Remote sensing to monitor cover crop adoption in southeastern Pennsylvania
Wells Hively, Sjoerd Duiker, Greg McCarty, Kusuma Prabhakara
2015, Journal of Soil and Water Conservation (70) 340-352
In the Chesapeake Bay Watershed, winter cereal cover crops are often planted in rotation with summer crops to reduce the loss of nutrients and sediment from agricultural systems. Cover crops can also improve soil health, control weeds and pests, supplement forage needs, and support resilient cropping systems. In southeastern Pennsylvania,...
Imaging the magmatic system of Mono Basin, California with magnetotellurics in three--dimensions
Jared R. Peacock, Margaret T. Mangan, Darcy McPhee, David A. Ponce
2015, Journal of Geophysical Research (120) 7273-7289
A three–dimensional (3D) electrical resistivity model of Mono Basin in eastern California unveils a complex subsurface filled with zones of partial melt, fluid–filled fracture networks, cold plutons, and regional faults. In 2013, 62 broadband magnetotelluric (MT) stations were collected in an array around southeastern Mono Basin from which a 3D...
Trends and natural variability of North American spring onset as evaluated by a new gridded dataset of spring indices
Toby R. Ault, Mark D. Schwartz, Raul Zurita-Milla, Jake F. Weltzin, Julio L. Betancourt
2015, Journal of Climate (28) 8363-8378
Climate change is expected to modify the timing of seasonal transitions this century, impacting wildlife migrations, ecosystem function, and agricultural activity. Tracking seasonal transitions in a consistent manner across space and through time requires indices that can be used for monitoring and managing biophysical and ecological systems during the coming...
Chesapeake Bay impact structure: A blast from the past
David S. Powars, Lucy E. Edwards, Gregory S. Gohn, J. Wright Horton Jr.
2015, General Information Product 159
About 35 million years ago, a 2-mile-wide meteorite smashed into Earth in what is now the lower Chesapeake Bay in Virginia. The oceanic impact vaporized, melted, fractured, and displaced rocks and sediments and sent billions of tons of water, sediments, and rocks into the air. Glassy particles of solidified melt...
The Chesapeake Bay impact structure
David S. Powars, Lucy E. Edwards, Gregory S. Gohn, J. Wright Horton Jr.
2015, Fact Sheet 2015-3071
About 35 million years ago, during late Eocene time, a 2-mile-wide asteroid or comet smashed into Earth in what is now the lower Chesapeake Bay in Virginia. The oceanic impact vaporized, melted, fractured, and (or) displaced the target rocks and sediments and sent billions of tons of water, sediments, and...
Flood-Inundation Maps for the North River in Colrain, Charlemont, and Shelburne, Massachusetts, From the Confluence of the East and West Branch North Rivers to the Deerfield River
Gardner C. Bent, Pamela J. Lombard, Robert W. Dudley
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2015-5108
A series of 10 digital flood-inundation maps were developed for a 3.3-mile reach of the North River in Colrain, Charlemont, and Shelburne, Massachusetts, by the U.S. Geological Survey in cooperation with the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The coverage of the maps extends from the confluence of the East and West...
Declining acidic deposition begins reversal of forest-soil acidification in the northeastern U.S. and eastern Canada
Gregory B. Lawrence, Paul W. Hazlett, Ivan J. Fernandez, Ouimet, Scott W. Bailey, Walter C. Shortle, Kevin T. Smith, Michael R. Antidormi
2015, Environmental Science & Technology (49) 13103-13111
Decreasing trends in acidic deposition levels over the past several decades have led to partial chemical recovery of surface waters. However, depletion of soil Ca from acidic deposition has slowed surface water recovery and led to the impairment of both aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. Nevertheless, documentation of acidic deposition effects...
Woodland salamander responses to a shelterwood harvest-prescribed burn silvicultural treatment within Appalachian mixed-oak forests
W. Mark Ford, Kathleen R. Mahoney, Kevin R. Russell, Jane L. Rodrigue, Jason D. Riddle, Thomas M. Schuler, Mary Beth Adams
2015, Forest Ecology and Management (359) 277-285
Forest management practices that mimic natural canopy disturbances, including prescribed fire and timber harvests, may reduce competition and facilitate establishment of favorable vegetative species within various ecosystems. Fire suppression in the central Appalachian region for almost a century has contributed to a transition from oak-dominated to more mesophytic, fire-intolerant forest...
Discharge, suspended sediment, and salinity in the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway and adjacent surface waters in South-Central Louisiana, 1997–2008
Christopher M. Swarzenski, Scott M. Perrien
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2015-5132
Discharge, suspended sediment, and salinity data collected between 1997 and 2008 indicate that the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway (GIWW) is an important distributary of river water and suspended sediments to coastal wetlands in south-central coastal Louisiana. Following natural hydraulic gradients, the GIWW passively distributes freshwater and suspended sediments from the Atchafalaya...
Hydrogeology of Valley-Fill Aquifers and Adjacent Areas in Eastern Chemung County, New York
Paul M. Heisig
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2015-5092
The extent, hydrogeologic framework, and potential well yields of valley-fill aquifers within a 151-square-mile area of eastern Chemung County, New York, were investigated, and the upland distribution of till thickness over bedrock was characterized. The hydrogeologic framework of these valleyfill aquifers was interpreted from multiple sources of surficial and subsurface...
Geologic map of the Alamosa 30’ × 60’ quadrangle, south-central Colorado
Ren A. Thompson, Ralph R. Shroba, Michael N. Machette, Christopher J. Fridrich, Theodore R. Brandt, Michael A. Cosca
2015, Scientific Investigations Map 3342
The Alamosa 30'× 60' quadrangle is located in the central San Luis Basin of southern Colorado and is bisected by the Rio Grande. The Rio Grande has headwaters in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado and ultimately discharges into the Gulf of Mexico 3,000 kilometers (km) downstream. Alluvial floodplains and...
Identifying block structure in the Pacific Northwest, USA
James C. Savage, Ray E. Wells
2015, Journal of Geophysical Research (120) 7905-7916
We have identified block structure in the Pacific Northwest (west of 116°W between 38°N and 49°N) by clustering GPS stations so that the same Euler vector approximates the velocity of each station in a cluster. Given the total number k of clusters desired, the clustering procedure finds the best assignment...
Initial characterization of the groundwater system near the Lower Colorado Water Supply Project, Imperial Valley, California
Alissa L. Coes, Michael Land, Jill N. Densmore, Michael T. Landrum, Kimberly R. Beisner, Jeffrey R. Kennedy, Jamie P. Macy, Fred D. Tillman
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2015-5102
In 2009, the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the city of Needles, began a study of the hydrogeology along the All-American Canal, which conveys water from the Colorado River to the Imperial Valley. The focus of this study was to gain a better understanding of the effect of...
Simulation of daily streamflow for nine river basins in eastern Iowa using the Precipitation-Runoff Modeling System
Adel E. Haj, Daniel E. Christiansen, Kasey J. Hutchinson
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2015-5129
The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, constructed Precipitation-Runoff Modeling System models to estimate daily streamflow for nine river basins in eastern Iowa that drain into the Mississippi River. The models are part of a suite of methods for estimating daily streamflow at ungaged...
Translating climate change effects on species into everyday language: an example of more driving and less fishing
Tyler Wagner, Jefferson T. Deweber
2015, Fisheries (40) 395-398
Climate change is expected to result in widespread changes in species distributions (e.g., shifting, shrinking, expanding species ranges; e.g., Parmesan and Yohe, 2003), especially for freshwater fish species (Heino et al. 2009). Although anglers and other resource users could be greatly affected by changes in species distributions, predicted changes...
Dam removal, connectivity, and aquatic resources in the St. Regis River Watershed, New York
James E. McKenna Jr., Kaitlin Hanak, Katharine DeVilbiss, Anthony David, James H. Johnson
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2015-5116
The decommissioning and planned removal of the Hogansburg Dam on the St. Regis River in New York has stimulated interest in the potential effects of that barrier removal on the St. Regis watershed. There will be immediate and systemic effects of the Hogansburg Dam removal, which may include inundation of...
Installation of a groundwater monitoring-well network on the east side of the Uncompahgre River in the Lower Gunnison River Basin, Colorado, 2014
Judith C. Thomas
2015, Data Series 955
The east side of the Uncompahgre River Basin has been a known contributor of dissolved selenium to recipient streams. Discharge of groundwater containing dissolved selenium contributes to surface-water selenium concentrations and loads; however, the groundwater system on the east side of the Uncompahgre River Basin is not well characterized. The...
Hyla chrysoscelis (Cope’s gray treefrog) x Hyla cinerea (green treefrog): putative natural hybrid
Brad M. Glorioso, J. Hardin Waddle, Jill A. Jenkins, Heather M. Olivier, Rebekah R. Layton
2015, Herpetological Review (46) 410-411
Naturally–occurring hybrid treefrogs have been occasionally found in the eastern United States. However, these hybrids are almost always between members of the same species group. On 10 Jun 2014, at 2145 h, we located an individual making an unusual advertisement call along Bayou Manual Road in Sherburne Wildlife Management Area...
Effectiveness of a refuge for Lake Trout in Western Lake Superior II: Simulation of future performance
Andrea L Akins, Michael J. Hansen, Michael J. Seider
2015, North American Journal of Fisheries Management (35) 1003-1018
Historically, Lake Superior supported one of the largest and most diverse Lake Trout Salvelinus namaycush fisheries in the Laurentian Great Lakes, but Lake Trout stocks collapsed due to excessive fishery exploitation and predation by Sea Lampreys Petromyzon marinus. Lake Trout stocking, Sea Lamprey control, and fishery regulations, including a refuge...
Status and trends of adult Lost River (Deltistes luxatus) and shortnose (Chasmistes brevirostris) sucker populations in Upper Klamath Lake, Oregon, 2014
David A. Hewitt, Eric C. Janney, Brian S. Hayes, Alta C. Harris
2015, Open-File Report 2015-1189
Executive Summary Data from a long-term capture-recapture program were used to assess the status and dynamics of populations of two long-lived, federally endangered catostomids in Upper Klamath Lake, Oregon. Lost River suckers (Deltistes luxatus) and shortnose suckers (Chasmistes brevirostris) have been captured and tagged with passive integrated transponder (PIT) tags during...
Ground motion-simulations of 1811-1812 New Madrid earthquakes, central United States
L. Ramirez-Guzman, Robert Graves, Kim Olsen, Oliver S. Boyd, Chris H. Cramer, Stephen H. Hartzell, Sidao Ni, Paul G. Somerville, Robert Williams, Jinquan Zhong
2015, Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (105) 1961-1988
We performed a suite of numerical simulations based on the 1811–1812 New Madrid seismic zone (NMSZ) earthquakes, which demonstrate the importance of 3D geologic structure and rupture directivity on the ground‐motion response throughout a broad region of the central United States (CUS) for these events. Our simulation set consists of...
Groundwater-level and storage-volume changes in the Equus Beds aquifer near Wichita, Kansas, predevelopment through January 2015
Joshua A. Whisnant, Cristi V. Hansen, Patrick J. Eslick
2015, Scientific Investigations Report 2015-5121
Development of the Wichita well field began in the 1940s in the Equus Beds aquifer to provide the city of Wichita, Kansas, a new water-supply source. After development of the Wichita well field began, groundwater levels began to decline. Extensive development of irrigation wells that began in the 1970s also...
Olistostrome shed eastward from the Antler orogenic forebulge, Bisoni-McKay area, Fish Creek Range, central Nevada
Forrest G. Poole, Charles Sandberg
2015, Book chapter, Unusual central Nevada geologic terranes produced by Late Devonian antler orogeny and Alamo impact
The Bisoni-McKay area, a structurally isolated, fault-bounded horst, offset eastward at the south end of the Fish Creek Range, displays a geologic terrane that is previously unrecorded in Nevada, and perhaps elsewhere in North America. This unique terrane is an olistostrome that was shed eastward by listric faulting from the...
Suburban watershed nitrogen retention: Estimating the effectiveness of stormwater management structures
Benjamin J. Koch, Catherine M. Febria, Roger M. Cooke, Jacob D. Hosen, Matthew E. Baker, Abigail R. Colson, Solange Filoso, Katharine Hayhoe, J. V. Loperfido, Anne M.K. Stoner, Margaret A. Palmer
2015, Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene
Excess nitrogen (N) is a primary driver of freshwater and coastal eutrophication globally, and urban stormwater is a rapidly growing source of N pollution. Stormwater best management practices (BMPs) are used widely to remove excess N from runoff in urban and suburban areas, and are expected to perform under a...
Spatial and temporal movement dynamics of brook Salvelinus fontinalis and brown trout Salmo trutta
L.A. Davis, Tyler Wagner, Meredith L. Barton
2015, Environmental Biology of Fishes (98) 2049-2065
Native eastern brook trout Salvelinus fontinalis and naturalized brown trout Salmo trutta occur sympatrically in many streams across the brook trout’s native range in the eastern United States. Understanding within- among-species variability in movement, including correlates of movement, has implications for management and conservation. We radio tracked 55 brook trout...
