USGS National Wildlife Health Center quarterly mortality report
Anne E. Ballmann, C. LeAnn White, Barbara L. Bodenstein, Jennifer L. Buckner
2015, Wildlife Disease Association Newsletter 4-5
No abstract available....
Patterns of floodplain sediment deposition along the regulated lower Roanoke River, North Carolina: annual, decadal, centennial scales
Cliff R. Hupp, Edward R. Schenk, Daniel Kroes, Debra A. Willard, Phil A. Townsend, Robert K. Peet
2015, Geomorphology (228) 666-680
The lower Roanoke River on the Coastal Plain of North Carolina is not embayed and maintains a floodplain that is among the largest on the mid-Atlantic Coast. This floodplain has been impacted by substantial aggradation in response to upstream colonial and post-colonial agriculture between the mid-eighteenth and mid-nineteenth centuries. Additionally,...
Distribution and dynamics of mangrove forests of South Asia
Chandra Giri, Jordan Long, Sawaid Abbas, R. Mani Murali, Faisal M. Qamer, Bruce Pengra, David Thau
2015, Journal of Environmental Management (148) 10-111
Mangrove forests in South Asia occur along the tidal sea edge of Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. These forests provide important ecosystem goods and services to the region's dense coastal populations and support important functions of the biosphere. Mangroves are under threat from both natural and anthropogenic stressors; however...
An analysis of three new infrasound arrays around Kīlauea Volcano
Weston A. Thelen, Jennifer Cooper
2015, Open-File Report 2014-1253
A network of three new infrasound station arrays was installed around Kīlauea Volcano between July 2012 and September 2012, and a preliminary analysis of open-vent monitoring has been completed by Hawaiian Volcano Observatory (HVO). Infrasound is an emerging monitoring method in volcanology that detects perturbations in atmospheric pressure at frequencies...
Estimated annual agricultural pesticide use for counties of the conterminous United States, 2008-12
Nancy T. Baker, Wesley W. Stone
2015, Data Series 907
Annual county-level pesticide use was estimated for 423 herbicides, insecticides, and fungicides applied to agricultural crops grown in the conterminous United States during 2008–12. For all States except California, pesticide-use data were compiled from proprietary surveys of farm operations located within U.S. Department of Agriculture Crop Reporting Districts (CRDs). Surveyed...
Attenuation of monkeypox virus by deletion of genomic regions
Juan G. Lopera, Elizabeth A. Falendysz, Tonie E. Rocke, Jorge E. Osorio
2015, Virology (475) 129-138
Monkeypox virus (MPXV) is an emerging pathogen from Africa that causes disease similar to smallpox. Two clades with different geographic distributions and virulence have been described. Here, we utilized bioinformatic tools to identify genomic regions in MPXV containing multiple virulence genes and explored their roles in pathogenicity; two selected regions...
Elk monitoring in Mount Rainier and Olympic national parks: 2008-2011 synthesis report
Kurt J. Jenkins, Paul C. Griffin, Patricia J. Happe, Mason E. Reid, David J. Vales, Barbara J. Moeller, Michelle Tirhe, Scott McCorquodale, Katherine Beirne, John Boetsch, William Baccus, Bruce C. Lubow
2015, Natural Resource Report NPS/NCCN/NRR - 2015/904
In 2008, the USGS collaborated with the NPS, the Muckleshoot and Puyallup Indian Tribes, and WDFW to develop a protocol tor monitor changes in abundance, population composition, and spatial distribution of elk on summer ranges in MORA and OLYM and winter ranges in OLYM. We developed double-observer sightability (DO-S) models...
Phenological synchrony of bird migration with tree flowering at desert riparian stopover sites
Jherime L. Kellermann, Charles van Riper III
2015, Book chapter, Studies in Avian Biology book series
Small-bodied songbirds replenish fat reserves during migration at stopover sites where they continually encounter novel and often unpredictable environmental conditions. The ability to select and utilize high quality habitats is critical to survival and fitness. Vegetation phenology is closely linked with emergence of insect prey and may provide valid cues...
Social and Economic Analysis Branch: integrating policy, social, economic, and natural science
Rudy Schuster, Katie D. Walters
2015, Fact Sheet 2014-3070
The Fort Collins Science Center's Social and Economic Analysis Branch provides unique capabilities in the U.S. Geological Survey by leading projects that integrate social, behavioral, economic, and natural science in the context of human–natural resource interactions. Our research provides scientific understanding and support for the management and conservation of our...
A summary of the benthic-invertebrate and fish-community data from streams in the Indianapolis metropolitan area, Indiana, 1981-2012
David C. Voelker, Aubrey R. Bunch, Edward G. Dobrowolski, Megan E. Shoda
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5225
Intermittently, during 1981–2012, the U.S. Geological Survey sampled sites in the White River and several tributaries in the Indianapolis metropolitan area of Indiana for benthic invertebrates and fish communities. During 1981–87, one study focused on benthic-invertebrate data collection at three sites along the White River. During 1994–96, 21 sites were...
Plant diversity predicts beta but not alpha diversity of soil microbes across grasslands worldwide
Suzanne M. Prober, Jonathan W. Leff, Scott T. Bates, Elizabeth T. Borer, Jennifer Firn, W. Stanley Harpole, Eric M. Lind, Eric W. Seabloom, Peter B. Adler, Jonathan D. Bakker, Elsa E. Cleland, Nicole DeCrappeo, Elizabeth DeLorenze, Nicole Hagenah, Yann Hautier, Kirsten S. Hofmockel, Kevin P. Kirkman, Johannes M. H. Knops, Kimberly J. La Pierre, Andrew S. MacDougall, Rebecca L. McCulley, Charles E. Mitchell, Anita C. Risch, Martin Schuetz, Carly J. Stevens, Ryan J. Williams, Noah Fierer
2015, Ecology Letters (18) 85-95
Aboveground–belowground interactions exert critical controls on the composition and function of terrestrial ecosystems, yet the fundamental relationships between plant diversity and soil microbial diversity remain elusive. Theory predicts predominantly positive associations but tests within single sites have shown variable relationships, and associations between plant and microbial diversity across broad spatial...
Landslide mobility and hazards: implications of the 2014 Oso disaster
Richard M. Iverson, David L. George, Kate E. Allstadt, Mark E. Reid, Brian D. Collins, James W. Vallance, Steve P. Schilling, Jonathan W. Godt, Charles Cannon, Christopher S. Magirl, Rex L. Baum, Jeffrey A. Coe, William H. Schulz, J. Brent Bower
2015, Earth and Planetary Science Letters (412) 197-208
Landslides reflect landscape instability that evolves over meteorological and geological timescales, and they also pose threats to people, property, and the environment. The severity of these threats depends largely on landslide speed and travel distance, which are collectively described as landslide “mobility”. To investigate causes and effects of mobility, we...
Total- and methyl-mercury concentrations and methylation rates across the freshwater to hypersaline continuum of the Great Salt Lake, Utah, USA
William P. Johnson, Neil Swanson, Brooks Black, Abigail Rudd, Gregory Carling, Diego P. Fernandez, John Luft, Jim Van Leeuwen, Mark C. Marvin-DiPasquale
2015, Science of the Total Environment (511) 489-500
We examined mercury (Hg) speciation in water and sediment of the Great Salt Lake and surrounding wetlands, a locale spanning fresh to hypersaline and oxic to anoxic conditions, in order to test the hypothesis that spatial and temporal variations in Hg concentration and methylation rates correspond to observed spatial and...
Quantifying water requirements of riparian river red gum (Eucalyptus camaldulensis) in the Murray-Darling Basin, Australia: Implications for the management of environmental flows
Tanya M. Doody, Matthew J. Colloff, Micah Davies, Vijay Koul, Richard G. Benyon, Pamela L. Nagler
2015, Ecohydrology (8) 1471-1487
Water resource development and drought have altered river flow regimes, increasing average flood return intervals across floodplains in the Murray-Darling Basin, Australia, causing health declines in riparian river red gum (Eucalyptus camaldulensis) forests and woodlands. Environmental flow allocations helped to alleviate water stress during the recent Millennium Drought (1997–2010), however,...
Lithologic and hydrologic controls of mixed alluvial-bedrock channels in flood-prone fluvial systems: bankfull and macrochannels in the Llano River watershed, central Texas, USA
Frank T. Heitmuller, Paul F. Hudson, William H. Asquith
2015, Geomorphology (232) 1-19
The rural and unregulated Llano River watershed located in central Texas, USA, has a highly variable flow regime and a wide range of instantaneous peak flows. Abrupt transitions in surface lithology exist along the main-stem channel course. Both of these characteristics afford an opportunity to examine hydrologic, lithologic, and sedimentary...
Baseline water-quality sampling to infer nutrient and contaminant sources at Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historical Park, Island of Hawai‘i, 2009
Charles D. Hunt Jr.
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5158
Baseline water-quality sampling was conducted for dissolved nutrients and for chemical and isotopic tracers at Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historical Park on the Island of Hawai'i. Existing and future urbanization in the surrounding areas have the potential to affect water quality in the Park, and so the National Park Service and the...
Fluid pressure responses for a Devil's Slide-like system: problem formulation and simulation
Matthew A. Thomas, Keith Loague, Clifford I. Voss
2015, Hydrological Processes (29) 1450-1465
This study employs a hydrogeologic simulation approach to investigate subsurface fluid pressures for a landslide-prone section of the central California, USA, coast known as Devil's Slide. Understanding the relative changes in subsurface fluid pressures is important for systems, such as Devil's Slide, where slope creep can be interrupted by episodic...
Implications of the circumpolar genetic structure of polar bears for their conservation in a rapidly warming Arctic
Elizabeth L. Peacock, Sarah A. Sonsthagen, Martyn E. Obbard, Andrei N. Boltunov, Eric V. Regehr, Nikita Ovsyanikov, Jon Aars, Stephen N. Atkinson, George K. Sage, Andrew G. Hope, Eve Zeyl, Lutz Bachmann, Dorothee Ehrich, Kim T. Scribner, Steven C. Amstrup, Stanislav Belikov, Erik W. Born, Andrew E. Derocher, Ian Stirling, Mitchell K. Taylor, Øystein Wiig, David Paetkau, Sandra L. Talbot
2015, PLoS ONE (10)
We provide an expansive analysis of polar bear (Ursus maritimus) circumpolar genetic variation during the last two decades of decline in their sea-ice habitat. We sought to evaluate whether their genetic diversity and structure have changed over this period of habitat decline, how their current genetic patterns compare with past...
U.S. Geological Survey groundwater toolbox, a graphical and mapping interface for analysis of hydrologic data (version 1.0): user guide for estimation of base flow, runoff, and groundwater recharge from streamflow data
Paul M. Barlow, William L. Cunningham, Tong Zhai, Mark Gray
2015, Techniques and Methods 3-B10
This report is a user guide for the streamflow-hydrograph analysis methods provided with version 1.0 of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Groundwater Toolbox computer program. These include six hydrograph-separation methods to determine the groundwater-discharge (base-flow) and surface-runoff components of streamflow—the Base-Flow Index (BFI; Standard and Modified), HYSEP (Fixed Interval, Sliding...
Location, timing and extent of wildfire vary by cause of ignition
Alexandra D. Syphard, Jon E. Keeley
2015, International Journal of Wildland Fire (24) 37-47
The increasing extent of wildfires has prompted investigation into alternative fire management approaches to complement the traditional strategies of fire suppression and fuels manipulation. Wildfire prevention through ignition reduction is an approach with potential for success, but ignitions result from a variety of causes. If some ignition sources result in...
Organic matters: investigating the sources, transport, and fate of organic matter in Fanno Creek, Oregon
Steven Sobieszczyk, Mackenzie K. Keith, Jami H. Goldman, Stewart A. Rounds
2015, Fact Sheet 2015-3003
The term organic matter refers to the remnants of all living material. This can include fallen leaves, yard waste, animal waste, downed timber, or the remains of any other plant and animal life. Organic matter is abundant both on land and in water. Investigating organic matter is necessary for understanding...
Data regarding hydraulic fracturing distributions and treatment fluids, additives, proppants, and water volumes applied to wells drilled in the United States from 1947 through 2010
Tanya J. Gallegos, Brian A. Varela
2015, Data Series 868
Comprehensive, published, and publicly available data regarding the extent, location, and character of hydraulic fracturing in the United States are scarce. The objective of this data series is to publish data related to hydraulic fracturing in the public domain. The spreadsheets released with this data series contain derivative datasets aggregated...
Core-satellite species hypothesis and native versus exotic species in secondary succession
Kelsey A. Martinez, David J. Gibson, Beth A. Middleton
2015, Plant Ecology (216) 419-427
A number of hypotheses exist to explain species’ distributions in a landscape, but these hypotheses are not frequently utilized to explain the differences in native and exotic species distributions. The core-satellite species (CSS) hypothesis predicts species occupancy will be bimodally distributed, i.e., many species will be common and many species...
Trends in hydraulic fracturing distributions and treatment fluids, additives, proppants, and water volumes applied to wells drilled in the United States from 1947 through 2010: data analysis and comparison to the literature
Tanya J. Gallegos, Brian A. Varela
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2014-5131
Hydraulic fracturing is presently the primary stimulation technique for oil and gas production in low-permeability, unconventional reservoirs. Comprehensive, published, and publicly available information regarding the extent, location, and character of hydraulic fracturing in the United States is scarce. This national spatial and temporal analysis of data on nearly 1 million...
Genetic analysis of invasive Asian Black Carp (Mylopharyngodon piceus) in the Mississippi River Basin: evidence for multiple introductions
Margaret E. Hunter, Leo G. Nico
2015, Biological Invasions (17) 99-114
Invasive Asian Black Carp (Mylopharyngodon piceus) have been present in USA aquaculture facilities since the 1980s and wild Black Carp have been found in the Mississippi River Basin since the early 1990s. This study characterizes the genetic diversity and relatedness of the Basin’s Black Carp and clarifies the introduction history....
