Influence of a guide net on the presence and behavior of fish near the selective water withdrawal structure in Lake Billy Chinook, Oregon, 2022
Collin D. Smith, Tyson W. Hatton
2023, Open-File Report 2023-1090
Imaging sonar was used to assess the influence of a fish guidance net, installed at the entrances to the selective water withdrawal (SWW) intake structure, in the forebay of Round Butte Dam, Oregon, on behavior, abundance, and timing of fish during the spring of 2022. The purposes of the SWW...
The context dependency of fish-habitat associations in separated karst ecoregions
Dusty A. Swedberg, Robert M. Mollenhauer, Shannon K. Brewer
2023, Ecology and Evolution (13)
Fish populations may be isolated via natural conditions in geographically separated ecoregions. Although reconnecting these populations is not a management goal, we need to understand how these populations persist across landscapes to develop meaningful conservation actions, particularly for species occupying sensitive karst ecosystems. Our study objective was to determine the...
Bayesian hierarchical modeling for probabilistic estimation of tsunami amplitude from far-field earthquake sources
Georgios Boumis, Eric L. Geist, Danhyang Lee
2023, Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans (128)
Evaluation of tsunami disaster risk for a coastal region requires reliable estimation of tsunami hazard, for example, wave amplitude close to the shore. Observed tsunami data are scarce and have poor spatial coverage, and for this reason probabilistic tsunami hazard analysis (PTHA) traditionally relies on numerical simulation...
Backpack satellite transmitters reduce survival but not nesting propensity or success of greater sage-grouse
Bryan S. Stevens, Courtney J. Conway, Cody A. Tisdale, Kylie N. Denny, Andrew Meyers, Paul Makela
2023, Ecology and Evolution (13)
Telemetry technology is ubiquitous for studying the behavior and demography of wildlife, including the use of traditional very high frequency (VHF) radio telemetry and more recent methods that record animal locations using global positioning systems (GPS). Satellite-based GPS telemetry allows researchers to collect high...
Maps of active layer thickness in northern Alaska by upscaling P-band polarimetric synthetic aperture radar retrievals
Jane Whitcomb, Richard Chen, Daniel Clewley, John S. Kimball, Neal Pastick, Yonghong Yi, Mahta Moghaddam
2023, Environmental Research Letters (19)
Extensive, detailed information on the spatial distribution of active layer thickness (ALT) in northern Alaska and how it evolves over time could greatly aid efforts to assess the effects of climate change on the region and also help to quantify greenhouse gas emissions generated due to permafrost...
Hydrogeology, karst, and groundwater availability of Monroe County, West Virginia
Mark D. Kozar, Daniel H. Doctor, William K. Jones, Nathan Chien, Cheyenne E. Cox, Randall C. Orndorff, David J. Weary, Mitchell R. Weaver, Mitchell A. McAdoo, Mercer Parker
2023, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5121
Monroe County is in southeastern West Virginia, encompassing an area of 474 square miles. The area consists of karst and siliciclastic aquifers of Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, and Mississippian age and is in parts of two physiographic provinces: the Valley and Ridge Province to the east of Peters Mountain, and the...
Unprecedented distribution data for Joshua trees (Yucca brevifolia and Y. jaegeriana) reveal contemporary climate associations of a Mojave Desert icon
Todd Esque, Daniel F. Shryock, Gabrielle A. Berr, Felicia Chen, Lesley A. DeFalco, Sabrina Mae Lewicki, Brent Lee Cunningham, Eddie J. Gaylord, Caitlin Shannon Poage, Gretchen Elizabeth Gantz, Ross Adrian Van Gaalen, Benjamin O Gottsacker, Amanda Marie Mcdonald, J.B. Yoder, C.I. Smith, K.E. Nussear
2023, Frontiers Ecology and Evolution (11)
Introduction: Forecasting range shifts in response to climate change requires accurate species distribution models (SDMs), particularly at the margins of species' ranges. However, most studies producing SDMs rely on sparse species occurrence datasets from herbarium records and public databases, along with random pseudoabsences. While environmental covariates used to fit SDMS...
Identifying invasive species threats, pathways, and impacts to improve biosecurity
Deah Lieurance, Susan Canavan, Donald C. Behringer, Amy E. Kendig, Carey R. Minteer, Lindsey S. Reisinger, Christina M. Romagosa, S. Luke Flory, Julie L. Lockwood, Patti J. Anderson, Shirley M. Baker, Jamie Bojko, Kristen E. Bowers, Kim Canavan, Kelly Carruthers, Wesley M. Daniel, Doria R. Gordon, Jeffrey E. Hill, Jennifer G. Howeth, Basil V. Iannone, Lucas Jennings, Lyn A. Gettys, Eutychus M. Kariuki, John M. Kunzer, H. Dail Laughinghouse, Nicholas E. Mandrak, Sara McCann, Tolulope Morawo, Cayla R. Morningstar, Matthew Neilson, Tabitha Petri, Ian A. Pfingsten, Robert Reed, Linda J. Walters, Christian Wanamaker
2023, Ecosphere (14)
Managing invasive species with prevention and early-detection strategies can avert severe ecological and economic impacts. Horizon scanning, an evidence-based process combining risk screening and consensus building to identify threats, has become a valuable tool for prioritizing invasive species management and prevention. We assembled a...
Examining the effect of environmental variability on the viability of endangered Steller sea lions using an integrated population model
Amanda J. Warlick, Devin S. Johnson, Katie L. Sweeney, Tom S. Gelatt, Sarah J. Converse
2023, Endangered Species Research (52) 343-361
Understanding spatio-temporal variability in demography and the influence of environmental conditions offers insight into the factors underlying population dynamics. This is particularly true for species with divergent demographic patterns across large geographic areas. The contrasting abundance trends observed across the range of Steller sea lions (Eumetopias jubatus) have been studied...
Assessment of prerestoration water quality in the Herring River to support adaptive management at the Cape Cod National Seashore
Thomas G. Huntington
2023, Scientific Investigations Report 2023-5120
In 2020 and 2021, the U.S. Geological Survey, Cape Cod National Seashore of the National Park Service, and Friends of Herring River cooperated to assess nutrient and suspended sediment concentrations across the ocean-estuary boundary at a dike on the Herring River on Chequessett Neck Road in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, that has...
Characterizing urban heat islands across 50 major cities in the United States
George Z. Xian
2023, Fact Sheet 2023-3048
Urban development and associated land-cover and land-use change alters the environment. The continued increase of developed land changes the Earth’s ecosystems and affects the resources provided to society. During the last 40 years, urban population in the United States has increased by more than 6.3 percent, and more...
Saproxylic beetles' morphological traits and higher trophic guilds indicate boreal forest naturalness
Ross Wetherbee, Tone Birkemoe, Ryan C. Burner, Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson
2023, Ecology and Evolution (13)
Forests contribute to numerous ecosystem functions and services and contain a large proportion of terrestrial biodiversity, but they are being negatively impaced by anthropogenic activities. Forests that have never been clear-cut and have old growth characteristics, termed “near-natural,” often harbor different and richer species...
Assessing the use of long-term lek survey data to evaluate the effect of landscape characteristics and wind facilities on sharp-tailed grouse lek dynamics in North Dakota and South Dakota
Jill A. Shaffer, Deborah A. Buhl, Wesley E. Newton
2023, Open-File Report 2023-1091
The contribution of renewable energy to meet worldwide demand continues to grow. In the United States, wind energy is one of the fastest growing renewable energy sectors. Throughout the Great Plains of the United States, wind facilities often are placed in open landscapes of high-elevation grasslands, and those same habitats...
Artisanal mining river dredge detection using SAR: A method comparison
Marissa Ann Alessi, Peter G. Chirico, Marco Millones
2023, Remote Sensing (15)
Challenges exist in monitoring artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) activities, given their dynamic and often informal nature. ASM takes form through various techniques and scales, including riverine dredging, which often targets the abundant alluvial gold deposits in South America. Remote sensing offers a solution to improve data collection, regulation, and...
Rapid Source Characterization of the 2023 Mw 6.8 Al Haouz, Morocco, Earthquake
William L. Yeck, Alexandra Elise Hatem, Dara Elyse Goldberg, William D. Barnhart, Jessica Ann Thompson Jobe, David R. Shelly, Antonio Villasenor, Harley Benz, Paul S. Earle
2023, The Seismological Record (3) 357-366
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) National Earthquake Information Center (NEIC) estimates source characteristics of significant damaging earthquakes, aiming to place events within their seismotectonic framework. Contextualizing the 8 September 2023, Mw 6.8 Al Haouz, Morocco, earthquake is challenging, because it occurred in an enigmatic region of active surface faulting,...
Bee species richness through time in an urbanizing landscape of the southeastern United State
Selina A. Ruzi, Elsa Youngsteadt, April Hamblin Cherveny, Jessica Kettenbach, Hannah K. Levenson, Danesha Seth Carley, Jaime A. Collazo, Rebecca E. Irwin
2023, Global Change Biology (30)
Compared to non-urban environments, cities host ecological communities with altered taxonomic diversity and functional trait composition. However, we know little about how these urban changes take shape over time. Using historical bee (Apoidea: Anthophila) museum specimens supplemented with online repositories and researcher collections, we investigated whether bee species richness tracked...
The Landscape Data Commons: A system for standardizing, accessing, and applying large environmental datasets for agroecosystem research and management
Sarah E. McCord, Nicholas P. Webb, Brandon T. Bestelmeyer, Kristopher Bonefont, Joseph R. Brehm, Joel R. Brown, Ericha M. Courtright, Christopher Dietrich, Michael C. Duniway, Brandon L. Edwards, Christopher Fraser, Jeffrey E. Herrick, Anna C. Knight, Loretta J Metz, Justin W. Van Zee, Craig E. Tweedie
2023, Agricultural & Environmental Letters (8)
Understanding where, when, and why agroecosystems are changing requires quality information about ecosystems that span land tenure, ecological processes, and spatial scales. Over the past two decades, land management agencies and research groups have adopted a suite of standardized methods for monitoring rangelands, which have been implemented...
FishPass sortable attribute database: Phenological, morphological, physiological, and behavioural characteristics related to passage and movement of Laurentian Great Lakes fishes
David M. Benoit, Daniel P. Zielinski, Reid G. Swanson, Robert L. McLaughlin, Theodore Castro-Santos, R. Andrew Goodwin, Thomas C. Pratt, Andrew M. Muir
2023, Journal of Great Lakes Research (49)
In-stream barriers pose threats to fishes, including habitat loss, constraints on migration, and reduced connectivity between populations. Despite many negative consequences, barriers can serve to protect native species by limiting the spread of invasive species. For example, in the Laurentian Great Lakes, physical barriers have long been used to control invasive sea...
Comprehensive assessment of macroinvertebrate community condition and sediment toxicity in the Eighteenmile Creek Area of Concern, New York, 2021
Scott D. George, Barry P. Baldigo, Scott M. Collins, David B. Clarke, Brian T. Duffy
2023, Journal of Great Lakes Research (49)
The degradation of benthic communities (benthos) is one of four remaining beneficial use impairments (BUIs) in the Eighteenmile Creek Area of Concern (AOC), located on the south shore of Lake Ontario in New York. The historical rationale for listing this BUI as impaired relied heavily on inferred or expected impact...
Reproducibility starts at the source: R, Python, and Julia Packages for retrieving USGS hydrologic data
Timothy O. Hodson, Laura A. DeCicco, Jayaram Athreya Hariharan, Lee Stanish, Scott Black, J. S. Horsburgh
2023, Water (15)
Much of modern science takes place in a computational environment, and, increasingly, that environment is programmed using R, Python, or Julia. Furthermore, most scientific data now live on the cloud, so the first step in many workflows is to query a cloud database and load the response into a...
Mapping high marsh and salt pannes/flats along the northern Gulf of Mexico coast
Nicholas Enwright, Wyatt Charles Cheney, Kristine O. Evans, Hana R. Thurman, Mark S. Woodrey, Auriel Fournier, Jena A. Moon, Heather E. Levy, James A. Cox, Peter J. Kappes, John A. Nyman, Jonathan L. Pitchford
2023, Geocarto International (38)
Coastal wetlands are predicted to undergo extensive transformation due to climate and land use change. Baseline maps of coastal wetlands can be used to help assess changes. Found in the upper portion of the estuarine zone, high marsh and salt pannes/flats provide ecosystem goods and services and are particularly important...
Satellite telemetry reveals space use of diamondback terrapins
Margaret Lamont, Melissa E. Price, Daniel J. Catizone
2023, Animal Biotelemetry (11)
Movement and space use information of exploited and imperiled coastal species is critical to management and conservation actions. While satellite telemetry has been successfully used to document movements of marine turtles, the large tag sizes available have limited use on smaller turtle species. We used small...
Understanding fatality patterns and sex ratios of Brazilian free-tailed bats (Tadarida brasiliensis) at wind energy facilities in western California and Texas
Sarah Licari, Amanda Hale, Sara Weaver, Sarah R. Fritts, Todd E. Katzner, David H. Nelson, Dean Williams
2023, PeerJ Life & Environment (11)
BackgroundOperation of wind turbines has resulted in collision fatalities for several bat species, and one proven method to reduce these fatalities is to limit wind turbine blade rotation (i.e., curtail turbines) when fatalities are expected to be highest. Implementation of curtailment can potentially be optimized by targeting times when...
Chromosome-level genome assembly of the blacktail brush lizard, Urosaurus nigricaudus, reveals dosage compensation in an endemic lizard
Elizabeth Davalos-Dehullu, Sarah M. Baty, Robert N. Fisher, Peter A. Scott, Greer A. Dolby, Adrian Munguia-Vega, Diego Cortez
2023, Genome Biology and Evolution (15)
Urosaurus nigricaudus is a phrynosomatid lizard endemic to the Baja California Peninsula in Mexico. This work presents a chromosome-level genome assembly and annotation from a male individual. We used PacBio long reads and HiRise scaffolding to generate a high-quality genomic assembly of 1.87 Gb distributed in 327 scaffolds, with an N50...
A review of natural and managed revegetation responses in two de-watered reservoirs after large dam removals on the Elwha River, Washington, USA
Joshua Chenoweth, Patrick B. Shafroth, Rebecca L. Brown, James M. Helfield, Jenise M. Bauman, Sara Cendejas-Zarelli, Chhaya M. Werner, Jarrett L. Schuster, Olivia A. Morgan
2023, Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution (11)
Large dam removals are increasing in frequency and the response of natural and managed revegetation is a critical consideration for managed restoration of dewatered reservoir landscapes post dam removal. The removal of two large dams on the Elwha River in 2011-2014 provides insight into reservoir revegetation. We review literature...
