A twenty-first century California observing network for monitoring extreme weather events
A.B. White, M.L. Anderson, M. D. Dettinger, F.M. Ralph, A. Hinojosa, D.R. Cayan, R.K. Hartman, D.W. Reynolds, L.E. Johnson, T.L. Schneider, R. Cifelli, Z. Toth, S.I. Gutman, C.W. King, F. Gehrke, P.E. Johnston, C. Walls, Dorte Mann, D.J. Gottas, T. Coleman
2013, Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology (30) 1585-1603
During Northern Hemisphere winters, the West Coast of North America is battered by extratropical storms. The impact of these storms is of paramount concern to California, where aging water supply and flood protection infrastructures are challenged by increased standards for urban flood protection, an unusually variable weather regime, and projections...
On the conversion of tritium units to mass fractions for hydrologic applications
David A. Stonestrom, Brian J. Andraski, Clay A. Cooper, Charles J. Mayers, Robert L. Michel
2013, Isotopes in Environmental and Health Studies (49) 250-256
We develop a general equation for converting laboratory-reported tritium levels, expressed either as concentrations (tritium isotope number fractions) or mass-based specific activities, to mass fractions in aqueous systems. Assuming that all tritium is in the form of monotritiated water simplifies the derivation and is shown to be reasonable for most...
Observed impacts of duration and seasonality of atmospheric-river landfalls on soil moisture and runoff in coastal northern California
F.M. Ralph, T. Coleman, P.J. Neiman, R.J. Zamora, Mike Dettinger
2013, Journal of Hydrometeorology (14) 443-459
This study is motivated by diverse needs for better forecasts of extreme precipitation and floods. It is enabled by unique hourly observations collected over six years near California’s Russian River and by recent advances in the science of atmospheric rivers (ARs). This study fills key gaps limiting the prediction of...
Estimating occupancy and predicting numbers of gray wolf packs in Montana using hunter surveys
Lindsey N. Rich, Robin E. Russell, Elizabeth M. Glenn, Michael S. Mitchell, Justin A. Gude, Kevin M. Podruzny, Carolyn A. Sime, Kent Laudon, David E. Ausband, James D. Nichols
2013, Journal of Wildlife Management (77) 1280-1289
Reliable knowledge of the status and trend of carnivore populations is critical to their conservation and management. Methods for monitoring carnivores, however, are challenging to conduct across large spatial scales. In the Northern Rocky Mountains, wildlife managers need a time- and cost-efficient method for monitoring gray wolf (Canis lupus) populations....
Water supply, demand, and quality indicators for assessing the spatial distribution of water resource vulnerability in the Columbia River Basin
Heejun Chang, Il-Won Jung, Angela L. Strecker, Daniel Wise, Martin Lafrenz, Vivek Shandas, Moradkhani, Alan Yeakley, Yangdong Pan, Gunnar Johnson, Mike Psaris
2013, Atmosphere - Ocean (51) 339-356
We investigated water resource vulnerability in the US portion of the Columbia River basin (CRB) using multiple indicators representing water supply, water demand, and water quality. Based on the US county scale, spatial analysis was conducted using various biophysical and socio-economic indicators that control water vulnerability. Water supply vulnerability and...
Geologic map of the Valley Mountain 15’ quadrangle, San Bernardino and Riverside Counties, California
Keith A. Howard, John Bacheller, Todd T. Fitzgibbon, Robert E. Powell, Charlotte M. Allen
2013, Geologic Quadrangle 1767
The Valley Mountain 15’ quadrangle straddles the Pinto Mountain Fault, which bounds the eastern Transverse Ranges in the south against the Mojave Desert province in the north. The Pinto Mountains, part of the eastern Transverse Ranges in the south part of the quadrangle expose a series of Paleoproterozoic gneisses and...
Local-area-enhanced, 2.5-meter resolution natural-color and color-infrared satellite-image mosaics of the Parwan mineral district in Afghanistan: Chapter CC in Local-area-enhanced, high-resolution natural-color and color-infrared satellite-image mosaics of mineral districts in Afghanistan
Philip A. Davis
2013, Data Series 709-CC
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Defense Task Force for Business and Stability Operations, prepared databases for mineral-resource target areas in Afghanistan. The purpose of the databases is to (1) provide useful data to ground-survey crews for use in performing detailed assessments of the...
Mercury cycling in agricultural and managed wetlands of California: seasonal influences of vegetation on mercury methylation, storage, and transport
Lisamarie Windham-Myers, Mark C. Marvin-DiPasquale, Evangelos Kakouros, Jennifer L. Agee, Le H. Kieu, Craig A. Stricker, Jacob A. Fleck, Joshua T. Ackerman
2013, Science of the Total Environment
Plants are a dominant biologic and physical component of many wetland capable of influencing the internal pools and fluxes of methylmercury (MeHg). To investigate their role with respect to the latter, we examined the changing seasonal roles of vegetation biomass and Hg, C and N composition from May 2007-February 2008...
Mapping wildfire burn severity in the Arctic Tundra from downsampled MODIS data
Crystal A. Kolden, John Rogan
2013, Arctic, Antarctic, and Alpine Research (45) 64-76
Wildfires are historically infrequent in the arctic tundra, but are projected to increase with climate warming. Fire effects on tundra ecosystems are poorly understood and difficult to quantify in a remote region where a short growing season severely limits ground data collection. Remote sensing has been widely utilized to characterize...
The role of vermetid gastropods in the development of the Florida Middle Ground, northeast Gulf of Mexico
Christopher D. Reich, Richard Z. Poore, Todd D. Hickey
2013, Journal of Coastal Research 46-57
The Florida Middle Ground is a complex of north to northwest trending ridges that lie approximately 180 km northwest of Tampa Bay, Florida. The irregular ridges appear on the otherwise gently sloping West Florida shelf and exhibit between 10-15 m of relief. Modern studies interpret the ridges as remnants of...
Sr/Ca proxy sea-surface temperature reconstructions from modern and holocene Montastraea faveolata specimens from the Dry Tortugas National Park
Jennifer A. Flannery, Richard Z. Poore
2013, Journal of Coastal Research (63) 20-31
Sr/Ca ratios from skeletal samples from two Montastraea faveolata corals (one modern, one Holocene, ~6 Ka) from the Dry Tortugas National Park were measured as a proxy for sea-surface temperature (SST). We sampled coral specimens with a computer-driven triaxial micromilling machine, which yielded an average of 15 homogenous samples per...
An examination of historic inorganic sedimentation and organic matter accumulation in several marsh types within the Mobile Bay and and Mobile-Tensaw River Delta region
Christopher G. Smith, Lisa E. Osterman, Richard Z. Poore
2013, Journal of Coastal Research (63) 68-83
Mass accumulation rates (MAR; g cm-2 y-1), linear sedimentation rates (LSR; cm y-1), and core geochronology derived from excess lead-210 (210Pb) profiles and inventories measured in six sediment cores collected from marsh sites from the MobileTensaw River Delta and Mobile Bay region record the importance of both continuous and event-driven...
Intercontinental migratory connectivity and population structuring of Dunlins from western Alaska
Robert E. Gill Jr., Colleen M. Handel, Daniel R. Ruthrauff
2013, The Condor (115) 525-534
The Dunlin (Calidris alpina) is a polytypic shorebird with complex patterns of distribution and migration throughout its holarctic range. We analyzed mark-re sighting data obtained between 1977 and 2010 from birds captured at two major staging areas in western Alaska to test the hypothesis that the migration patterns of Alaskan...
Hydrogeology, groundwater seepage, nitrate distribution, and flux at the Raleigh hydrologic research station, Wake County, North Carolina, 2005-2007
Kristen Bukowski McSwain, Richard E. Bolich, Melinda J. Chapman
2013, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5041
rom 2005 to 2007, the U.S. Geological Survey and the North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Division of Water Quality, conducted a study to describe the geologic framework, measure groundwater quality, characterize the groundwater-flow system, and describe the groundwater/surface-water interaction at the 60-acre Raleigh hydrogeologic research station (RHRS)...
New Method for Electrical Conductivity Temperature Compensation
R. Blaine McCleskey
2013, Environmental Science & Technology (47) 9874-9881
Electrical conductivity (κ) measurements of natural waters are typically referenced to 25 °C (κ25) using standard temperature compensation factors (α). For acidic waters (pH < 4), this can result in a large κ25 error (δκ25). The more the sample temperature departs from 25 °C, the larger the potential δκ25. For...
Pb-Sr-Nd isotopes in surficial materials at the Pebble Porphyry Cu-Au-Mo Deposit, Southwestern Alaska: can the mineralizing fingerprint be detected through cover?
Robert A. Ayuso, Karen D. Kelley, Robert G. Eppinger, Francesca Forni
2013, Economic Geology (108) 543-563
The Cretaceous Pebble porphyry Cu-Au-Mo deposit is covered by tundra and glacigenic sediments. Pb-Sr-Nd measurements were done on sediments and soils to establish baseline conditions prior to the onset of mining operations and contribute to the development of exploration methods for concealed base metal deposits of this type. Pebble rocks...
A combined radio- and stable-isotopic study of a California coastal aquifer system
Peter W. Swarzenski, Mark Baskaran, Robert J. Rosenbauer, Brian D. Edwards, Michael Land
2013, Water (5) 480-504
Stable and radioactive tracers were utilized in concert to characterize geochemical processes in a complex coastal groundwater system and to provide constraints on the kinetics of rock/water interactions. Groundwater samples from wells within the Dominguez Gap region of Los Angeles County, California were analyzed for a suite of major cations...
K-Ar dating and delta O-18-delta D characterization of nanometric illite from Ordovician K-bentonites of the Appalachians: illitization and the Acadian-Alleghenian tectonic activity
Norbert Clauer, Anthony E. Fallick, Dennis D. Eberl, Miroslav Honty, Warren D. Huff, Amelie Auberti
2013, American Mineralogist (98) 2144-2154
Nanometric (<0.02, 0.02–0.05, 0.05–0.1, 0.1–0.2 μm) illite fractions were separated from K-bentonite samples from northwestern Georgia, and studied by X-ray diffraction, oxygen and hydrogen isotope geochemistry, and K-Ar dated to more tightly constrain the tectono-thermal history of the Appalachian orogeny. Their XRD patterns are very similar for a given sample...
The influence of oxalate-promoted growth of saponite and talc crystals
Dirk Schumann, Hyman Hartman, Dennis D. Eberl, S. Kelly Sears, Reinhard Hesse, Hojatollah Vali
2013, Clays and Clay Minerals (61) 342-360
The intercalating growth of new silicate layers or metal hydroxide layers in the interlayer space of other clay minerals is known from various mixed-layer clay minerals such as illite-smectite (I-S), chlorite-vermiculite, and mica-vermiculite. In a recent study, the present authors proposed that smectite-group minerals can be synthesized from solution as...
Thickness distributions and evolution of growth mechanisms of NH4-illite from the fossil hydrothermal system of Harghita Bai, Eastern Carpathians, Romania
Iuliu Bobos, Dennis D. Eberl
2013, Clays and Clay Minerals (61) 375-391
The crystal growth of NH4-illite (NH4-I) from the hydrothermal system of Harghita Bãi (Eastern Carpathians) was deduced from the shapes of crystal thickness distributions (CTDs). The 4-illite-smectite (I-S) interstratified structures (R1, R2, and R3-type ordering) with a variable smectite-layer content. The NH4-I-S (40–5% S) structures were identified underground in a...
A quantitative X-ray diffraction inventory of the tephra and volcanic glass inputs into the Holocene marine sediment archives off Iceland: A contribution to V.A.S.T.
John T. Andrews, Greta B. Kristjansdottir, Dennis D. Eberl, Anne E. Jennings
2013, Polar Research (32) 11130
This paper re-evaluates how well quantitative x-ray diffraction (qXRD) can be used as an exploratory method of the weight percentage (wt%) of volcaniclastic sediment, and to identify tephra events in marine cores. In the widely used RockJock v6 software programme, qXRD tephra and glass standards include the rhyodacite White River...
Feeding ecology of pelagic larval Burbot in Northern Lake Huron, Michigan
Ellen M. George, Edward F. Roseman, Bruce M. Davis, Timothy P. O’Brien
2013, Transactions of the American Fisheries Society (142) 1716-1723
Burbot Lota lota are a key demersal piscivore across the Laurentian Great Lakes whose populations have declined by about 90% in recent decades. Larval Burbot typically hatch in the early spring and rely on abundant crustacean zooplankton prey. We examined the stomach contents of larval Burbot from inshore (≤15 m)...
Current research issues related to post-wildfire runoff and erosion processes
John A. Moody, Richard A. Shakesby, Peter R. Robichaud, Susan H. Cannon, Deborah A. Martin
2013, Earth-Science Reviews (122) 10-37
Research into post-wildfire effects began in the United States more than 70 years ago and only later extended to other parts of the world. Post-wildfire responses are typically transient, episodic, variable in space and time, dependent on thresholds, and involve multiple processes measured by different methods. These characteristics tend to...
Addition of sea turtle editors at Herpetological Conservation and Biology
R. Bruce Bury
2013, Herpetological Conservation and Biology (8) i
No abstract available....
Atmospheric mercury and fine particulate matter in coastal New England: implications for mercury and trace element sources in the northeastern United States
Allan Kolker, Mark A. Engle, Bernhard Peucker-Ehrenbrink, Nicholas J. Geboy, David P. Krabbenhotft, Michael H. Bothner, Michael T. Tate
2013, Atmospheric Environment (79) 760-768
Intensive sampling of ambient atmospheric fine particulate matter was conducted at Woods Hole, Massachusetts over a four-month period from 3 April to 29 July, 2008, in conjunction with year-long deployment of the USGS Mobile Mercury Lab. Results were obtained for trace elements in fine particulate matter concurrently with determination of...
