin
2017, PLoS ONE (12)
To assess the change in the size of the eastern North American monarch butterfly summer population, studies have used long-term data sets of counts of adult butterflies or eggs per milkweed stem. Despite the observed decline in the monarch population as measured at overwintering sites in Mexico, these studies found...
An evaluation of sampling and full enumeration strategies for Fisher Jenks classification in big data settings
Sergio J. Rey, Philip A. Stephens, Jason R. Laura
2017, Transactions in GIS (21) 796-810
Large data contexts present a number of challenges to optimal choropleth map classifiers. Application of optimal classifiers to a sample of the attribute space is one proposed solution. The properties of alternative sampling-based classification methods are examined through a series of Monte Carlo simulations. The impacts of spatial autocorrelation, number...
Retrospective analysis of seasonal ocean growth rates of two sea winter Atlantic Salmon in eastern Maine using historic scales
Lisa K. Izzo, Joseph D. Zydlewski
2017, Marine and Coastal Fisheries: Dynamics, Management, and Ecosystem Science (9) 357-372
Substantial declines of anadromous Atlantic Salmon Salmo salar have occurred throughout its range, with many populations at the southern extent of the distribution currently extirpated or endangered. While both one sea winter (1SW) and two sea winter (2SW) spawner numbers for the North American stocks have declined since the 1950s, the decline...
Use of navigation channels by Lake Sturgeon: Does channelization increase vulnerability of fish to ship strikes?
Darryl W. Hondorp, David Bennion, Edward F. Roseman, Christopher M. Holbrook, James C. Boase, Justin A. Chiotti, Michael V. Thomas, Todd C. Wills, Richard Drouin, Steven T. Kessel, Charles C. Krueger
2017, PLoS ONE (12)
Channelization for navigation and flood control has altered the hydrology and bathymetry of many large rivers with unknown consequences for fish species that undergo riverine migrations. In this study, we investigated whether altered flow distributions and bathymetry associated with channelization attracted migrating Lake Sturgeon (Acipenser fulvescens) into commercial navigation channels,...
Model selection for the North American Breeding Bird Survey: A comparison of methods
William A. Link, John R. Sauer, Daniel Niven
2017, Condor (119) 546-556
The North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) provides data for >420 bird species at multiple geographic scales over 5 decades. Modern computational methods have facilitated the fitting of complex hierarchical models to these data. It is easy to propose and fit new models, but little attention has been given to...
Tackling an intractable problem: Can greater taxon sampling help resolve relationships within the Stenopelmatoidea (Orthoptera: Ensifera)?
Amy G. Vandergast, David B Weissman, Dustin Wood, David C F Rentz, Corinna S Bazelet, Norihiro Ueshima
2017, Zootaxa (4291) 1-33
The relationships among and within the families that comprise the orthopteran superfamily Stenopelmatoidea (suborder Ensifera) remain poorly understood. We developed a phylogenetic hypothesis based on Bayesian analysis of two nuclear ribosomal and one mitochondrial gene for 118 individuals (84 de novo and 34 from GenBank). These included Gryllacrididae from North,...
Rodenticide incidents of exposure and adverse effects on non-raptor birds
Nimish B. Vyas
2017, Science of the Total Environment (609) 68-76
Interest in the adverse effects of rodenticides on birds has focused primarily on raptors. However, non-raptor birds are also poisoned (rodenticide exposure resulting in adverse effects including mortality) by rodenticides through consumption of the rodenticide bait and contaminated prey. A literature search for rodenticide incidents (evidence of exposure to a...
Noble gas data from Goldfield and Tonopah epithermal Au-Ag deposits, ancestral Cascades Arc, USA: Evidence for a primitive mantle volatile source
Andrew H. Manning, Albert H. Hofstra
2017, Ore Geology Reviews (89) 683-700
The He, Ne, and Ar isotopic composition of fluid inclusions in ore and gangue minerals were analyzed to determine the source of volatiles in the high-grade Goldfield and Tonopah epithermal Au-Ag deposits in southwestern Nevada, USA. Ar and Ne are mainly atmospheric, whereas He has only a minor atmospheric component....
Assessing multi-tissue lead burdens in free-flying obligate scavengers in eastern North America
Shannon Behmke, Patricia Mazik, Todd E. Katzner
2017, Environmental Monitoring and Assessment (189)
Avian scavengers are regularly exposed to anthropogenic lead. Although many studies evaluate lead concentrations of either blood or tissues of lead-poisoned birds, there is comparatively less research on lead burdens of free-flying, apparently healthy individuals and populations. Here, we address this lack of information by assessing lead levels of multiple...
Volcano geodesy in the Cascade arc, USA
Michael P. Poland, Michael Lisowski, Daniel Dzurisin, Rebecca Kramer, Megan McLay, Benjamin Pauk
2017, Bulletin of Volcanology (79) 1-33
Experience during historical time throughout the Cascade arc and the lack of deep-seated deformation prior to the two most recent eruptions of Mount St. Helens might lead one to infer that Cascade volcanoes are generally quiescent and, specifically, show no signs of geodetic change until they are about to erupt....
Partitioning evapotranspiration into green and blue water sources in the conterminous United States
Naga Manohar Velpuri, Gabriel B. Senay
2017, Scientific Reports (7)
In this study, we combined two 1 km actual evapotranspiration datasets (ET), one obtained from a root zone water balance model and another from an energy balance model, to partition annual ET into green (rainfall-based) and blue (surface water/groundwater) sources. Time series maps of green water ET...
Optimization of decision rules for hydroelectric operation to reduce both eel mortality and unnecessary turbine shutdown: A search for a win-win solution
David R. Smith, Paul L. Fackler, Sheila M. Eyler, Laura Villegas, Stuart A. Welsh
2017, Rivers Research and Applications (33) 1279-1285
Worldwide populations of freshwater eels have declined with one of the contributing causes related to mortality during passage through hydropower turbines. An inherent trade‐off underlies turbine management where the competing demand for more hydropower comes at the expense of eel survival. A win–win solution exists when an option performs better...
Group inverse sampling: An economical approach to inverse sampling
Bardia Panahbehagh, David R. Smith
2017, Environmetrics (28)
Inverse sampling is an adaptive design in the sense that the final sampling effort during a search for rare events will depend on what is found during the survey. Conventional inverse sampling (CIS) designs successively select individual sampling units to find, for example, the k th rare event. In real...
2017 One‐year seismic‐hazard forecast for the central and eastern United States from induced and natural earthquakes
Mark D. Petersen, Charles Mueller, Morgan P. Moschetti, Susan M. Hoover, Allison Shumway, Daniel E. McNamara, Robert Williams, Andrea L. Llenos, William L. Ellsworth, Justin L. Rubinstein, Arthur F. McGarr, Kenneth S. Rukstales
2017, Seismological Research Letters (88) 772-783
We produce a one‐year 2017 seismic‐hazard forecast for the central and eastern United States from induced and natural earthquakes that updates the 2016 one‐year forecast; this map is intended to provide information to the public and to facilitate the development of induced seismicity forecasting models, methods, and data. The 2017...
Improved efficiency of maximum likelihood analysis of time series with temporally correlated errors
John O. Langbein
2017, Journal of Geodesy (91) 985-994
Most time series of geophysical phenomena have temporally correlated errors. From these measurements, various parameters are estimated. For instance, from geodetic measurements of positions, the rates and changes in rates are often estimated and are used to model tectonic processes. Along with the estimates of the size of the parameters,...
Deepwater sculpin status and recovery in Lake Ontario
Brian Weidel, Maureen Walsh, Michael J. Connerton, Brian F. Lantry, Jana R. Lantry, Jeremy P. Holden, Michael J. Yuille, James A. Hoyle
2017, Journal of Great Lakes Research (43) 854-862
Deepwater sculpin are important in oligotrophic lakes as one of the few fishes that use deep profundal habitats and link invertebrates in those habitats to piscivores. In Lake Ontario the species was once abundant, however drastic declines in the mid-1900s led some to suggest the species had been extirpated and...
Maternal transfer of mercury to songbird eggs
Joshua T. Ackerman, C. Alex Hartman, Mark P. Herzog
2017, Environmental Pollution (230) 463-468
We evaluated the maternal transfer of mercury to eggs in songbirds, determined whether this relationship differed between songbird species, and developed equations for predicting mercury concentrations in eggs from maternal blood. We sampled blood and feathers from 44 house wren (Troglodytes aedon) and 34 tree swallow (Tachycineta bicolor) mothers and...
Ecohydrological role of biological soil crusts across a gradient in levels of development
Kristen M. Whitney, Enrique R. Vivoni, Michael C. Duniway, John B. Bradford, Sasha C. Reed, Jayne Belnap
2017, Ecohydrology (10)
Though biological soil crusts (biocrusts) form abundant covers in arid and semiarid regions, their competing effects on soil hydrologic conditions are rarely accounted for in models. This study presents the modification of a soil water balance model to account for the presence of biocrusts at different levels of development (LOD)...
Coupling gene-based and classic veterinary diagnostics improves interpretation of health and immune function in the Agassiz’s desert tortoise (Gopherus agassizii)
K. Kristina Drake, Lizabeth Bowen, Rebecca L. Lewison, Todd C. Esque, Kenneth Nussear, Josephine Braun, Shannon C. Waters-Dynes, A. Keith Miles
2017, Conservation Physiology (5)
The analysis of blood constituents is a widely used tool to aid in monitoring of animal health and disease. However, classic blood diagnostics (i.e. hematologic and plasma biochemical values) often do not provide sufficient information to determine the state of an animal’s health. Field studies on wild tortoises and other...
Revised tephra volumes for Cascade Range volcanoes
Manuel Nathenson
2017, Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research (341) 42-52
Isopach maps from tephra eruptions from Mount St. Helens were reported in Carey et al. (1995) and for tephra eruptions from Glacier Peak in Gardner et al. (1998). For exponential thinning, the isopach data only define a single slope on a log thickness versus square root of area plot. Carey...
Landscape context and the biophysical response of rivers to dam removal in the United States
Melissa M. Foley, Francis J. Magilligan, Christian E. Torgersen, Jon J. Major, Chauncey W. Anderson, Patrick J. Connolly, Daniel J. Wieferich, Patrick B. Shafroth, James E. Evans, Dana M. Infante, Laura Craig
2017, PLoS ONE (7)
Dams have been a fundamental part of the U.S. national agenda over the past two hundred years. Recently, however, dam removal has emerged as a strategy for addressing aging, obsolete infrastructure and more than 1,100 dams have been removed since the 1970s. However, only 130 of these removals had any...
Thermal regimes of Rocky Mountain lakes warm with climate change
James Roberts, Kurt D. Fausch, Travis S. Schmidt, David M. Walters
2017, PLoS ONE (12) 1-17
Anthropogenic climate change is causing a wide range of stresses in aquatic ecosystems, primarily through warming thermal conditions. Lakes, in response to these changes, are experiencing increases in both summer temperatures and ice-free days. We used continuous records of lake surface temperature and air temperature to create statistical models of...
Activation of a small ephemeral lake in southern Jordan during the last full glacial period and its paleoclimatic implications
Gentry A. Catlett, Jason A. Rech, Jeffrey S. Pigati, Mustafa Al Kuisi, Shanying Li, Jeffrey S. Honke
2017, Quaternary Research (88) 98-109
Playas, or ephemeral lakes, are one of the most common depositional environments in arid and semiarid lands worldwide. Playa deposits, however, have mostly been avoided as paleoclimatic archives because they typically contain exceptionally low concentrations of organic material, making 14C dating difficult. Here, we describe a technique for concentrating organic...
