Twelve-year dynamics and rainfall thresholds for alternating creep and rapid movement of the Hooskanaden landslide from integrating InSAR, pixel offset tracking, and borehole and hydrological measurements
Y. Xu, Z. Lu, William H. Schulz, J. Kim
2020, JGR Earth Surface
The Hooskanaden landslide is a large (~600 m wide × 1,300 m long), deep (~30 – 45 m) slide located in southwestern Oregon. Since 1958, it has had five moderate/major movements that catastrophically damaged the intersecting U.S. Highway 101, along with persistent slow wet‐season movements and a long‐term accelerating trend due to coastal erosion. Multiple remote sensing...
Improved prediction of management-relevant groundwater discharge characteristics throughout river networks
Janet R. Barclay, J. Jeffrey Starn, Martin A. Briggs, Ashley Helton
2020, Water Resources Research (56)
Groundwater discharge zones connect aquifers to surface water, generating baseflow and serving as ecosystem control points across aquatic ecosystems. The influence of groundwater discharge on surface flow connectivity, fate and transport of contaminants and nutrients, and thermal habitat depends strongly on hydrologic characteristics such as the...
Impacts of grade control structure installations on hydrology and sediment transport as an adaptive management strategy
Deborah Tosline, Laura M. Norman, Blair P. Greimann, Jay Cederberg, Victor Huang, Benjamin L. Ruddell
2020, Final Report ST-2017-1751-01
The goal of this research was to examine the impacts of Grade Control Structure (GCS) installations at the Heard Scout Pueblo (HSP) study site in the City of Phoenix, Arizona, USA. The study site is around a high-use trail system and is comprised of eroded and incised channels that conduct...
Mississippi Alluvial Valley Forest-breeding landbird population & quantitative habitat objectives
Dean W. Demarest, Blaine Elliott, Robert Ford, David Hanni, S. Keith McKnight, Anne E. Mini, Daniel J. Twedt, R. Randy Wilson
2020, Report
The Mississippi Alluvial Valley (MAV) is a 9 million ha (22-million-acre) floodplain that supports a diverse and ecologically rich bottomland hardwood forest ecosystem – one of the most productive in North America. It extends from roughly Cape Girardeau, Missouri, to the Gulf of Mexico and features a mosaic of ridges,...
Assessing plot-scale impacts of land use on overland flow generation in Central Panama
Sidney A. Bush, Robert Stallard, Brian A. Ebel, Holly R. Barnard
2020, Hydrological Processes (34) 5043-5069
Land use in Panama has changed dramatically with ongoing deforestation and conversion to cropland and cattle pastures, potentially altering the soil properties that drive the hydrological processes of infiltration and overland flow. We compared plot-scale overland flow generation between hillslopes in forested and actively cattle-grazed watersheds...
The Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN) surface-water interpolation model, version 3
Saira Haider, Eric Swain, James Beerens, Matthew D. Petkewich, Bryan McCloskey, Heather Henkel
2020, Scientific Investigations Report 2020-5083
The Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN) is an integrated network of water-level gages, interpolation models that estimate daily water-level data at ungaged locations, and applications that generate derived hydrologic data across the freshwater part of the Greater Everglades landscape. Version 3 (V3) of the EDEN interpolation surface-water model is the most...
Shifting food web structure during dam removal—Disturbance and recovery during a major restoration action
Sarah A. Morley, Melissa M Foley, Jeffrey J. Duda, Mathew M Beirne, Rebecca L Paradis, Rachelle Carina Johnson, Michael L. McHenry, Mel Elofson, Earnest M Sampson, Randall E McCoy, Justin Stapleton, George R. Pess
2020, PLoS ONE (15)
We measured food availability and diet composition of juvenile salmonids over multiple years and seasons before and during the world’s largest dam removal on the Elwha River, Washington State. We conducted these measurements over three sediment-impacted sections (the estuary and two sections of the river downstream of each dam) and...
Modeling soil porewater salinity in mangrove forests (Everglades, Florida, USA) impacted by hydrological restoration and a warming climate
Xiaochen Zhao, Victor H. Rivera-Monroy, Hongqing Wang, Zuo Xue, Cheng-Feng Tsai, C. S. Willson, E. Castañeda-Moya, Robert R. Twilley
2020, Ecological Modelling (436)
Hydrology is a critical driver controlling mangrove wetlands structural and functional attributes at different spatial and temporal scales. Yet, human activities have negatively affected hydrology, causing mangrove diebacks and coverage loss worldwide. In fact, the assessment of mangrove water budgets, impacted by natural and human disturbances, is limited due to...
Predicting bird guilds using vegetation composition and structure on a wild and scenic river in Arizona
Erin S. Cubley, Heather L. Bateman, Sidney B. Riddle, Christopher Holmquist-Johnson, David M. Merritt
2020, Wetlands (40) 1829-1842
Riparian areas are among the most ecologically diverse terrestrial ecosystems but make up <2% of landscape area in southwestern USA. Many species of resident and neotropical migratory birds utilize riparian habitats for breeding, foraging, and nesting. We quantified vegetation composition and structure to predict bird guilds...
Age-0 Smallmouth Bass abundance depends on physicochemical conditions and stream network position
Andrew D. Miller, Shannon K. Brewer
2020, Ecosphere (11)
Stream fish survival and recruitment are products of a physicochemical environment that affects growth and provides refuge; yet, the drivers of spatiotemporal variation in juvenile fish abundance remain unclear. Understanding how physicochemical conditions drive spatial and temporal patterns in fish abundances provides insight into how conditions...
Occurrence and spatiotemporal dynamics of pharmaceuticals in a temperate-region wastewater effluent-dominated stream: Variable inputs and differential attenuation yield evolving complex exposure mixtures
Hui Zhi, Dana W. Kolpin, R. D. Klaper, Luke R. Iwanowicz, Shannon M. Meppelink, Gregory H. LeFevre
2020, Environmental Science & Technology (54) 12967-12978
Effluent-dominated streams are becoming increasingly common in temperate regions and generate complex pharmaceutical mixture exposure conditions that may impact aquatic organisms via drug–drug interactions. Here, we quantified spatiotemporal pharmaceutical exposure concentrations and composition mixture dynamics during baseflow conditions at four sites...
Ecohydrological responses to surface flow across borders: Two decades of changes in vegetation greenness and water use in the riparian corridor of the Colorado River Delta
Pamela L. Nagler, Armando Barreto-Muñoz, Sattar Chavoshi Borujeni, Christopher J. Jarchow, Marth M. Gómez‐Sapiens, Hamideh Nouri, Stefanie M. Herrmann, Kamel Didan
2020, Hydrological Processes (34) 4851-4883
Hydrological and bioclimatic processes that lead to drought may stress plants and wildlife, restructure plant community type and architecture, increase monotypic stands and bare soils, facilitate the invasion of non‐native plant species and accelerate soil erosion. Our study focuses on the impact of a paucity of Colorado River surface flows...
Application of a new species-richness based flow ecology framework for assessing flow reduction effects on aquatic communities
Jennifer Rapp, Robert W. Burgholzer, Joseph D Kleiner, Durelle R Scott, Elaina M Passero
2020, Journal of the American Water Resources Association (6) 967-980
Water‐resources managers are challenged with maintaining a balance among beneficial uses throughout river networks and need robust means of assessing potential risks to aquatic life resulting from flow alterations. This study generated ecological limit functions from species‐streamflow relations to quantify potential fish richness response to flow...
Temperature and water-quality diversity and the effects of surface-water connection in off-channel features of the Willamette River, Oregon, 2015–16
Cassandra D. Smith, Joseph F. Mangano, Stewart A. Rounds
2020, Scientific Investigations Report 2020-5068
Water-quality conditions (including temperature) in the Willamette River and many of its adjacent off-channel features, such as alcoves and side channels, were monitored between river miles 67 (near Salem, Oregon) and 168 (near Eugene, Oregon) during the summers of 2015 and 2016. One or more parameters (water temperature, dissolved...
Accounting for temporal variability of streamflow in estimates of travel time
Christopher P. Konrad, Noah Schmadel, Judson Harvey, Gregory E. Schwarz, Jesus Gomez-Velez, Elizabeth W. Boyer, Durelle Scott
2020, Frontiers in Water (2)
Retention, processing, and transport of solutes and particulates in stream corridors are influenced by the travel time of streamflow through stream channels, which varies dynamically with discharge. The effects of streamflow variability across sites and over time cannot be addressed by time-averaged models if parameters are based solely on...
Rethinking a groundwater flow system using a multiple-tracer geochemical approach: A case study in Moab-Spanish Valley, Utah
Philip M. Gardner, Nora C. Nelson, Victor M. Heilweil, John E. Solder, Douglas K. Solomon
2020, Journal of Hydrology (590)
The Glen Canyon Group Aquifer (GCGA) is the sole source of public water supply for the city of Moab, Utah, a domestic and international tourist destination. Population and tourism growth are likely to target the GCGA for future water resources, but our analysis indicates...
Water Quality of groundwater used for public supply in principal aquifers of the western United States
Celia Z. Rosecrans, MaryLynn Musgrove
2020, Scientific Investigations Report 2020-5078
Groundwater provides nearly half of the Nation’s drinking water. As the Nation’s population grows, the importance of (and need for) high-quality drinking-water supplies increases. As part of a national-scale effort to assess groundwater quality in principal aquifers (PAs) that supply most of the groundwater used for public supply, the...
Effects of water level alteration on carbon cycling in peatlands
Yehui Zhong, Jiang Ming, Beth Middleton
2020, Ecosystem Health and Sustainability (6)
Globally, peatlands play an important role in the carbon (C) cycle. High water level is a key factor in maintaining C storage in peatlands, but water levels are vulnerable to climate change and anthropogenic disturbance. This review examines literature related to the effects of water level alteration on C cycling...
elfgen: A new instream flow framework for rapid generation and optimization of flow-ecology relations
Joseph D Kleiner, Elaina M Passero, Robert W. Burgholzer, Jennifer L. Krstolic, Durelle R Scott
2020, Journal of the American Water Resources Association (6) 949-966
Effective water resource management requires practical, data‐driven determination of instream flow needs. Newly developed, high‐resolution flow models and aquatic species databases provide enormous opportunity, but the volume of data can prove challenging to manage without automated tools. The objective of this study was to develop a...
Flow‐ecology modelling to inform reservoir releases for riparian restoration and management
John T Hickey, Patrick B. Shafroth, Woodrow L Fields
2020, Hydrological Processes (34) 4576-4591
Linked hydrologic, hydraulic, and ecological models can facilitate planning and implementing water releases from reservoirs to achieve ecological objectives along rivers. We applied a flow‐ecology model, the Ecosystem Functions Model (HEC‐EFM), to the Bill Williams River in southwestern USA to estimate areas suitable for recruitment of...
Exploring the potential of ground-penetrating radar (GPR) to measure the extent of chronic disturbance in peatlands: Examples from acid mine drainage and peat fire
Neil Terry, Robert L. Runkel, Dale D. Werkema, Elizabeth Rutila, Xavier Comas, Matthew Warren, Agus Kristiyono, Daniel Murdiyarso
2020, Conference Paper
Peatlands are accumulations of partially decayed organic soil that cover approximately 3% of Earth’s surface and have been shown to serve essential environmental and ecological functions such as sequestering carbon, purifying water, and providing habitat for organisms. However, peatlands are threatened by pressures from agriculture, urban development, mining, and climate...
Coarse sediment dynamics in a large glaciated river system: Holocene history and storage dynamics dictate contemporary climate sensitivity
Scott W. Anderson, Kristin Jaeger
2020, Geological Society of America Bulletin
The gravel-bedded White River drains a 1279 km2 basin in Washington State, with lowlands sculpted by continental glaciation and headwaters on an actively glaciated stratovolcano. Chronic aggradation along an alluvial fan near the river’s mouth has progressively reduced flood conveyance. In order to better understand how forecasted climate change may influence...
Permafrost hydrogeology
Barret L. Kurylyk, Michelle A. Walvoord
2020, Book chapter, Arctic hydrology, permafrost and ecosystems
Groundwater processes are often overlooked in permafrost environments, but subsurface storage and routing can strongly influence water and biogeochemical cycling in northern catchments. Groundwater flow in permafrost regions is controlled by the temporal and spatial distribution of frozen ground, causing the hydrogeologic framework to be temperature-dependent. Most flow...
Use of boosted regression trees to quantify cumulative instream flow resulting from curtailment of irrigation in the Sprague River basin, Oregon
Tamara M. Wood
2020, Scientific Investigations Report 2019-5130
A boosted regression trees (BRT) approach was used to estimate the amount by which streamflow is increased when irrigation is regulated (curtailed) upstream of a streamgage on the Sprague River in southern-central Oregon. The BRT approach differs from most other approaches that require baseline conditions for comparison, where those baseline...
Flood-frequency estimation for very low annual exceedance probabilities using historical, paleoflood, and regional information with consideration of nonstationarity
Karen R. Ryberg, Kelsey A. Kolars, Julie E. Kiang, Meredith L. Carr
2020, Scientific Investigations Report 2020-5065
Streamflow estimates for floods with an annual exceedance probability of 0.001 or lower are needed to accurately portray risks to critical infrastructure, such as nuclear powerplants and large dams. However, extrapolating flood-frequency curves developed from at-site systematic streamflow records to very low annual exceedance probabilities (less than 0.001) results in...
