Market forces and technological substitutes cause fluctuations in the value of bat pest-control services for cotton
Laura López-Hoffman, Ruscena Wiederholt, Chris Sansone, Kenneth J. Bagstad, Paul M. Cryan, James E. Diffendorfer, Joshua Goldstein, Kelsie LaSharr, John Loomis, Gary McCracken, Rodrigo A. Medellin, Amy Russell, Darius J. Semmens
2014, PLoS ONE (2)
Critics of the market-based, ecosystem services approach to biodiversity conservation worry that volatile market conditions and technological substitutes will diminish the value of ecosystem services and obviate the “economic benefits” arguments for conservation. To explore the effects of market forces and substitutes on service values, we assessed how the value...
External quality-assurance project report for the National Atmospheric Deposition Program/National Trends Network and Mercury Deposition Network, 2009-2010
Gregory A. Wetherbee, RoseAnn Martin, Mark F. Rhodes, Tanya A. Chesney
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5147
The U.S. Geological Survey operated six distinct programs to provide external quality-assurance monitoring for the National Atmospheric Deposition Program/National Trends Network (NTN) and Mercury Deposition Network (MDN) during 2009–2010. The field-audit program assessed the effects of onsite exposure, sample handling, and shipping on the chemistry of NTN samples; a system-blank...
Estimation of potential scour at bridges on local government roads in South Dakota, 2009-12
Ryan F. Thompson, Chelsea M. Wattier, Richard R. Liggett, Ryan A. Truax
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5233
In 2009, the U.S. Geological Survey and South Dakota Department of Transportation (SDDOT) began a study to estimate potential scour at selected bridges on local government (county, township, and municipal) roads in South Dakota. A rapid scour-estimation method (level-1.5) and a more detailed method (level-2) were used to develop estimates...
Water-quality variability and constituent transport and processes in streams of Johnson County, Kansas, using continuous monitoring and regression models, 2003-11
Teresa Rasmussen, Jackline Gatotho
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5221
The population of Johnson County, Kansas increased by about 24 percent between 2000 and 2012, making it one of the most rapidly developing areas of Kansas. The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Johnson County Stormwater Management Program, began a comprehensive study of Johnson County streams in 2002 to...
Suspended-sediment concentrations, loads, total suspended solids, turbidity, and particle-size fractions for selected rivers in Minnesota, 2007 through 2011
Christopher A. Ellison, Brett E. Savage, Gregory D. Johnson
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5205
Sediment-laden rivers and streams pose substantial environmental and economic challenges. Excessive sediment transport in rivers causes problems for flood control, soil conservation, irrigation, aquatic health, and navigation, and transports harmful contaminants like organic chemicals and eutrophication-causing nutrients. In Minnesota, more than 5,800 miles of streams are identified as impaired by...
Simulation and validation of larval sucker dispersal and retention through the restored Williamson River Delta and Upper Klamath Lake system, Oregon
Tamara M. Wood, Heather A. Hendrixson, Douglas F. Markle, Charles S. Erdman, Summer M. Burdick, Craig M. Ellsworth
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5194
A hydrodynamic model with particle tracking was used to create individual-based simulations to describe larval fish dispersal through the restored Williamson River Delta and into Upper Klamath Lake, Oregon. The model was verified by converting particle ages to larval lengths and comparing these lengths to lengths of larvae in net...
National Assessment of Oil and Gas Project: geologic assessment of undiscovered gas hydrate resources on the North Slope, Alaska
Timothy S. USGS AK Gas Hydrate Assessment Team: Collett, Warren F. Agena, Myung Woong Lee, Kristen A. Lewis, Margarita V. Zyrianova, Kenneth J. Bird, Ronald R. Charpentier, Troy A. Cook, David W. Houseknecht, Timothy R. Klett, Richard M. Pollastro
2014, Data Series 69-CC
Scientists with the U.S. Geological Survey have completed the first assessment of the undiscovered, technically recoverable gas hydrate resources beneath the North Slope of Alaska. This assessment indicates the existence of technically recoverable gas hydrate resources—that is, resources that can be discovered, developed, and produced using current technology. The approach used...
Model distribution of Silver Chub (Macrhybopsis storeriana) in western Lake Erie
James E. McKenna Jr., Chris Castiglione
2014, American Midland Naturalist (171) 301-310
Silver Chub (Macrhybopsis storeriana) was once a common forage fish in Lake Erie but has declined greatly since the 1950s. Identification of optimal and marginal habitats would help conserve and manage this species. We developed neural networks to use broad-scale habitat variables to predict abundance classes of Silver Chub in...
Snow conditions as an estimator of the breeding output in high-Arctic pink-footed geese Anser brachyrhynchus
Gitte Hoj Jensen, Jesper Madsen, Fred A. Johnson, Mikkel P. Tamstorf
2014, Polar Biology (37) 1-14
The Svalbard-breeding population of pink-footed geese Anser brachyrhynchus has increased during the last decades and is giving rise to agricultural conflicts along their migration route, as well as causing grazing impacts on tundra vegetation. An adaptive flyway management plan has been implemented, which will be based on predictive population models...
On the role of budget sufficiency, cost efficiency, and uncertainty in species management
Max Post van der Burg, Bartholomew B. Bly, Tammy Vercauteren, J. Barry Grand, Andrew J. Tyre
2014, Journal of Wildlife Management (78) 153-163
Many conservation planning frameworks rely on the assumption that one should prioritize locations for management actions based on the highest predicted conservation value (i.e., abundance, occupancy). This strategy may underperform relative to the expected outcome if one is working with a limited budget or the predicted responses are uncertain. Yet,...
Guidelines for monitoring and adaptively managing restoration of Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) and steelhead (O. mykiss) on the Elwha River
R.J. Peters, J.J. Duda, G.R. Pess, M. Zimmerman, P. Crain, Z. Hughes, A. Wilson, M.C. Liermann, S.A. Morley, J. McMillan, K. Denton, K. Warheit
2014, Conference Paper, Proceedings of the Joint Federal Interagency Conference
As of January, 2014, the removal of the Elwha and Glines Canyon dams on the Elwha River, Washington, represents the largest dam decommissioning to date in the United States. Dam removal is the single largest step in meeting the goals of the Elwha River Ecosystem and Fisheries Restoration Act of...
Transport of fine sediment over a coarse, immobile riverbed
Paul E. Grams, Peter R. Wilcock
2014, Journal of Geophysical Research F: Earth Surface (119) 188-211
Sediment transport in cobble-boulder rivers consists mostly of fine sediment moving over a coarse, immobile bed. Transport rate depends on several interrelated factors: boundary shear stress, the grain size and volume of fine sediment, and the configuration of fine sediment into interstitial deposits and bed forms. Existing models do not...
Earthquake intensity distributions: a new view
Susan E. Hough
2014, Bulletin of Earthquake Engineering (12) 135-155
Pioneering work by Nicolas Ambraseys and many collaborators demonstrates both the tremendous value of macroseismic data and the perils of its uncritical assessment. In numerous publications he shows that neglect of original sources and/or failure to appreciate the context of historical accounts, as well as use of unreliable indicators such as landslid- ing to...
Simulation of groundwater flow in the Edwards-Trinity and related aquifers in the Pecos County region, Texas
Brian R. Clark, Johnathan R. Bumgarner, Natalie A. Houston, Adam L. Foster
2014, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5228
The Edwards-Trinity aquifer is a vital groundwater resource for agricultural, industrial, and public supply uses in the Pecos County region of western Texas. The U.S. Geological Survey completed a comprehensive, integrated analysis of available hydrogeologic data to develop a numerical groundwater-flow model of the Edwards-Trinity and related aquifers in the...
Temporal and spatial distributions of cold-water corals in the Drake Passage: insights from the last 35,000 years
Andrew R. Margolin, Laura F. Robinson, Andrea Burke, Rhian G. Waller, Kathryn M. Scanlon, Mark L. Roberts, Maureen E. Auro, Tina van de Flierdt
2014, Deep-Sea Research Part II: Topical Studies in Oceanography (99) 237-248
Scleractinian corals have a global distribution ranging from shallow tropical seas to the depths of the Southern Ocean. Although this distribution is indicative of the corals having a tolerance to a wide spectrum of environmental conditions, individual species seem to be restricted to a much narrower range of ecosystem variables....
Mineral resource of the month: Iron and steel
Michael D. Fenton
2014, Earth
Iron is one of the most abundant elements on Earth, but it does not occur in nature in a useful metallic form. Although ancient people may have recovered some iron from meteorites, it wasn’t until smelting was invented that iron metal could be derived from iron oxides. After the beginning...
Nocturnal field use by fall migrating American woodcock in the Delta of Arkansas
David G. Krementz, Richard Crossett II, Sarah E. Lehnen
2014, Journal of Wildlife Management (78) 264-272
The American woodcock (Scolopax minor) population has declined since the late 1960s across its range and is now considered a species of special concern. Research on woodcock habitat use during migration and migratory routes through the Central Flyway has been limited. We assessed woodcock phenology, estimated density, and nocturnal habitat...
Reconstruction of historic sea ice conditions in a sub-Arctic lagoon
Chris Petrich, Adrienne C. Tivy, David H. Ward
2014, Cold Regions Science and Technology (98) 55-62
Historical sea ice conditions were reconstructed for Izembek Lagoon, Bering Sea, Alaska. This lagoon is a crucial staging area during migration for numerous species of avian migrants and a major eelgrass (Zostera marina) area important to a variety of marine and terrestrial organisms, especially Pacific Flyway black brant geese (Branta...
Status of forest birds on Rota, Mariana Islands
Richard J. Camp, Kevin W. Brinck, P. Marcos Gorresen, Fred A. Amidon, Paul M. Radley, S. Paul Berkowitz, Paul C. Banko
2014, Report, Hawaii Cooperative Studies Unit Technical Report
The western Pacific island of Rota is the third largest human inhabited island in the Mariana archipelago, and is designated an Endemic Bird Area. Between 1982 and 2012, 12 point-transect distance sampling surveys were conducted to assess population status. Surveys did not consistently sample the entire island; thus, we used...
Modelling riverine habitat for robust redhorse: assessment for reintroduction of an imperilled species
J. M. Fisk III, Thomas J. Kwak, R. J. Heise
2014, Fisheries Management and Ecology (21) 57-67
A critical component of a species reintroduction is assessment of contemporary habitat suitability. The robust redhorse, Moxostoma robustum (Cope), is an imperilled catostomid that occupies a restricted range in the south-eastern USA. A remnant population persists downstream of Blewett Falls Dam, the terminal dam in the Pee Dee River, North...
Blocking and guiding adult sea lamprey with pulsed direct current from vertical electrodes
Nicholas S. Johnson, Henry T. Thompson, Christopher M. Holbrook, John A. Tix
2014, Fisheries Research (150) 38-48
Controlling the invasion front of aquatic nuisance species is of high importance to resource managers. We tested the hypothesis that adult sea lamprey (Petromyzon marinus), a destructive invasive species in the Laurentian Great Lakes, would exhibit behavioral avoidance to dual-frequency pulsed direct current generated by vertical electrodes and that the...
Forecasting landscape effects of Mississippi River diversions on elevation and accretion in Louisiana deltaic wetlands under future environmental uncertainty scenarios
Hongqing Wang, Gregory D. Steyer, Brady R. Couvillion, John M. Rybczyk, Holly J. Beck, William J. Sleavin, Ehab A. Meselhe, Mead A. Allison, Ronald G. Boustany, Craig J. Fischenich, Victor H. Rivera-Monroy
2014, Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science (138) 57-68
Large sediment diversions are proposed and expected to build new wetlands to alleviate the extensive wetland loss (5,000 km2) affecting coastal Louisiana during the last 78 years. Current assessment and prediction of the impacts of sediment diversions have focused on the capture and dispersal of both water and sediment on...
Contrasting past and current numbers of bears visiting Yellowstone cutthroat trout streams
Mark A. Haroldson, Charles C. Schwartz, Justin E. Teisberg, Kerry A. Gunther, Jennifer K. Fortin, Charles T. Robbins
2014, Journal of Wildlife Management (78) 369-378
Spawning cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii bouvieri) were historically abundant within tributary streams of Yellowstone Lake within Yellowstone National Park and were a highly digestible source of energy and protein for Yellowstone’s grizzly bears (Ursus arctos) and black bears (U. americanus). The cutthroat trout population has subsequently declined since the introduction...
Regional distribution models with lack of proximate predictors: Africanized honeybees expanding north
Catherine S. Jarnevich, Wayne E. Esaias, Peter L.A. Ma, Jeffery T. Morisette, Jaime E. Nickeson, Thomas J. Stohlgren, Tracy R. Holcombe, Joanne M. Nightingale, Robert E. Wolfe, Bin Tan
2014, Diversity and Distributions (20) 193-201
Species distribution models have often been hampered by poor local species data, reliance on coarse-scale climate predictors and the assumption that species–environment relationships, even with non-proximate predictors, are consistent across geographical space. Yet locally accurate maps of invasive species, such as the Africanized honeybee (AHB) in North America, are needed...
Increased flexibility for modeling telemetry and nest-survival data using the multistate framework
Olivier Devineau, William L. Kendall, Paul F. Doherty Jr., Tanya M. Shenk, Gary C. White, Paul M. Lukacs, Kenneth P. Burnham
2014, Journal of Wildlife Management (78) 224-230
Although telemetry is one of the most common tools used in the study of wildlife, advances in the analysis of telemetry data have lagged compared to progress in the development of telemetry devices. We demonstrate how standard known-fate telemetry and related nest-survival data analysis models are special cases of the...
