Progradational-to-retrogradational styles of Palaeogene fluvial fan successions in the San Juan Basin, New Mexico
Kristine L. Zellman, Piret Plink-Bjorklund, Leland Robson Spangler
2024, Journal of Basin Research (36)
Basin-scale outcrop analyses of fluvial architecture in the Palaeogene San Juan Basin, New Mexico, document lateral and vertical trends in channel, floodplain and palaeosol characteristics. Herein, the uppermost part of the Palaeocene Nacimiento Formation and lower Eocene Cuba Mesa and Regina Members of the...
Twenty-five years of change in forest structure and nesting behavior of Hawaiʻi ʻelepaio
Kelly Jaenecke, Paul C. Banko, Robert W. Peck, Zee Sarr, Nicholas Shema
2024, Restoration Ecology (32)
Long-term ecological studies are invaluable for detecting changes over time. Forest restoration has been a conservation priority in Hawaiʻi, where invasive species have negatively impacted native bird habitat. During 1993–1994, a study was conducted of Hawaiʻi ʻelepaio (Chasiempis sandwichensis) nest site selection and forest composition...
Using explainable machine learning methods to evaluate vulnerability and restoration potential of ecosystem state transitions
John T. Delaney, Danelle M. Larson
2024, Conservation Biology (38)
Ecosystem state transitions can be ecologically devastating or be a restoration success. State transitions are common within aquatic systems worldwide, especially considering human-mediated changes to land use and water use. We created a transferable conceptual framework to enable multiscale assessments of state resilience and...
Recent, widespread nitrate decreases may be linked to persistent dissolved organic carbon increases in headwater streams recovering from past acidic deposition
Kevin Alexander Ryan, Gregory B. Lawrence
2024, Science of the Total Environment (906)
Long-term monitoring of water quality responses to natural and anthropogenic perturbation of watersheds informs policies for managing natural resources. Dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and nitrate (NO3−) in streams draining forested landscapes provide valuable information on ecosystem function due to their biogeochemical reactivity and solubility in water....
Leveraging the strengths of citizen science and structured surveys to achieve scalable inference on population size
Andrew N. Stillman, Paige E. Howell, Guthrie S. Zimmerman, Emily R. Bjerre, Brian A. Millsap, Orin J. Robinson, Daniel Fink, Erica Francis Stuber, Viviana Ruiz-Gutierrez
2024, Journal of Applied Ecology (60) 2389-2399
Population size is a key metric for management and policy decisions, yet wildlife monitoring programmes are often limited by the spatial and temporal scope of surveys. In these cases, citizen science data may provide complementary information at higher resolution and greater extent.We present a case study demonstrating how data...
Validating morphometrics as a nonlethal tool to determine Arctic Grayling sex
WT Samuel, EG Hinkle, LE Yancy, Jeffrey A. Falke
2024, North American Journal of Fisheries Management (44) 70-78
ObjectiveSome graylings Thymallus spp. possess an elongated dorsal fin and other morphological traits that can be sexually dimorphic, as demonstrated in the European Grayling T. thymallus. North American Arctic Grayling T. arcticus are assumed to follow these trends, but decisive evidence is lacking. This study aimed to determine whether sexually dimorphic...
Analyzing spatial distributions and alignments of pitted cone features in Utopia Planitia on Mars
Mackenzie M. Mills, Alfred S. McEwen, Amanda N. Hughes, Ji-Eun Kim, Chris Okubo
2024, Icarus (408)
Martian geomorphology and surface features provide links to understanding past geologic processes such as fluid movement, local and regional tectonics, and feature formation mechanisms. Pitted cones are common features in the northern plains basins of Mars. They have been proposed to have formed from upwelling volatile-rich fluids, such as magma or water-sediment slurries. In...
A novel approach to assessing natural resource injury with Bayesian networks
Freya Elizabeth Rowland, Christopher James Kotalik, Bruce G. Marcot, Jo Ellen Hinck, David Walters
2024, Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management (20) 562-573
Quantifying the effects of environmental stressors on natural resources is problematic because of complex interactions among environmental factors that influence endpoints of interest. This complexity, coupled with data limitations, propagates uncertainty that can make it difficult to causally associate specific environmental stressors with injury endpoints. The Natural Resource Damage Assessment...
Identifying demographic and environmental drivers of population dynamics and viability in an endangered top predator using an integrated model
Amanda J. Warlick, Gina K Himes Boor, Tamara L McGuire, Kim E. W. Shelden, Eiren K. Jacobson, Charlotte Boyd, Paul Wade, André E. Punt, Sarah J. Converse
2024, Animal Conservation (27) 240-252
Knowledge about the demographic and environmental factors underlying population dynamics is fundamental to designing effective conservation measures to recover depleted wildlife populations. However, sparse monitoring data or persistent knowledge gaps about threats make it difficult to identify the drivers of population dynamics. In situations...
Machine learning application to assess occurrence and saturations of methane hydrate in marine deposits offshore India
Leebyn Chong, Timothy Collett, C. Gabriel Creason, Yongkoo Seol, E.M. Myshakin
2024, Journal Interpretation (12) T63-T75
Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) were used to assess methane hydrate occurrence and saturation in marine sediments offshore India. The ANN analysis classifies the gas hydrate occurrence into three types: methane hydrate in pore space, methane hydrate in fractures, or no methane hydrate. Further, predicted saturation characterizes the volume of gas...
Spatial variation in density of American black bears in northern Yellowstone National Park
Nathaniel R. Bowersock, Andrea R. Litt, Michael A. Sawaya, Kerry A. Gunther, Frank T. van Manen
2024, The Journal of Wildlife Management (88)
The quality and availability of resources are known to influence spatial patterns of animal density. In Yellowstone National Park, relationships between the availability of resources and the distribution of grizzly bears (Ursus arctos) have been explored but have yet to be examined in American black bears (Ursus americanus). We conducted...
The inevitability of large shallow craters on Callisto and Ganymede: Implications for crater depth-diameter trends
Michael T. Bland, Veronica Bray
2024, Icarus (408)
Complex craters with diameters (D) ≥ 40 km on Callisto and Ganymede are shallower than would be expected from simply extrapolating the depth-diameter trend from smaller (D ≤ 40 km) craters. This unusual depth-diameter (d-D) trend, and associated changes in crater morphology, have been hypothesized to result from...
Episodic evolution of a protracted convergent margin revealed by detrital zircon geochronology in the Greater Caucasus
Dylan A Vasey, Leslie Garcia, Eric S. Cowgill, Charles Cashman Trexler, Tea Godoladze
2024, Basin Research (36)
Convergent margins play a fundamental role in the construction and modification of Earth's lithosphere and are characterized by poorly understood episodic processes that occur during the progression from subduction to terminal collision. On the northern margin of the active Arabia-Eurasia collision zone, the Greater...
Revisiting conservation units for the endangered mountain yellow-legged frog species complex (Rana muscosa, Rana sierrae) using multiple genomic methods
Allison Q. Byrne, Andrew P. Rothstein, Lydia L. Smith, Hannah Kania, Roland A. Knapp, Daniel M. Boiano, Cheryl J. Briggs, Adam R. Backlin, Robert N. Fisher, Erica Bree Rosenblum
2024, Conservation Genetics (25) 591-606
Insights from conservation genomics have dramatically improved recovery plans for numerous endangered species. However, most taxa have yet to benefit from the full application of genomic technologies. The mountain yellow-legged frog species complex, Rana muscosa and Rana sierrae, inhabits the Sierra Nevada mountains and Transverse/Peninsular Ranges of California and Nevada....
Identifying predictors of translocation success in rare plant species
Joe Bellis, Oyomoare L. Osazuwa-Peters, Joyce Maschinski, Matthew J. Keir, Elliott W. Parsons, Thomas N. Kaye, Michael Kunz, Jennifer Possley, Eric Menges, Stacy A. Smith, Daniela Roth, Debbie Brewer, William E. Brumback, James J. Lange, Christal Niederer, Jessica B. Turner-Skoff, Megan Bontrager, Richard Braham, Michelle Coppoletta, Karen D. Holl, Paula Williamson, Timothy J. Bell, Jayne L. Jonas, Kathryn McEachern, Kathy L. Robertson, Sandra J. Birnbaum, Adam Dattilo, John J. Dollard Jr., Jeremie Fant, Wendy Kishida, Peter Lesica, Steven O. Link, Noel B. Pavlovic, Jackie Poole, Charlotte M. Reemts, Peter Stiling, David D. Taylor, Jonathan H. Titus, Priscilla J. Titus, Edith D. Adkins, Timothy Chambers, Mark W. Paschke, Katherine D. Heinman, Matthew A. Albrecht
2024, Conservation Biology (38)
The fundamental goal of a rare plant translocation is to create self-sustaining populations with the evolutionary resilience to persist in the long-term. Yet most plant translocation syntheses focus on a few factors influencing short-term benchmarks of success (e.g., survival and reproduction). Short-term benchmarks can be misleading when trying to infer...
Using multiple metal mixture models to predict toxicity of riverine sediment porewater to the benthic life stage of juvenile white sturgeon (Acipenser transmontanus)
Laurie S. Balistrieri
2024, Environmental Toxicology & Chemistry (43) 62-73
Five metal mixture dose–response models were used to predict the toxicity of porewater to young sturgeon at areas of interest in the Upper Columbia River (WA, USA/BC, Canada) and to evaluate these models as tools for risk assessments. Dose components of metal mixture models...
Temperature thresholds for leaf damage from two extreme freeze events (2018 and 2021) near the northern range limit of black mangroves (Avicennia germinans) in southeastern North America
Simen Kaalstad, Michael Osland, Donna J. Devlin, C. Edward Proffitt, Laura Feher, Anna R. Armitage, Richard Day, Kathleen M. Swanson, Gordon Anderson, Brigid Berger, Just Cebrian, Karen L. Cummins, Kenneth H. Dunton, Ilka C. Feller, Alejandro Fierro-Cabo, Elena A. Flores, Andrew From, A. Randall Hughes, David A. Kaplan, Amy K. Langston, Melinda Martinez, Briana Martinez, Christopher J. Miller, Nathan G.F. Reaver, Colt R. Sanspree, Caitlin M. Snyder, Andrew P. Stetter, Jamie E. Thompson, Carlos Zamora-Tovar
2024, Estuaries and Coasts (47) 292-300
Extreme winter temperatures govern the northern range limit of black mangroves (Avicennia germinans) in southeastern North America. There is a pressing need for studies that advance our understanding of how extreme cold temperature events affect mangroves near their range limits. However, such events are infrequent and challenging to study at...
Long-term trends of local bird populations based on monitoring schemes: Are they suitable for justifying management measures?
Antonio J. Hernández-Navarro, Francisco Robledano, María V. Jiménez-Franco, Andy Royle, José F. Calvo
2024, Journal of Ornithology (165) 355-367
Local biodiversity monitoring is important to assess the effects of global change, but also to evaluate the performance of landscape and wildlife protection, since large-scale assessments may buffer local fluctuations, rare species tend to be underrepresented, and management actions are usually implemented on local scales. We...
Expansive, positive changes to fish habitat diversity following the formation of a valley plug in a degraded desert river
Tansy T. Remiszewski, Phaedra E. Budy, William W. Macfarlane
2024, River Research and Applications (40) 116-128
Widespread hydrologic alterations have simplified in-stream habitats in rivers globally, driving population declines and extirpations of many native fishes. Here, we examine how rapid geomorphic change in a historically degraded desert river has influenced habitat diversification and ecosystem persistence. In 2010, a large reach of the degraded and simplified lower...
Critical stakeholder engagement: The road to actionable science Is paved with scientists’ good intentions
Aparna Bamzai-Dodson, Amanda E. Cravens, Renee A. McPherson
2024, Annals of the American Association of Geographers (114) 1-20
To help stakeholders such as planners, resource managers, policymakers, and decision makers address environmental challenges in the Anthropocene, scientists are increasingly creating actionable science—science that is useful, usable, and used. Critical physical geography encourages the engagement of stakeholders in the creation of scientific knowledge to conduct actionable science and produce...
A nontarget, disturbance-resilient native species influences post-fire recovery and multiphasic herbicide-seeding outcomes in drylands threatened by exotic annual grasses
Chad Raymond Kluender, Matthew Germino
2024, Restoration Ecology (32)
Native species that are abundant and persistent across disturbance-succession cycles can affect recovery and restoration of plant communities, especially in drylands. In the sagebrush-steppe deserts of North America, restoring deep-rooted perennial bunchgrasses (DRPBGs) is key to the strategy for breaking an increasingly problematic cycle...
Disparate data streams together yield novel survival estimates of Alaska-breeding Whimbrels
Daniel R. Ruthrauff, Christopher M. Harwood, T. Lee Tibbitts, Vijay P. Patil
2024, Ibis (166) 622-632
Survival estimates are critical components of avian ecology. In well-intentioned efforts to maximize the utility of one's research, survival estimates often derive from data that were not originally collected for survival assessments, and such post hoc analyses may include unintentional biases. We estimated the survival of Whimbrels captured and marked at two...
Lack of strong responses to the Pacific marine heatwave by benthivorous marine birds indicates importance of trophic drivers
Brian H. Robinson, Heather A. Coletti, Brenda Ballachey, James L. Bodkin, Kimberly A. Kloecker, Sarah Beth Traiger, Daniel Esler
2024, Marine Ecology Progress Series (737) 215-226
The Pacific marine heatwave (PMH) of 2014-2016 was an intense, long-lasting environmental disturbance expressed throughout the north Pacific. While dramatic consequences of the PMH on pelagic food webs have been well documented, effects on nearshore food webs, i.e., those based on macroalgae primary productivity, benthic invertebrate intermediate consumers, and specialized...
Morphological differences between wild and hatchery-reared Bloater (Coregonus hoyi) from Lake Michigan, USA
Andrew Edgar Honsey, Yu-Chun Kao, Christopher Olds, David Bunnell
2024, Fisheries Management and Ecology (31)
Coregonines (ciscoes and whitefishes) are economically, ecologically, and culturally important fishes that are distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere. In the Laurentian Great Lakes, coregonines declined throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, and managers have prioritized their restoration. A key restoration tool is reintroduction via stocking....
Experimental reduction of a primary nest predator fails to decrease nest predation rates of sagebrush songbirds
Ashleigh M. Rhea, Anna D. Chalfoun
2024, Ornithological Applications (126)
Brewer’s Sparrow (Spizella breweri), Sagebrush Sparrow (Artemisiospiza nevadensis), and Sage Thrasher (Oreoscoptus montanus)—during May to August 2019 in western Wyoming, USA, to assess whether nest predation risk was additive or compensatory, and whether nest predator removal could comprise a potentially effective management tool. Deer mouse removal did not affect...
