River floods under wetter antecedent conditions deliver coarser sediment to the coast
Amy E. East, Alexander G. Snyder, Andrew W. Stevens, Jonathan A. Warrick, David J. Topping, Matthew A. Thomas, Andrew C. Ritchie
2025, Geophysical Research Letters (52)
Increasing hydrologic volatility—more extreme rain, and larger variations between wet and dry years—has become apparent in some regions, but few data exist to determine how intensifying hydrologic extremes affect sedimentary systems. Using uniquely high-resolution records of fluvial suspended sediment and coastal morphology, we quantify sedimentary responses from a steep, 357-km2 watershed...
Geochemical and tectonic evolution of the Ordovician Bronson Hill arc and Silurian and Devonian Connecticut Valley–Gaspé trough: Eastern Vermont and western New Hampshire, USA
Peter M. Valley, Gregory J. Walsh, Arthur J. Merschat, Ryan J. McAleer
2025, Geosphere (21) 418-445
We present major and trace element whole-rock geochemistry of 94 samples from the Bronson Hill arc (BHA) and Connecticut Valley–Gaspé trough (CVGT). These data, when combined with recent zircon U-Pb geochronology and a reexamination of existing whole-rock geochemistry, enable a new analysis of the tectonic history of the ancient Laurentian-Ganderian...
How quickly do brook trout lose long-term thermal acclimation?
Matthew J. O'Donnell, Amy M. Regish, S.D. McCormick, Benjamin Letcher
2025, Journal of Thermal Biology (129)
Abundances of coldwater adapted stream fish populations are declining largely due to anthropogenic influences, including increased temperature. To persist in streams with unsuitable thermal habitat, fish must move to coldwater patches, acclimate, or adapt to water temperatures above thermal optima. Brook trout, a coldwater adapted salmonid, has previously displayed physiological...
Identical sequence types of Yersinia ruckeri associated with lethal disease in wild-caught invasive Blue Catfish and cultured hybrid catfish (Channel Catfish ♀ × Blue Catfish ♂) from disparate aquatic ecosystems
Christine L. Densmore, Madeleine Hendrix, Stephen Reichley, Clayton D. Raines, Noah Bressman, Zachary Crum, Lester Khoo, Geoffrey Waldbieser, Matt Griffin, Timothy J Welch, Luke R. Iwanowicz
2025, Journal of Aquatic Animal Health (37) 21-33
ObjectiveThe Blue Catfish Ictalurus furcatus is commonly raised in warmwater aquaculture in the United States to produce Channel Catfish I. punctatus × Blue Catfish hybrids. It is also a prominent aquatic invasive species of concern in the mid-Atlantic region of the United States. Here, Yersina ruckeri was isolated from moribund Blue Catfish...
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) mass flux and mass balance at an aqueous film-forming foam release site in semiarid eastern New Mexico, USA
Erin Louise Gray, Samuel Edwin Potteiger, Trevor Dylan Brannon, Stuart Bryan Norton, Jay Cho, Michael D. Annable
2025, Journal of Contaminant Hydrology (272)
Passive flux meters (PFMs) directly measure groundwater chemistry mass flux and Darcy flux, providing insight into contaminant source-zone architecture and transport properties. This study uses PFMs to characterize PFAS flux in groundwater at a semiarid site with a thick (greater than 90-m) unsaturated zone where groundwater has been contaminated with per-...
A partnership between the USGS and the Klamath Tribes to apply structured decision making for chronic wasting disease management
Margaret C. McEachran, Katie M. Guntly-Yancey, Richard Eugene Waggaman Berl, Donald Gentry, Michael C. Runge, Carl White, Jonathan D. Cook
2025, Fact Sheet 2025-3012
Project Overview: The Klamath Tribes (TKT) are the Klamath, Modoc, and Yahooskin Paiute peoples, and are the first peoples of the land, having lived in ancestral lands of Oregon and California since time immemorial. Members of TKT have rights to hunt, fish, trap, and gather, including the harvest of mule...
Reconstructing relative abundance indices for Atlantic sturgeon using hierarchical ecological models
Daniel S. Stich, Dewayne Fox, Amanda Higgs, David C. Kazyak, Richard Pendleton, Suresh A Sethi
2025, Transactions of the American Fisheries Society (154) 134-142
ObjectiveThe Atlantic Sturgeon Acipenser oxyrinchus is a wide-ranging, long-lived diadromous fish that is endangered in most of its range. Our objective was to develop and apply long-term, detection-corrected indices of relative abundance for juvenile and adult Atlantic Sturgeon in the Hudson River, New York, United States, to support...
New paleomagnetic constraints on the eruption timing, stratigraphy, and post-emplacement deformation of the Picture Gorge Basalt within the Columbia River Basalt Group
Anthony Francis Pivarunas, Margaret Susan Avery, Jonathan T. Hagstrum, Scott E.K. Bennett, Andrew T. Calvert
2025, Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth (130)
The Picture Gorge Basalt (PGB) is part of the Miocene Columbia River Basalt Group (CRBG). The PGB, which outcrops in eastern Oregon, is considered coincident in time with the voluminous Grande Ronde Basalt. New radiometric ages have expanded the age‐range of the PGB, suggesting it began erupting prior to the Steens...
Specific conductance and water type as a proxy model for salinity and total dissolved solids measurements in the Upper Colorado River Basin
R. Blaine McCleskey, Charles A. Cravotta III, Matthew P. Miller, Tanner William Chapin, Fred D. Tillman, Gabrielle L. Keith
2025, Applied Geochemistry (184)
Salinity levels in streams and tributaries of the Colorado River Basin have been a major concern for the United States and Mexico for over 50 years as the water is used by millions of people for domestic and industrial purposes. Recently, the United States Geological Survey expanded stream monitoring networks...
Spatial variation in landlocked Atlantic Salmon smolt survival associated with dam passage, avian predation, and stocking location
Kurt C. Heim, William R. Ardren, Jonah L. Withers, Zachery Eisenhauer, Matthew A. Mensinger, Theodore Castro-Santos
2025, North American Journal of Fisheries Management (45) 1-14
ObjectiveWe evaluated survival differences between upstream and downstream stocking for landlocked Atlantic Salmon Salmo salar smolts in a tributary to Lake Champlain.MethodsWe radio-tagged smolts and stocked them concurrently with 22,000 smolts at two release sites in 2 years. The downstream location (DS, river kilometer...
Mortality events in Yuma myotis (Myotis yumanensis) due to white-nose syndrome in Washington, USA
Jeffrey M. Lorch, A. Tobin, Alexandria Annelise Argue, Valerie I. Shearn-Bochsler, Brenda M. Berlowski-Zier, Kyle George, Katherine H. Haman, Anne Ballmann
2025, Journal of Wildlife Diseases (61) 509-514
The impacts of white-nose syndrome (WNS) on many bat species in eastern North America have been well documented because of the length of time that the causative agent, Pseudogymnoascus destructans (Pd), has been present and the ability to monitor bat hibernacula in that region. However, the disease outcomes for bat species in...
A 700-year rupture sequence of great eastern Aleutian earthquakes from tsunami modeling of stratigraphic records
Yoshiki Yamazaki, Kwok Fai Cheung, Thorne Lay, SeanPaul La Selle, Robert C. Witter, Bruce E. Jaffe
2025, Nature Communications (16)
Great Aleutian underthrusting earthquakes produced destructive tsunamis impacting Hawaiʻi in 1946 and 1957. Prior modeling of the 1957 tsunami deposit and runup records on eastern Aleutian and Hawaiian Islands jointly with tide-gauge observations across the Pacific Ocean constrained a rupture model with shallow slip up to 26 m along 600 km of...
Ordovician stratigraphy, structure, and karst of the Falling Spring Valley, Alleghany County, Virginia, USA
John T. Haynes, Richard A. Lambert, Delbert C. Martin, Randall C. Orndorff, Mercer Parker
Yonathan Admassu, Ángel Garcia, Richard Hutto, editor(s)
2025, Book chapter, From the Ozark Plateaus and Arkansas River Valley to the Shenandoah Valley: Field guides for the 2025 Southeastern and South-Central Section Meetings
This one-day trip highlights new findings on a preliminary bedrock geologic map that shows results from ongoing geologic mapping in the Falling Spring Valley of Alleghany County, Virginia, USA, which is the southern end of the larger Warm Springs Valley, an elongated anticlinal valley rimmed by Ordovician and Silurian siliciclastic...
Comparison of hydrologic data and water budgets between 2003–08 and 2018–23 for the eastern part of the Arbuckle-Simpson aquifer, south-central Oklahoma
Shana L. Mashburn, Evin J. Fetkovich, Hayden A. Lockmiller, Chloe Codner, Ethan Allen Kirby, Isaac A. Dale, Colin A. Baciocco
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2025-5011
The Arbuckle-Simpson aquifer is divided spatially into three parts (eastern, central, and western). The largest groundwater withdrawals are from the eastern part of the Arbuckle-Simpson aquifer, which provides water to approximately 39,000 people in Ada and Sulphur, Oklahoma, and surrounding areas. The Arbuckle-Simpson aquifer, including the eastern part, is designated...
Evidence of red fox (Vulpes vulpes) depredating a Saltmarsh Sparrow (Ammospiza caudacuta) nest
Bridget Re, Sarah M. Karpanty, Elizabeth Ann Hunter
2025, The Wilson Journal of Ornithology (137) 647-654
Saltmarsh Sparrows (Ammospiza caudacuta), a tidal-marsh specialist, face severe population declines due to habitat loss, sea-level rise, and predation. While previous research suggests that predation pressure increases at the southern extent of the species’ breeding range, data on local predator communities remain limited. To address this, we...
Overwinter survival of an estuarine resident fish (Fundulus heteroclitus) in North Carolina salt marsh creeks
P. J. Rudershausen, Matthew J. O'Donnell
2025, Journal of Fish of Biology (107) 188-200
The mummichog Fundulus heteroclitus is a trophically important fish inhabiting Atlantic coastal salt marshes, with few in situ estimates of overwinter survival throughout the species range. We estimated overwinter apparent survival rates of F. heteroclitus at the approximate mid-latitudinal species range [coastal North Carolina (USA)] in four tidal creeks that experience variable winter water...
Potential effects of sea level rise and high tide flooding on Laterallus jamaicensis jamaicensis (eastern black rail) coastal breeding areas
Catherine A. Nikiel, Marta P. Lyons
2025, Open-File Report 2021-1104-F
Laterallus jamaicensis jamaicensis (eastern black rails; Gmelin, 1789) are facing increasing risk from flooding in coastal breeding habitats because of rising sea levels combined with standard high tide flooding. In this report, we examine regional differences in relative rates of sea level rise, days in the breeding season above historical...
Delineating ecologically-distinct groups for annual cycle management of a declining shorebird
Elly C. Knight, J. D. Carlisle, Andy J. Boyce, D.C. Bradley, Paula Cimprich, Stephanie Coates, Stephen J. Dinsmore, Cory J. Gregory, Joel G. Jorgensen, Jeffrey F. Kelly, David Newstead, Alina Olalla, Larkin A. Powell, Amy L. Scarpignato, T. Lee Tibbitts, Nils Warnock, Walter Wehtje, Peter P. Marra, Autumn-Lynn Harrison
2025, Journal of Applied Ecology (62) 1152-1165
1. Patterns of migratory connectivity are increasingly used to understand and manage threats throughout the annual cycle of migratory species. Strong migratory connectivity refers to when individuals from different populations remain spatially separated across the annual cycle, which may expose populations to unique sets of threats and conditions that cause...
Foundational science in flight—USGS bird programs support conservation, culture, and a thriving U.S. economy
David Ziolkowski, Antonio Celis-Murillo, Jenn Malpass, Keith L. Pardieck, Julien Martin, Lauren Emily Walker
2025, Fact Sheet 2025-3011
Birds are vital to our economy, ecosystems, and cultural heritage. Investing in bird conservation benefits communities, businesses, and working lands while reinforcing our nation’s legacy of stewardship and biodiversity. By valuing birds, we ensure a richer, healthier, and more vibrant future for all Americans. The USGS leads two national bird...
Peak streamflow trends in Minnesota and their relation to changes in climate, water years 1921–2020
Tara Williams-Sether, Chris Sanocki
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5064-E
This report chapter summarizes the effect of hydroclimatic variability of annual peak streamflow in Minnesota and is part of a larger U.S. Geological Survey multistate study to assess potential nonstationarity in annual peak streamflows across the Midwest. Spatial and temporal patterns were examined for nonstationarity in annual peak streamflow, daily...
Peak streamflow trends in North Dakota and their relation to changes in climate, water years 1921–2020
Karen R. Ryberg, Tara Williams-Sether
2025, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5064-H
Standardized guidelines for completing flood-flow frequency analyses are presented in a U.S. Geological Survey Techniques and Methods report known as Bulletin 17C, https://doi.org/10.3133/tm4B5. In recent decades (since about 2000), a better understanding of long-term climatic persistence (periods of clustered floods or droughts, or wet or dry periods) and...
Bedrock fracture characterization of the New Hampshire State Route 111 bypass, Windham, New Hampshire
Gregory J. Walsh, Nicholas Edwin Powell
2025, Data Report 1208
Bedrock roadcuts developed with blasting along the New Hampshire State Route 111 bypass in Windham expose the metasedimentary Silurian Berwick Formation and intrusions of multiple phases of foliated to nonfoliated granite to granitic pegmatite of the Devonian New Hampshire Plutonic Suite. Fracture characterization at two roadway rock cuts (roadcuts) included...
Quantifying sea otter abundance, distribution, habitat use, and foraging intake in Cook Inlet, Alaska
Daniel Monson, Kimberly A. Kloecker, Nicole LaRoche, Collin Power, Laura Geissinger, Elizabeth Hasan, Tahzay Jones, Ben Weitzman
2025, OCS Study BOEM 2025-019
Following near extirpation from the fur trade, sea otters (Enhydra lutris) have returned to occupy lower Cook Inlet since the 1950s, or earlier, with numbers increasing to ~11,000 and ~9,000 on the west and east side, respectively, by 2017. Northward range expansion on the west side has been negligible for...
Fisheries research and monitoring activities of the Lake Erie Biological Station, 2024
Mark Richard Dufour, Francesco Guzzo, Corbin David Hilling, Kevin R. Keretz, Richard Kraus, Richard Cole Oldham, James J. Roberts, Joseph Schmitt
2025, Report
A comprehensive understanding of fish populations and their interactions is the cornerstone of modern fishery management and the basis for Lake Erie’s Fish Community Objectives (FCOs) developed in 2020 (Francis et al. 2020). The 2024 U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Lake Erie Biological Station Annual Report is responsive to these FCOs...
Methodology
North American Bird Conservation Initiative, A. Rodewald, Mike Brasher, John Alexander, Elisabeth M. Ammon, Tracy E. Borneman, Dustin Brewer, Stephen Brown, Jennie N. Duberstein, Beth Flint, Adam Hannuksela, Kathleen Holland, J. A. Hostetler, Edwin Juarez, Robin Kaler, Chris Latimer, Elva Manquera, Kate Martin, Chris McCreedy, Nicole Michel, Corina Newsome, Andrew Olsen, Marc Romano, Kenneth V. Rosenberg, B. Ryder, Rebekah J. Rylander, John R. Sauer, Adam Smith, Dena Spatz, Caleb Spiegel, Tice Supplee, Roberta Swift, Eric VanderWerf, Josh Vest, Olivia Wang
2025, Report, State of the birds report, United States of America 2025
Following the approach developed by Gregory and van Strien (2010), State of the Birds reports focus on composite summaries of population change for collections of species that share common primary habitat or taxonomic affinity. In this report, we provide composite indexes for habitat-obligate species as defined in earlier reports (Grassland, Aridland, Eastern Forest and...
