Assessment of continuous oil and gas resources of the Timan-Pechora Basin Province, Russia, 2018
Christopher J. Schenk, Tracey J. Mercier, Janet K. Pitman, Phuong A. Le, Marilyn E. Tennyson, Michael E. Brownfield, Kristen R. Marra, Heidi M. Leathers-Miller, Ronald M. Drake II, Timothy R. Klett
2018, Fact Sheet 2018-3050
Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated undiscovered, technically recoverable mean resources of 1.4 billion barrels of oil and 46 trillion cubic feet of gas in the Timan-Pechora Basin Province of Russia....
Strike-slip 23 January 2018 MW 7.9 Gulf of Alaska rare intraplate earthquake: Complex rupture of a fracture zone system
Anne Krabbenhoeft, Roland von Huene, John J. Miller, Dietrich Lange, Felipe Vera
2018, Scientific Reports (8) 1-9
Large intraplate earthquakes in oceanic lithosphere are rare and usually related to regions of diffuse deformation within the oceanic plate. The 23 January 2018 MW 7.9 strike-slip Gulf of Alaska earthquake ruptured an oceanic fracture zone system offshore Kodiak Island. Bathymetric compilations show a muted topographic expression of the fracture zone...
Where have all the turtles gone, and why does it matter?
Jeffrey E. Lovich, Joshua R. Ennen, Mickey Agha, J. Whitfield Gibbons
2018, BioScience (68) 771-781
Of the 356 species of turtles worldwide, approximately 61% are threatened or already extinct. Turtles are among the most threatened of the major groups of vertebrates, in general, more so than birds, mammals, fishes or even the much besieged amphibians. Reasons for the dire situation of turtles worldwide include the...
Assessing wild juvenile trout ecology in the lower Mountain Fork
James M. Long, W. W. Hoback, M. L. Reed, Tyler Farling
2018, Cooperator Science Series 133-2018
Reservoir tailwaters can be valuable fisheries for Rainbow Trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss), which is commonly stocked as mitigation for the altered habitat because it performs well as a put-and-take species in these thermally depressed systems. These fisheries are usually sustained by stocking due to flow fluctuations and lack of suitable spawning...
Movements and dive patterns of pygmy killer whales (Feresa attenuata) released in the Gulf of Mexico following rehabilitation
Eric Pulis, Randall S. Wells, Gregory S. Schorr, David C. Douglas, Mystera M. Samuelson, Moby Solangi
2018, Aquatic Mammals (44) 555-567
The habits and habitats of pygmy killer whales (Feresa attenuata) in the Gulf of Mexico (GoM) are poorly known outside of strandings and line-transect surveys. Two adult male pygmy killer whales were found live-stranded in the state of Mississippi (USA) on 1 September 2015 and were subsequently rehabilitated and returned...
Quantifying uncertainty in cumulative surface slip along the Cucamonga Fault, a crustal thrust fault in southern California
Devin McPhillips, Katherine M. Scharer
2018, Journal of Geophysical Research B: Solid Earth (123) 9063-9083
Studies of historic earthquake ground surface ruptures show that displacements along strike are spatially variable. As a result, latest Quaternary slip rates developed from a spatially restricted set of cumulative displacement measurements may not accurately represent fault velocity. Here we examine the uncertainties associated with slip...
Continuing progress toward a national assessment of water availability and use
Eric J. Evenson, Sonya A. Jones, Nancy L. Barber, Paul M. Barlow, David L. Blodgett, Breton W. Bruce, Kyle R. Douglas-Mankin, William H. Farmer, Jeffrey M. Fischer, William B. Hughes, Jonathan G. Kennen, Julie E. Kiang, Molly A. Maupin, Howard W. Reeves, Gabriel B. Senay, Jennifer S. Stanton, Chad R. Wagner, Jennifer T. Wilson
2018, Circular 1440
Executive SummaryThe Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 (Public Law 111—11) was passed into law on March 30, 2009. Subtitle F, also known as the SECURE Water Act, calls for the establishment of a “national water availability and use assessment program” within the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). The USGS...
Additional period and site class maps for the 2014 National Seismic Hazard Model for the conterminous United States
Allison Shumway, Mark D. Petersen, Peter M. Powers, Sanaz Rezaeian
2018, Open-File Report 2018-1111
The 2014 update of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) National Seismic Hazard Model (NSHM) for the conterminous United States (2014 NSHM; Petersen and others, 2014, 2015) included probabilistic ground motion maps for 2 percent and 10 percent probabilities of exceedance in 50 years, derived from seismic hazard curves for peak ground acceleration...
Streamflow contributions from tribal lands to major river basins of the United States
Kyle W. Blasch, Stephen Hundt, Patrick Wurster, Roy Sando, Antony Berthelote
2018, PLoS ONE (13) 1-16
While many studies on tribal water resources of individual tribal lands in the United States (US) have been conducted, the importance of tribal water resources at a national scale has largely gone unrecognized because their combined totals have not been quantified. Thus, we sought to provide a numerical estimate of...
Collision and displacement vulnerability to offshore wind energy infrastructure among marine birds of the Pacific Outer Continental Shelf
Emily C. Kelsey, Jonathan J. Felis, Max Czapanskiy, David M. Peresksta, Josh Adams
2018, Journal of Environmental Management (227) 229-247
Marine birds are vulnerable to collision with and displacement by offshore wind energy infrastructure (OWEI). Here we present the first assessment of marine bird vulnerability to potential OWEI in the California Current System portion of the U.S. Pacific Outer Continental Shelf (POCS). Using population size, demography, life history, flight heights, and avoidance...
Monitoring the social benefits of ecological restoration
David M. Martin, James E. Lyons
2018, Restoration Ecology (26) 1045-1050
Ecological restoration has traditionally been evaluated by monitoring the recovery of ecosystem conditions, such as species diversity and abundance, physical form, and water quality, whereas monitoring the social benefits of restoration is uncommon. Current monitoring frameworks do not track who benefits from restoration or by how much. In this study,...
Chronic wasting disease detection and mortality sources in semi-protected deer population
Krysten L. Schuler, Jonathan A. Jenks, Robert W. Klaver, Christopher S. Jennelle, R. Terry Bowyer
2018, Wildlife Biology (2018)
Surveillance for wildlife diseases is essential for assessing population dynamics of ungulates, especially in free-ranging populations where infected animals are difficult to sample. Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is an emerging infectious disease of concern because of the potential for substantial negative effects on populations of cervids. Variability in the likelihood...
Climatically driven changes in primary production propagate through trophic levels
David C. Stoner, Joseph O. Sexton, David M. Choate, Jyothy Nagol, Heather H. Bernales, Steven A. Sims, Kirsten E. Ironside, Kathleen M. Longshore, Thomas C. Edwards Jr.
2018, Global Change Biology (24) 4453-4463
Climate and land‐use change are the major drivers of global biodiversity loss. Their effects are particularly acute for wide‐ranging consumers, but little is known about how these factors interact to affect the abundance of large carnivores and their herbivore prey. We analyzed population densities of a primary and secondary consumer...
Erratum - Greater sage-grouse population trends across Wyoming.
David R. Edmunds, Cameron L. Aldridge, Michael S. O’Donnell, Adrian P. Monroe
2018, Journal of Wildlife Management (82) 1808-1808
No abstract available....
The 1952 Kern County, California earthquake: A case study of issues in the analysis of historical intensity data for estimation of source parameters
Leah Salditch, Susan E. Hough, Seth Stein, Bruce Spencer, Edward Brooks, James S. Neely, Madeleine C. Lucas
2018, Physics of the Earth and Planetary Interiors (283) 140-151
Seismic intensity data based on first-hand accounts of shaking give valuable insight into historical and early instrumental earthquakes. Comparing an observed intensity distribution to intensity-prediction models based on modern calibration events allows the magnitude to be estimated for many historic earthquakes. Magnitude estimates can also potentially be refined for earthquakes...
Changes in Earth’s gravity reveal changes in groundwater storage
Jeffrey R. Kennedy
2018, Fact Sheet 2018-3032
Changes in the amount of water stored in underground aquifers cause small changes in Earth’s gravitational field. The U.S. Geological Survey’s Southwest Gravity Program has developed methods for measuring terrestrial gravity changes with part-per-billion precision. The measurements allow scientists to map changes in groundwater storage and to improve models...
Necropsy-based wild fish health assessment
Vicki S. Blazer, Heather L. Walsh, Ryan P. Braham, Cheyenne R. Smith
2018, Journal of Visualized Experiments (139)
Anthropogenic influences from increased nutrients and chemical contaminants, to habitat alterations and climate change, can have significant effects on fish populations. Adverse effects monitoring, utilizing biomarkers from the organismal to the molecular level, can be used to assess the cumulative effects on fishes and other organisms. Fish health has been...
The 19 September 2017 M 7.1 Puebla‐Morelos earthquake: Spectral ratios confirm Mexico City zoning
Mehmet Celebi, Valerie Jean Sahakian, Diego Melgar, Luis Quintanar
2018, Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (108) 3289-3299
One important element of understanding basin response to strong shaking is the analysis of spectral ratios, which may provide information about the dominant frequency of ground motion at specific locations. Spectral ratios computed from accelerations recorded by strong‐motion stations in Mexico City during the mainshock of the 19 September 2017 <span...
Internal parasites of the two subspecies of the West Indian manatee Trichechus manatus
Heidi M. Wyrosdick, Alycia Chapman, Antonio A. Mignucci-Giannoni, Carla I. Riviera-Perez, Robert K. Bonde
2018, Diseases of Aquatic Organisms (130) 145-152
The West Indian manatee Trichechus manatus is divided into 2 subspecies: the Antillean (T. m. manatus) and Florida (T. m. latirostris) manatees. This study reports sample prevalence of manatee parasites from populations of these 2 subspecies in different geographical locations. Although necropsy is a valuable diagnostic tool for parasite infections, the need...
Modelling sound attenuation in heterogeneous environments for improved bioacoustic sampling of wildlife populations
J. Andrew Royle
2018, Methods in Ecology and Evolution (9) 1939-1947
Acoustic sampling methods are becoming increasingly important in biological monitoring. Sound attenuation is one of the most important dynamics affecting the utility of acoustic data as it directly affects the probability of detection of individuals by acoustic sensor arrays and especially the localization of acoustic signals necessary in telemetry...
Prioritizing conserved areas threatened by wildfire and fragmentation for monitoring and management
Jeff A. Tracey, Carlton J. Rochester, Stacie A. Hathaway, Kristine L. Preston, Alexandra D. Syphard, Amy G. Vandergast, James E. Diffendorfer, Janet Franklin, Jason B. MacKenzie, Tomas A. Oberbauer, Scott Tremor, Clark S. Winchell, Robert N. Fisher
2018, PLoS ONE (13) 1-23
In many parts of the world, the combined effects of habitat fragmentation and altered disturbance regimes pose a significant threat to biodiversity. This is particularly true in Mediterranean-type ecosystems (MTEs), which tend to be fire-prone, species rich, and heavily impacted by human land use. Given the spatial complexity of overlapping...
Latitudinal limits to the predicted increase of the peatland carbon sink with warming
Angela Gallego-Sala, Dan Charman, Simon Brewer, Sue Page, I. Colin Prentice, Pierre Friedlingstein, Steven Morley, Matthew Amesbury, David Beilman, Svante Bjorck, Tatiana Blyakharchuk, Christopher Bochicchio, Robert K Booth, Joan Bunbury, Philip Camill, Donna Carless, Rodney A. Chimner, Michael Clifford, Elizabeth Cressey, Colin Courtney-Mustaphi, Francois De Vleeschouwer, Rixt de Jong, Barbara Fialkiawicz-Koziel, Sarah A Finkelstein, Michelle Garneau, Esther N. Githumbi, John Hribjlan, James Holmquist, Paul Hughes, Chris D. Jones, Miriam Jones, Edgar Karofeld, Eric S. Klein, Ulla Kokfelt, Atte Korhola, Terri Lacourse, Gael LeRoux, Mariusz Lamentowicz, David Large, Martin Lavoie, Julie Loisel, Helen MacKay, Glen M. MacDonald, Markku Makila, Gabriel Magnan, R. Marchant, Katarzyna Marcisz, Antonio Martinez-Cortizas, Charly Massa, Paul Mathijssen, Dmitri Mauquoy, Timothy Mighall, Fraser J.G. Mitchell, Patrick Moss, J. Nichols, P.O. Oksanen, L. Orme, Maara S. Packalen, Stephen Robinson, Thomas P. Roland, Nicole K. Sanderson, A. B. K. Sannel, Noemi Silva-Sanchez, Natasha Steinberg, Graeme T. Swindles, T. Edward Turner, Joanna Uglow, M. Valiranta, Simon van Bellen, Marjolein van der Linden, Guoping Wang, Zicheng Yu, Joana Zaragoza-Castells, Yan Zhao
2018, Nature Climate Change (8) 907-913
The carbon sink potential of peatlands depends on the balance of carbon uptake by plants and microbial decomposition. The rates of both these processes will increase with warming but it remains unclear which will dominate the global peatland response. Here we examine the global relationship between peatland carbon accumulation rates...
Methods used to reconstruct historical daily streamflows in northern New Jersey and southeastern New York, water years 1922–2010
R. Edward Hickman, Amy R. McHugh
2018, Scientific Investigations Report 2018-5068
A study was conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, to reconstruct streamflows for use in the RiverWare model. Methods and data used to estimate daily reconstructed streamflows at 53 sites in selected subbasins in northern New Jersey and southeastern New...
Multiphase flow and underpressured shale at the Bruce nuclear site, Ontario, Canada
Michelle R. Plampin, Christopher E. Neuzil
2018, Geological Society, London, Special Publications (482) 101-114
Hydraulic testing has revealed dramatic underpressures in Paleozoic shales and carbonates at the Bruce nuclear site in Ontario. Although evidence from both laboratory and field studies suggests that a small amount of gas-phase methane could be present in the shale, previous studies examining causal linkages between the gas phase and...
U.S. Geological Survey sage-grouse and sagebrush ecosystem research annual report for 2018
Steven E. Hanser, editor(s)
2018, Circular 1446
The sagebrush (Artemisia spp.) ecosystem extends across a large portion of the Western United States, and the greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) is one of the iconic species of this ecosystem. Greater sage-grouse populations occur in 11 States and are dependent on relatively large expanses of sagebrush-dominated habitat. Sage-grouse populations have...
