Search Results

Shallow submarine volcanoes pose unique scientific and monitoring challenges. The interaction between water and magma can create violent explosions just below the surface, but the inaccessibility of submerged volcanoes means they are typically not instrumented. This both increases the risk to marine and aviation traffic and leaves the underlying eruption...

Coastal regions worldwide face increasing management concerns due to natural and anthropogenic forces that have the potential to significantly degrade nearshore marine resources. The goal of our study was to develop and test a monitoring strategy for nearshore marine ecosystems in remote areas that are not readily accessible for sampling....

Climatic drivers of the size and body condition of forage fish in the North Pacific are poorly known. We hypothesized that length and condition of forage fish in the Gulf of Alaska (GoA) should vary in relation to ocean temperature on multiple scales. To test this...

Mountain glaciers integrate climate processes to provide an unmatched signal of regional climate forcing. However, extracting the climate signal via intercomparison of regional glacier mass balance records can be problematic when methods for extrapolating and calibrating direct glaciological measurements are mixed or inconsistent. To address this problem, we reanalyzed and...

—First sighting records of rare occurrences may become increasingly important for recognizing changes in distribution, changes in migratory strategies, or increases in hybridization. We focumented the first record of a Tundra Bean Goose in the Mississippi Alluvial Valley, the outlet and historic floodplain for much of North America and one...

Climatic variation is a key driver of freshwater physical processes that in turn control stream fish growth and population dynamics at fine spatial scales and species distributions across broad landscapes. A recent downturn in Chinook Salmon returns across the Yukon River basin, Alaska, USA, and Yukon Territories, Canada, has led...

Cretaceous-Paleocene porphyry Cu(±Mo±Au) occurrences are scattered throughout the Yukon-Tanana upland in eastern Alaska. Known occurrences in eastern Alaska are poorly characterized, despite a resurgence in exploration. Porphyry deposits in the upland are emplaced into structurally complex metamorphic rocks representing a variety of tectonic environments, resulting in diverse alteration and mineralization...

Black Oystercatchers Haematopus bachmani, a species of conservation concern, depend on marine intertidal prey resources. We examined diet, feeding rates, growth, and survival of Black Oystercatcher broods in southcentral Alaska, 2013-2014. To determine the importance of diet on brood survival, we modeled daily survival rates of broods as a function...

This report and its accompanying geospatial data outline many areas of coal in the United States beneath more than 3,000 ft of overburden. Based on depth, these areas may be targets for injection and storage of supercritical carbon dioxide. Additional areas where coal exists beneath more than 1,000 ft of...

The majority of seabirds breed colonially and exhibit considerable site fidelity over the course of their long lifespans. Initial colony selection can therefore have substantial fitness consequences; however, factors contributing to recruitment into colonies and subsequent fidelity remain unclear. We used multi-state capture-recapture models to test several hypotheses related to...

This postcard provides details about the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Energy and Wildlife Research Annual Report for 2019, which highlights new research on the interactions of energy development with wildlife. Encompassing investigations of conventional and renewable energy development across the United States, from the Arctic Coastal Plain of Alaska to...

We defined the bathymetry of Shelikof Strait and the western Gulf of Alaska (WGOA) from the edges of the land masses down to about 7000 m deep in the Aleutian Trench. This map was produced by combining soundings from historical National Ocean Service (NOS) smooth sheets (2.7 million soundings); shallow...

Suitable habitat for Arctic-breeding migratory shorebirds is decreasing at their traditional wintering islands and atolls in the Central Pacific Flyway (i.e., Oceania) due to habitat degradation, reclamation, and sea-level rise. To maintain the size and resiliency of their populations, migratory shorebirds will need to expand their winter ranges by...

Accurate reference intervals (RI) for commonly measured blood-based analytes are essential for health monitoring programs. Baseline values for a panel of analytes can be used to monitor physiologic and pathophysiologic processes such as organ function, electrolyte balance, and protein catabolism. Our reference population includes 651 serum samples from polar...

The energetic status of fishes represents energy stored as protein and lipids and reflects the ability of an individual to reproduce, migrate, and transition through life stages, ultimately influencing survival. However, traditional measurement methods, while highly accurate, are time consuming, expensive, and lethal, and nonlethal methods...

Most king (Somateria spectabilis) and common eiders (S. mollissima v-nigra) breeding in the northwestern Nearctic migrate past Point Barrow, Alaska. Spring migration counts have been conducted there since 1953; during 1976–1996, both species declined > 50% for unknown reasons. To evaluate population trends, counts in 2003, 2004, 2015, and 2016 were compared...

Predation is a major limiting factor for most small sedentary caribou (Rangifer tarandus) populations, particularly those that are threatened or endangered across the southern extent of the species’ range. Thus, reducing predation impacts is often a management goal for improving the status of small caribou populations,...

Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated undiscovered, technically recoverable mean resources of about 54 trillion cubic feet of gas resources within gas hydrates in the North Slope of Alaska....

Arctic Indigenous communities have been classified as highly vulnerable to climate change impacts. The remoteness of Arctic communities, their dependence upon local species and habitats, and the historical marginalization of Indigenous peoples, enhances this characterization of vulnerability. However, vulnerability is a result of diverse historical, social, economic, political,...

Shrub mud volcano is one of three large mud volcanoes that comprise the Klawasi Group in the Copper River Basin of southcentral Alaska. Except for minor discharges in the mid-1950s when the group was first described, Shrub was dormant prior to its reactivation in summer 1996. From 1997 to 1999,...

The Alaska Geochemical Database Version 3.0 (AGDB3) contains new geochemical data compilations in which each geologic material sample has one “best value” determination for each analyzed species, greatly improving speed and efficiency of use. Like the Alaska Geochemical Database Version 2.0 before it, the AGDB3 was created and designed to...

Fresh volcanic eruption deposits tend to be loose, bare, and readily resuspended by wind. Major resuspension events in Patagonia, Iceland, and Alaska have lofted ash clouds with potential to impact aircraft, infrastructure, and downwind communities. However, poor constraints on this resuspension process limit our ability to model...

Stream fish rely on a mix of terrestrial and aquatic prey sources. While the importance of terrestrial invertebrates as a food source for stream fish is well documented, the role of aquatic insects that emerge from the stream as winged adult insects (aquatic winged adults) and return to the stream...

The Yellow-billed Loon, known in Europe as the White-billed Diver, is a relatively rare bird nesting in arctic tundra regions of North America and Eurasia. This species was first described by G. R. Gray in 1859 (1), and named (Gavia adamsii) after the surgeon Dr. Edward Adams...

Between January 1, 2013, and December 31, 2017, the Alaska Volcano Observatory (AVO) located a total of 28,172 earthquakes at volcanoes in Alaska. The annual totals are 3,840, 5,819, 5,297, 6,151, and 7,065 earthquakes for the years 2013 through 2017, respectively. This represents an average of 5,634 earthquakes per year,...