Characterizing toxicity of metal‐contaminated sediments from the Upper Columbia River, Washington, USA, to benthic invertebrates
John M. Besser, Jeffery A. Steevens, James L. Kunz, William G. Brumbaugh, Christopher G. Ingersoll, Stephen E. Cox, Christopher A. Mebane, Laurie S. Balistrieri, Jesse A. Sinclair, Donald D. MacDonald
2018, Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (37) 3102-3114
Sediments from the Upper Columbia River, Washington, USA, are contaminated with metals from smelting operations. We conducted short‐term and long‐term tests with the midge Chironomus dilutus and the amphipod Hyalella azteca and short‐term tests with the freshwater mussel Lampsilis siliquoidea with 54 sediments from the Upper Columbia River to characterize thresholds for toxicity of metals to...
Population viability analyses for three Macrhybopsis spp. of the Lower Missouri River
Janice L. Albers, Mark L. Wildhaber, Nicholas S. Green
2018, Journal of Applied Ichthyology (34) 1285-1292
Recent declines in three species of chubs that inhabit the lower Missouri River (shoal chub M. hyostoma, sicklefin chub M. meeki and sturgeon chub M. gelida) have become a concern in the management of their own populations and the endangered pallid sturgeon (Scaphirhynchus albus) that feeds on them. These chub populations encounter threats from...
Analysis of multi-decadal wetland changes, and cumulative impact of multiple storms 1984 to 2017
Steven H. Douglas, Julie Bernier, Kathryn E.L. Smith
2018, Wetlands Ecology and Management (26) 1121-1142
Land-cover classification analysis using Landsat satellite imagery acquired between 1984 and 2017 quantified short- (post-Hurricane Sandy) and long-term wetland-change trends along the Maryland and Virginia coasts between Metompkin Bay, VA and Ocean City, MD. Although there are limited options for upland migration of wetlands in the study area, regression analysis...
Geometric versus anemometric surface roughness for a shallow accumulating snowpack
Jessica E. Sanow, Steven R. Fassnacht, David J. Kamin, Graham A. Sexstone, William L. Bauerle, Iuliana Oprea
2018, Geosciences (8) 1-10
When applied to a snow-covered surface, aerodynamic roughness length, z0, is typically considered as a static parameter within energy balance equations. However, field observations show that z0 changes spatially and temporally, and thus z0 incorporated as a dynamic parameter may greatly improve models. To evaluate methods for characterizing snow surface roughness, we...
Updated California aftershock parameters
Jeanne L. Hardebeck, Andrea L. Llenos, Andrew J. Michael, Morgan T. Page, Nicholas van der Elst
2018, Seismological Research Letters (90) 262-270
Reasenberg and Jones (1989) introduced a statistical model for aftershock rate following a mainshock along with estimates of “generic” California parameter values based on past aftershock sequences. The Reasenberg and Jones (1989) model has been used for decades to issue aftershock forecasts following <span...
Interactive tool to estimate groundwater elevations in central and eastern North Dakota
Rochelle A. Nustad, William C. Damschen, Aldo V. Vecchia
2018, Open-File Report 2018-1185
This report describes an interactive tool (NDakGWtool) in which a statistical model is developed using locally weighted regression to estimate monthly mean groundwater elevations for a specified latitude and longitude, referred to as the “user-specified location.” For each user-specified location, seven models are developed for each month from April through...
Reconstructing lava flow emplacement histories with rheological and morphological analyses: the Harrat Rahat volcanic field, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
Hannah R. Dietterich, Drew T. Downs, Mark E. Stelten, Hani M. Zahran
2018, Bulletin of Volcanology (80) 1-23
Mafic volcanic fields are widespread, but few have erupted in historic times, providing limited observations of the magnitudes, dynamics, and timescales of lava flow emplacement in these settings. To expand our knowledge of effusive mafic eruptions, we must evaluate solidified flows to discern syn-eruptive conditions. The Harrat Rahat volcanic field...
Waterfowl spring migratory behavior and avian influenza transmission risk in the changing landscape of the East Asian-Australasian Flyway
Jeffery D. Sullivan, John Y. Takekawa, Kyle A. Spragens, Scott H. Newman, Xiangming Xiao, Paul J. Leader, Bena Smith, Diann J. Prosser
2018, Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution (6) 1-14
Avian influenza has advanced from a regional concern to a global health issue with significant economic, trade, and public health implications. Wild birds, particularly waterfowl (Anseriformes), are known reservoirs for low-pathogenic avian influenza viruses (AIV) and recent studies have shown their potential in the spread of highly pathogenic forms of...
Rising tides: Assessing habitat vulnerability for an endangered salt marsh-dependent species with sea-level rise
Jordan A. Rosencranz, Karen M. Thorne, Kevin J. Buffington, Cory T. Overton, John Takekawa, Michael L. Casazza, Jennifer McBroom, Julian K. Wood, Nadav Nur, Richard L. Zembal, Glen M. MacDonald, Richard F. Ambrose
2018, Wetlands (39) 1-16
Salt marsh-dependent species are vulnerable to impacts of sea-level rise (SLR). Site-specific differences in ecogeomorphic processes result in different SLR vulnerabilities. SLR impacts to Ridgway’s rail (Rallus obsoletus) of Southern California (SC) and San Francisco Bay (SF), U.S.A. could foreshadow SLR effects on other coastal endemic species. Salt...
Twenty-nine years of population dynamics in a small-bodied montane amphibian
Erin L. Muths, R D Scherer, S M Amburgey, PS Corn
2018, Ecosphere (9)
Identifying population declines before they reach crisis proportions is imperative given the current global decline in vertebrate fauna and associated challenges and expense of recovery. Understanding life histories and how the environment influences demography are critical aspects of this challenge, as is determining the biological relevance of covariates that are...
Flood-inundation maps for the Salamonie River at Portland, Indiana
Kellan R. Strauch
2018, Scientific Investigations Report 2018-5132
Digital flood-inundation maps for a 6.5-mile reach of the Salamonie River at Portland, Indiana, were created by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in cooperation with the Indiana Department of Transportation. The flood-inundation maps, which can be accessed through the USGS Flood Inundation Mapping Science website at https://water.usgs.gov/osw/flood_inundation/, depict...
Size-structured habitat selection by arapaima in floodplain lakes of the lower Amazon
Paul L. Angermeier, Jordan C. Richard, Leandro Castello, Daniel J. Gurdak, Brandon K. Peoples
2018, Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems (28) 1403-1413
Human modification of floodplain ecosystems is widespread and a major threat to fish populations, particularly in the tropics where fish diversity and rates of floodplain degradation are high. Identifying measures to minimize the susceptibility of floodplain fishes to habitat modification requires understanding dry-season lake habitat selection for species of...
Simulating the evolution of fluid underpressures in the Great Plains, by incorporation of tectonic uplift and tilting, with a groundwater flow model
Amjad M. J. Umari, Philip H. Nelson, Gary D. Lecain
2018, Geofluids (2018) 1-30
Underpressures (subhydrostatic heads) in the Paleozoic units underlying the Great Plains of North America are a consequence of Cenozoic uplift of the area. Based on tectonostratigraphic data, we have developed a cumulative uplift history with superimposed periods of deposition and erosion for the Great Plains for the period from 40 Ma...
Estimating the societal benefits of carbon dioxide sequestration through peatland restoration
Emily Pindilli, Rachel Sleeter, Dianna M. Hogan
2018, Ecological Economics (154) 145-155
The Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge (GDS) is a forested peatland that provides a number of ecosystem services including carbon (C) sequestration. We modeled and analyzed the potential capacity of the GDS to sequester C under four management scenarios: no management, no management with catastrophic fire, current management, and...
Global Earthquake Model (GEM) Risk Map
V. Silva, D. Amo-Oduro, A. Calderon, J. Dabbeek, V. Despotaki, L. Martins, A. Rao, M. Simionato, D. Vigano, C. Yepes, A. Acevedo, H. Crowley, Nick Horspool, Kishor S. Jaiswal, M. Journeay, M. Pittore
2018, Report
The Global Earthquake Risk Map (v2018.1) comprises four global maps. The main map presents the geographic distribution of average annual loss (USD) normalized by the average construction costs of the respective country (USD/m2 due to ground shaking in the residential, commercial and industrial building stock, considering contents,...
Consequences of abrading bed load on vertical and lateral bedrock erosion in a curved experimental channel
Jagriti Mishra, Takuya Inoue, Yasuyuki Shimizu, Tamaki Sumner, Jonathan M. Nelson
2018, Journal of Geophysical Research F: Earth Surface (123) 3147-3161
In this study, we conducted multiple physical experiments to estimate the efficacy and spatial pattern of erosion by abrading sediment moving through a simple U‐shaped channel bend with erodible bed and banks. The experiments showed that in the bend, lateral abrasion followed a monotonically increasing linear relationship with sediment feed...
No flood effect on recruitment of a small Louisiana black bear population
Joseph D. Clark, Kaitlin C. O’Connell-Goode, Carrie L. Lowe, Sean M. Murphy, Sutton C. Maehr, Maria M. Davidson, Jared S. Laufenberg
2018, Journal of Wildlife Management (82) 566-572
A flood event in 2011 had minor impacts on apparent survival and movement probabilities of a small, isolated population of Louisiana black bears (Ursus americanus luteolus) in the Upper Atchafalaya River Basin, Louisiana, USA. However, the potential effects of the flood on recruitment of juveniles into the population, then listed...
Event-response ellipses: A method to quantify and compare the role of dynamic storage at the catchment scale in snowmelt-dominated systems
Jessica M. Driscoll, Thomas Meixner, Noah P. Molotch, Ty P. A. Ferre, Mark W. Williams, James O. Sickman
2018, Water (10) 1-17
A method for quantifying the role of dynamic storage as a physical buffer between snowmelt and streamflow at the catchment scale is introduced in this paper. The method describes a quantitative relation between hydrologic events (e.g., snowmelt) and responses (e.g., streamflow) by generating event-response ellipses that can be used to...
New data yield new geologic insights at the Fallon FORGE site, Carson Sink Region, Nevada
Drew L. Siler, James E. Faulds, Jonathan M. G. Glen, Jeffrey B. Witter
2018, Geothermal Resources Council Transactions (42)
The geologic structure beneath the Fallon Frontier Observatory for Research in Geothermal Energy (FORGE) site represents a record of the Mesozoic through Cenozoic tectonism, volcanism, and sedimentation that has affected the Carson Sink local to Fallon, NV. A robust dataset confirms that the lithologic sequence consists of Quaternary through Miocene...
2D and 3D potential field mapping and modelling at the Fallon FORGE site, Nevada, USA
Jeffrey B. Witter, Jonathan M. G. Glen, Drew L. Siler, Dominique Fournier
2018, Geothermal Resources Council Transactions (42)
Accurate geological characterization of Fallon FORGE is important for preparing the site as an EGS laboratory. As part of this effort, a 3D geologic map was constructed previously from well logs, surface geologic mapping, 2D seismic profiles, interpreted gravity & magnetic maps, and a gravity-inferred basement surface. In this study,...
Quantifying uncertainty in Sr/Ca-based estimates of SST from the coral Orbicella faveolata
Jennifer A. Flannery, Julie N. Richey, Lauren T. Toth, Ilsa B. Kuffner, Richard Z. Poore
2018, Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology (33) 958-973
The strontium to calcium ratio (Sr/Ca) in aragonitic skeletons of massive corals provides a proxy for sea surface temperature (SST) that can be used to reconstruct paleoclimates across decades, centuries, and, potentially, millennia. Determining the reproducibility of Sr/Ca records among contemporaneous coral colonies from the same region is critical to...
Identifying opportunities for long-lasting habitat conservation and restoration in Hawaii’s shifting climate
Lucas B. Fortini, James D. Jacobi
2018, Regional Environmental Change (18) 2391-2402
Conservation efforts in isolated archipelagos such as Hawaii often focus on habitat-based conservation and restoration efforts that benefit multiple species. Unfortunately, identifying locations where such efforts are safer from climatic shifts is still challenging. We aimed to provide a method to approximate these potential habitat shifts for similar data- and...
Historical patterns of wildfire ignition sources in California ecosystems
Jon E. Keeley, Alexandra D. Syphard
2018, International Journal of Wildland Fire (27) 781-799
State and federal agencies have reported fire causes since the early 1900s, explicitly for the purpose of helping land managers design fire-prevention programs. We document fire-ignition patterns in five homogenous climate divisions in California over the past 98 years on state Cal Fire protected lands and 107 years on federal...
Discovery of a blind geothermal system in Southern Gabbs Valley, western Nevada, through application of the play fairway analysis at multiple scales
James Faulds, Jason W. Craig, Nicholas H. Hinz, Mark F. Coolbaugh, Jonathan M. Glen, Tait E. Earney, William D. Schermerhorn, Jared R. Peacock, Stephen B. Deoreo, Drew L. Siler
2018, Geothermal Resources Council Transactions (42)
The Great Basin region is capable of generating much greater amounts of geothermal energy than currently produced. Most geothermal resources in this region are blind, and thus favorable characteristics for geothermal activity must be synthesized and methodologies developed to discover new commercial-grade systems. The geothermal play fairway concept involves integration...
Ontogenetic changes in swimming speed of silver carp, bighead carp, and grass carp larvae: implications for larval dispersal
Amy E. George, Tatiana Garcia, Benjamin H. Stahlschmidt, Duane Chapman
2018, PeerJ (6)
Bighead, silver, and grass carps are invasive in the waterways of central North America, and grass carp reproduction in tributaries of the Great Lakes has now been documented. Questions about recruitment potential motivate a need for accurate models of egg and larval dispersal. Quantitative data on swimming behaviors and capabilities...
