Estimation of low-flow statistics at ungaged sites on streams in the Lower Hudson River Basin, New York, from data in geographic information systems
Allan D. Randall, Douglas A. Freehafer
2017, Scientific Investigations Report 2017-5019
A variety of watershed properties available in 2015 from geographic information systems were tested in regression equations to estimate two commonly used statistical indices of the low flow of streams, namely the lowest flows averaged over 7 consecutive days that have a 1 in 10 and a 1 in 2...
The National Map seamless digital elevation model specifications
Christy-Ann M. Archuleta, Eric W. Constance, Samantha T. Arundel, Amanda J. Lowe, Kimberly S. Mantey, Lori A. Phillips
2017, Techniques and Methods 11-B9
This specification documents the requirements and standards used to produce the seamless elevation layers for The National Map of the United States. Seamless elevation data are available for the conterminous United States, Hawaii, Alaska, and the U.S. territories, in three different resolutions—1/3-arc-second, 1-arc-second, and 2-arc-second. These specifications include requirements and...
Geomorphic response of the North Fork Stillaguamish River to the State Route 530 landslide near Oso, Washington
Scott W. Anderson, Mackenzie K. Keith, Christopher S. Magirl, J. Rose Wallick, Mark C. Mastin, James R. Foreman
2017, Scientific Investigations Report 2017-5055
On March 22, 2014, the State Route 530 Landslide near Oso, Washington mobilized 8 million cubic meters of unconsolidated Pleistocene material, creating a valley‑spanning deposit that fully impounded the North Fork Stillaguamish River. The river overtopped the 8-meter high debris impoundment within 25 hours and began steadily incising a new...
Field-trip guide to Mount St. Helens, Washington - An overview of the eruptive history and petrology, tephra deposits, 1980 pyroclastic density current deposits, and the crater
John S. Pallister, Michael A. Clynne, Heather M. Wright, Alexa R. Van Eaton, James W. Vallance, David R. Sherrod, B. Peter Kokelaar
2017, Scientific Investigations Report 2017-5022-D
This field trip will provide an introduction to several fascinating features of Mount St. Helens. The trip begins with a rigorous hike of about 15 km from the Johnston Ridge Observatory (9 km north-northeast of the crater vent), across the 1980 Pumice Plain, to Windy Ridge (3.6 km northeast of...
Interpreting surveys to estimate the size of the monarch butterfly population: Pitfalls and prospects
John M. Pleasants, Myron P. Zalucki, Karen S. Oberhauser, Lincoln P. Brower, Orley R. Taylor, Wayne E. Thogmartin
2017, PLoS ONE (12)
To assess the change in the size of the eastern North American monarch butterfly summer population, studies have used long-term data sets of counts of adult butterflies or eggs per milkweed stem. Despite the observed decline in the monarch population as measured at overwintering sites in Mexico, these studies found...
Restoring monarch butterfly habitat in the Midwestern US: 'All hands on deck'
Wayne E. Thogmartin, Laura Lopez-Hoffman, Jason J. Rohweder, James E. Diffendorfer, Ryan G. Drum, Darius J. Semmens, Scott Black, Iris Caldwell, Donita Cotter, Pauline Drobney, Laura L. Jackson, Michael Gale, Doug Helmers, Steven B. Hilburger, Elizabeth Howard, Karen S. Oberhauser, John M. Pleasants, Brice X. Semmens, Orley R. Taylor, Patrick Ward, Jake F. Weltzin, Ruscena Wiederholt
2017, Conservation Letters (12)
The eastern migratory population of monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus plexippus) has declined by >80% within the last two decades. One possible cause of this decline is the loss of ≥1.3 billion stems of milkweed (Asclepias spp.), which monarchs require for reproduction. In an effort to restore monarchs to a population goal...
Mechanisms associated with an advance in the timing of seasonal reproduction in an urban songbird
Adam M. Fudickar, Timothy J Greives, Mikas Abolins-Abols, Jonathan W. Atwell, Simone L. Meddle, Guillermo Friis, Craig A. Stricker, Ellen D. Ketterson
2017, Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution (5)
The colonization of urban environments by animals is often accompanied by earlier breeding and associated changes in seasonal schedules. Accelerated timing of seasonal reproduction in derived urban populations is a potential cause of evolutionary divergence from ancestral populations if differences in physiological processes that regulate reproductive timing become fixed over...
Efficacy and residual toxicity of a sodium hydroxide based ballast water treatment system for freshwater bulk freighters
Adria Elskus, Carys L. Mitchelmore, David Wright, Jeffrey W. Henquinet, Nicholas Welschmeyer, Colin Flynn, Barnaby J. Watten
2017, Journal of Great Lakes Research (43) 744-754
The efficacy and residual toxicity of a sodium hydroxide (NaOH) based ballast water treatment system (BWTS) were tested aboard the Great Lakes carrier M/V American Spiritin 1000 L mesocosms containing water from the ship's ballast tanks. NaOH was added to elevate the pH to 11.5 or 11.7 for 48 h, after which pH was reduced to < 9...
Identifying ecologically relevant scales of habitat selection: diel habitat selection in elk
Caleb P. Roberts, James W. Cain III, Robert D. Cox
2017, Ecosphere (8) 1-16
Although organisms make resource selection decisions at multiple spatiotemporal scales, not all scales are ecologically relevant to any given organism. Ecological patterns and rhythms such as behavioral and climatic patterns may provide a consistent method for identifying ecologically relevant scales of habitat selection. Using elk (Cervus canadensis) as an example...
New constraints on coseismic slip during southern Cascadia subduction zone earthquakes over the past 4600 years implied by tsunami deposits and marine turbidites
George R. Priest, Robert C. Witter, Yinglong J. Zhang, Chris Goldfinger, Kelin Wang, Jonathan C. Allan
2017, Natural Hazards (88) 285-313
Forecasting earthquake and tsunami hazards along the southern Cascadia subduction zone is complicated by uncertainties in the amount of megathrust fault slip during past ruptures. Here, we estimate slip on hypothetical ruptures of the southern part of the megathrust through comparisons of late Holocene Cascadia earthquake histories derived from tsunami...
Vegetation history since the last glacial maximum in the Ozark highlands (USA): A new record from Cupola Pond, Missouri
Rachel A. Jones, John W. Williams, Stephen T. Jackson
2017, Quaternary Science Reviews (170) 174-187
The timing and drivers of vegetation dynamics and formation of no-analog plant communities during the last deglaciation in the unglaciated southeastern US are poorly understood. We present a multi-proxy record spanning the past 19,800 years from Cupola Pond in the Ozarks Mountains, consisting of replicate high-resolution pollen records, 25 AMS...
Mapping tree density in forests of the southwestern USA using Landsat 8 data
Kamal Humagain, Carlos Portillo-Quintero, Robert D. Cox, James W. Cain III
2017, Forests (8) 1-15
The increase of tree density in forests of the American Southwest promotes extreme fire events, understory biodiversity losses, and degraded habitat conditions for many wildlife species. To ameliorate these changes, managers and scientists have begun planning treatments aimed at reducing fuels and increasing understory biodiversity. However, spatial variability in tree...
A multi-species synthesis of physiological mechanisms in drought-induced tree mortality
Henry D. Adams, Melanie Zeppel, William R.L. Anderegg, Henrik Hartmann, Simon M. Landhausser, David T. Tissue, Travis E. Huxman, Patrick J. Hudson, Trenton E. Franz, Craig D. Allen, Leander D. L. Anderegg, Greg A. Barron-Gafford, David Beerling, David D. Breshears, Timothy J. Brodribb, Harald Bugmann, Richard C. Cobb, Adam D. Collins, L. Turin Dickman, Honglang Duan, Brent E. Ewers, Lucia Galiano, David A. Galvez, Nuria Garcia-Forner, Monica L. Gaylord, Matthew J. Germino, Arthur Gessler, Uwe G. Hacke, Rodrigo Hakamada, Andy Hector, Michael W. Jenkins, Jeffrey M. Kane, Thomas E. Kolb, Darin J. Law, James D. Lewis, Jean-Marc Limousin, David Love, Alison K. Macalady, Jordi Martínez-Vilalta, Maurizio Mencuccini, Patrick J. Mitchell, Jordan D. Muss, Michael J. O’Brien, Anthony P. O’Grady, Robert E. Pangle, Elizabeth A. Pinkard, Frida I. Piper, Jennifer Plaut, William T. Pockman, Joe Quirk, Keith Reinhardt, Francesco Ripullone, Michael G. Ryan, Anna Sala, Sanna Sevanto, John S. Sperry, Rodrigo Vargas, Michel Vennetier, Danielle A. Way, Chonggang Wu, Enrico A. Yepez, Nate G. McDowell
2017, Nature Ecology & Evolution (1) 1285-1291
Widespread tree mortality associated with drought has been observed on all forested continents and global change is expected to exacerbate vegetation vulnerability. Forest mortality has implications for future biosphere–atmosphere interactions of carbon, water and energy balance, and is poorly represented in dynamic vegetation models. Reducing uncertainty requires improved mortality projections...
Geographic variation in winter adaptations of snowshoe hares (Lepus americanus)
Laura C. Gigliotti, Duane R. Diefenbach, M.J. Sheriff
2017, Canadian Journal of Zoology (95) 539-545
Understanding adaptations of nonhibernating northern endotherms to cope with extreme cold is important because climate-induced changes in winter temperatures and snow cover are predicted to impact these species the most. We compared winter pelage characteristics and heat production of snowshoe hares (Lepus americanus Erxleben, 1777) on the southern edge of their...
How hunter perceptions of wildlife regulations, agency trust, and satisfaction affect attitudes about duck bag limits
Susan A. Schroeder, David C. Fulton, Jeffrey S. Lawrence, Steven D. Cordts
2017, Human Dimensions of Wildlife (22) 454-475
This study explored how factors, including the function of bag limits, agency trust, satisfaction, hunting participation, and demographics, related to opinions about duck bag limits. The results are from a survey of 2014 Minnesota resident waterfowl hunters. Analyses identified four dimensions of attitudes about functions of bag limits, including that...
Can personality predict individual differences in brook trout spatial learning ability?
S.L. White, Tyler Wagner, C. Gowan, V.A. Braithwaite
2017, Behavioural Processes (141) 220-228
While differences in individual personality are common in animal populations, understanding the ecological significance of variation has not yet been resolved. Evidence suggests that personality may influence learning and memory; a finding that could improve our understanding of the evolutionary processes that produce and maintain intraspecific behavioural heterogeneity. Here, we...
Response to comment on “Primary sources and toxicity of PAHs in Milwaukee-area streambed sediments”—The authors' reply
Austin K. Baldwin, Steven R. Corsi, Michelle A. Lutz, Christopher G. Ingersoll, Rebecca A. Dorman, Christopher Magruder, Matthew Magruder
2017, Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (36) 1981-1983
No abstract available....
Celebrating ten years of collaboration
W. Matthew Cushing
2017, GEOSUR Newsletter (4) 4-5
Since the GEOSUR Program launched in 2007, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center has had the honor of collaborating with CAF, PAIGH, and others supporting the Latin America GEOSUR Program. The catalyst for starting the program was the convergence of regional geospatial activities USGS,...
Future research needs involving pathogens in groundwater
Scott A. Bradford, Ronald W. Harvey
2017, Hydrogeology Journal (25) 931-938
Contamination of groundwater by enteric pathogens has commonly been associated with disease outbreaks. Proper management and treatment of pathogen sources are important prerequisites for preventing groundwater contamination. However, non-point sources of pathogen contamination are frequently difficult to identify, and existing approaches for pathogen detection are costly and only provide semi-quantitative...
Lichens and microfungi in biocrusts: Structure and function now and in the future
Jayne Belnap, Otto L. Lange
J. Dighton, James F. White, editor(s)
2017, Book chapter, The fungal community
Biological soil crusts (biocrusts) are formed by soil-surface communities of biota that live within, or immediately on top of, the uppermost millimeters of soil. They consist of cyanobacteria, algae, mosses, microfungi, and lichenized fungi (hereafter, lichens). Cyanobacterial and microfungal filaments, rhizinae and rhizomorphs of lichens, and rhizinae and protonemata of...
Relative sampling efficiency and movements of subadult Lake Sturgeon in the Lower Wolf River, Wisconsin
Zachary R. Snobl, Daniel A. Isermann, Ryan P. Koenigs, Joshua K. Raabe
2017, Transactions of the American Fisheries Society (146) 1070-1080
Understanding sampling efficiency and movements of subadult Lake Sturgeon Acipenser fulvescens is necessary to facilitate population rehabilitation and recruitment monitoring in large systems with extensive riverine and lacustrine habitats. We used a variety of sampling methods to capture subadult Lake Sturgeon (i.e., fish between 75 and 130 cm TL that had not...
Variation and plasticity and their interaction with urbanization in Guadalupe Bass populations on and off the Edwards Plateau
Jessica E. Pease, Timothy B. Grabowski, Allison A. Pease
2017, Report
The Colorado River Basin in Texas has experienced major alterations to its hydrologic regime due to changing land and water use patterns. These anthropogenic influences on hydrologic variability have had major implications for riparian and aquatic ecosystems and the species dependent upon them. However, impacts are often assessed at a...
A validation of 11 body-condition indices in a giant snake species that exhibits positive allometry
Bryan Falk, Ray W. Snow, Robert N. Reed
2017, PLoS ONE (12) 1-20
Body condition is a gauge of the energy stores of an animal, and though it has important implications for fitness, survival, competition, and disease, it is difficult to measure directly. Instead, body condition is frequently estimated as a body condition index (BCI) using length and mass measurements. A desirable BCI...
Spatial and temporal variability in benthic invertebrate assemblages in Upper Klamath Lake, Oregon
Natalie J. Stauffer-Olsen, James L. Carter, Steven V. Fend
2017, Northwest Science (91) 257-271
Upper Klamath Lake (UKL) in southern Oregon has experienced declines in water quality due to excessive nutrient loading. This has led to annual cyanobacterial blooms, primarily of Aphanizomenon flos-aquae (AFA). Benthic invertebrates are important food resources for benthic feeding fishes; however, they can increase autochthonous nutrient cycling in lakes and as a...
Potential impacts of sea level rise on native plant communities and associated cultural sites in coastal areas of the main Hawaiian Islands
James D. Jacobi, Frederick R. Warshauer
2017, Report
Hawaiian coastal vegetation is comprised of plant species that are adapted to growing in extremely harsh conditions (salt spray, wave wash, wind, and substrates with limited nutrients) found in this habitat zone. Prior to human colonization of Hawai‘i coastal vegetation extended as a continuous ring around each of the islands,...
