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Search indexed USGS publications on groundwater, aquifers, geologic maps, mineral resources and earthquakes. Explore source records by subject and place.

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At least 1,387 records · Page 77Linked to original sources
USGS2005

The U.S. Geological Survey's Amphibian Research and Monitoring Initiative

The Amphibian Research and Monitoring Initiative (ARMI) began in 2000 as an attempt by the United States Geological Survey to determine the status and trends of amphibians on federal lands in the United States and its territories. ARMI research focuses on determining causes of declines, if observed, developing new techniques to sample populations and analyze data, and disseminating information to scientists and policy makers. Monitoring is conducted at multiple scales, with an emphasis on an ability to draw conclusions about status in well-defined study areas such as national parks and wildlife refuges.

Alytes↗
USGS1991

User's guide to the wetland creation/restoration data base, version 2

Wetland creation or restoration projects are frequently proposed as mitigation for unavoidable wetland losses, as components of wetland enhancement programs, and as tools to accomplish specific objectives such as waterfowl production or flood control. There is considerable controversy concerning the effectiveness of such projects as well as the most appropriate and efficient techniques to employ. The importance of the resource and the long time scales involved in fully evaluating a creation or restoration effort make it imperative to consider existing information as fully as possible in the development and evaluation of wetland creation or restoration proposals. To aid in the evaluation of wetland/creation efforts, the U.s. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), National Ecology Research Center, has developed the Wetland Creation/Restoration (WCR) Data Base. The data base is a highly indexed or keyworded bibliography of wetland creation or restoration articles. ("Articles" refers to any type of publication that deals specifically with wetland creation/restoration projects or studies.) The scope of the articles is international, although most of them are concerned with projects conducted in the United States. Information coded for each article includes author; citation; type of wetland and its location in terms of state, ecoregion, and FWS region; type of study undertaken; objectives in creating or restoring the wetland; actions performed to realize those objectives; length of time encompassed by the study; evaluation of results and responses to the wetland creation/restoration actions; and a listing of plant species significant to the project. A brief annotation summarizes the article and includes any significant additional information that may not be adequately reflected in the above described fields. Many of these articles describe only one or two components of a total wetland restoration effort. Planning a project that is designed to restore a wetland system (including at least some of its functions) is similar to constructing a picture from a number of puzzle pieces--missing pieces represent data gaps or information that is not available. Articles range from specific case studies, to overviews of restoration methods and techniques, to planning restoration projects and assessing programmatic and administrative backgrounds and interactions. In this data base, the term "restoration" is applied loosely to include rehabilitation of wetlands. It may refer to a number of situations or actions including, but not limited to: 1. breaching dikes or plugging drains; 2. water pollution clean-up; 3. conversion of eutrophic conditions; 4. wastewater treatment; 5. recolonization of previously disturbed or denuded areas; 6. amelioration of adverse conditions (erosion, wave, or wind action); 7. soil treatment --mulching, fertilization; 8. rerouting streams --may include construction of meander patterns; 9. monitoring natural vegetation; or 0. excluding grazers (geese, cattle) and monitoring results. This report describes the format and content of Version 2 of the WCR data base. Version 2 differs from the previous version described in SchnellerMcDonald et al. (1988): several fields have been dropped and condensed and new records have been added. Version 2 includes all records distributed with the earlier version and its updates. We recommend you replace any previous version with Version 2.

Book↗
USGS1994

Ecological perspective: Linking ecology, GIS, and remote sensing to ecosystem management

Awareness of significant human impacts on the ecology of Earth's landscapes is not new (Thomas 1956). Over the past decade (Forman and Godron 1986, Urban et a1. 1987) applications of geographic information systems (GIS) and remote sensing technologies have supported a rapid rise in landscape.stale research. The heightened recognition within the research community of the ecological linkages between local sites and larger spatial scales has spawned increasing calls for more holistic management of landscapes (Noss 1983, Harris 1984, Risser 1985, Norse et al. 1986, Agee and Johnson 1988, Franklin 1989, Brooks and Grant 1992, Endangered Species Update-Special Issue 1993, Crow 1994, Grumbine 1994). As a result agencies such as the U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and National Park Service are now converging on "ecosystem management" as a new paradigm to sustainably manage wildlands and maintain biodiversity. However, as this transition occurs, several impediments to implementation of this new paradigm persist, including (1) significant uncenainty among many land managers about the definition and goals of ecosystem management, (2) inadequate ecological information on the past and present processes and structural conditions of target ecosystems, (3) insufficient experience on the part of land managers with the rapidly diversifying array of GIS and remote sensing tools to effectively use them to support ecology-based land management, and (4) a paucity of intimate, long-term relationships between people (including land managers) and the particular landscape communities to which they belong. This chapter provides an ecological perspective on these issues as applied to ecosystem management in a southwestern U.S. landscape.

Book chapter↗
USGS1977

Coal: special report number 2

The Fish and Wildlife Service has extensive biological expertise within the Department of Interior and exerts national leadership in the management and protection of the nation's fish and wildlife resources, their habitat, and environment. Specifically, the Office of Biological Services obtains and assimilates biological and environmental data and identifies additional informational needs and means to provide environmental and biological input into major natural resource decisions. Coal Coordinators assist in carrying out Fish and Wildlife Service involvement in the Interior Department Coal Leasing Program through a multi-stage process designed to assemble existing fish and wildlife inventory data and to prioritize fish and wildlife values in areas subject to coal leasing and associated development. This report is designed to identify possible areas of concern for wildlife and its habitat in Wyoming in the development of coal and the associate implication of land use changes. This report summarizes past and present development of the coal resource in Wyoming in anticipation of future identification of data needs for making sound resource decisions in the development of coal.

FWS/OBS↗
USGS2018

Status of selenium in south San Francisco Bay—A basis for modeling potential guidelines to meet National tissue criteria for fish and a proposed wildlife criterion for birds

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed Aquatic Life and AquaticDependent Wildlife Criteria for Selenium (Se) in California’s San Francisco Bay and Delta (Bay-Delta) in June 2016. Here we apply the same modeling methodology—Ecosystem-Scale Selenium Modeling— to an assessment of conditions and documentation of food webs of south San Francisco Bay (South Bay) as an exploratory framework in support of site-specific Se criteria development. Long-term datasets contribute to the basis for modeling, especially the 21-year collection of the clam Macoma petalum from a mudflat at the lower end of South Bay (Lower South Bay). As such, this is a working document that may serve as a basis to establish an understanding of the specifics of Se biodynamics within the estuary and reduce uncertainties about how to protect it. This approach brings together the main factors involved in toxicity: likelihood of high exposure, inherent species sensitivity, and the behavioral ecology (for example, demographics and life history) of an organism in terms of susceptibility to a reproductive toxicant. Species sensitivity is represented here by use of the EPA’s current national tissue Se criterion for fish or that proposed to protect the eggs of aquatic birds for the Bay-Delta (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2016a, 2016b, 2016c). This report also strives to bring together findings and field data across a body of literature for South Bay to provide an integrative assessment. We find an assemblage of site-specific conditions that could affect modeling: associated urban processes such as discharges from municipal wastewater treatment plants and drainage from mercury (Hg) mining and limestone extraction are sources of Se that characterize the Lower South Bay as the location of interest for Se exposure; • hydrodynamics are lagoon-like (that is, less flushing), which sustains elevated nutrients and phytoplankton blooms; • managed freshwater sources are a major hydrodynamic component; • birds, in addition to fish, are prominent predators in South Bay; • wetland restoration has recently intervened to play a significant role in ecosystem function that may include uptake of both Hg and Se; • the dietary food web of surficial-sediment to M. petalum is important because of the dominance of this clam species and its elevated Se bioaccumulation potential compared to other local food webs; and 2 • maximal Se concentrations may be limited by transitory or annually renewed food webs (for example, migratory shorebirds and decimation of clams from marshes). We also find that the constructed mechanistic model: • spatially connects to the Palo Alto mudflat site because of data availability; • accurately predicts average observed Se concentrations in M. petalum and in predator species of fish and birds; and • is able to bracket a range of potential protective water-column Se concentrations specific to predator species based on the EPA’s national Se criterion for whole-body fish tissue and a proposed site-specific criterion for bird eggs in the Bay-Delta.

California↗
USGS2016

Mountain goat abundance and population trends in the Olympic Mountains, northwestern Washington, 2016

Executive Summary We estimated abundance and trends of non-native mountain goats ( Oreamnos americanus ) in the Olympic Mountains of northwestern Washington, based on aerial surveys conducted during July 13–24, 2016. The surveys produced the seventh population estimate since the first formal aerial surveys were conducted in 1983. This was the second population estimate since we adjusted survey area boundaries and adopted new estimation procedures in 2011. Before 2011, surveys encompassed all areas free of glacial ice at elevations above 1,520 meters (m), but in 2011 we expanded survey unit boundaries to include suitable mountain goat habitats at elevations between 1,425 and 1,520 m. In 2011, we also began applying a sightability correction model allowing us to estimate undercounting bias associated with aerial surveys and to adjust survey results accordingly. The 2016 surveys were carried out by National Park Service (NPS) personnel in Olympic National Park and by Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) biologists in Olympic National Forest and in the southeastern part of Olympic National Park. We surveyed a total of 59 survey units, comprising 55 percent of the 60,218-hectare survey area. We estimated a mountain goat population of 623 ±43 (standard error, SE). Based on this level of estimation uncertainty, the 95-percent confidence interval ranged from 561 to 741 mountain goats at the time of the survey. We examined the rate of increase of the mountain goat population by comparing the current population estimate to previous estimates from 2004 and 2011. Because aerial survey boundaries changed between 2004 and 2016, we recomputed population estimates for 2011 and 2016 surveys based on the revised survey boundaries as well as the previously defined boundaries so that estimates were directly comparable across years. Additionally, because the Mount Washington survey unit was not surveyed in 2011, we used results from an independent survey of the Mount Washington unit conducted by WDFW biologists in 2012 and combined it with the 2011 survey results to produce a complete survey conducted over 2 years. The revised estimates of mountain goat abundance occurring at elevations above 1,520 m were 230 ±19 (SE) in 2004, 350 ±41 (SE) in 2011, and 584 ±39 (SE) in 2016. The difference between the overall 2016 population estimate (623 ±43 [SE]) and the smaller estimate (584 ±39 [SE]) reflected the number of mountain goats counted in the expanded survey areas added in 2011. Based on comparisons within the standardized survey boundary, the mountain goat population in the Olympic Mountains increased at an average finite rate of 6 percent annually from 2004 to 2011, 11 percent annually from 2011 to 2016, and 8 percent annually over the combined period. We caution that the population may have been underestimated in 2011 because of record heavy snows persisting into the survey season. Therefore, the rate of population increase from 2011 and 2016 may be overestimated. The rate of increase measured over the combined period (2004–16) may be more representative of the recent population growth. We conclude that the abundance of mountain goats has increased for more than a decade, and if the recent average rate of population growth were sustained, the population would increase by 45 percent over the next 5 years.

Washington↗
USGS2004

Economic analysis of alternative bison and elk management practices on the National Elk Refuge and Grand Teton National Park: A comparison of visitor and household responses

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the National Park Service (NPS) are preparing a management plan for bison and elk inhabiting the National Elk Refuge (NER) and Grand Teton National Park (GTNP). These animals are part of the bison and elk herds in Jackson Hole, one of the largest concentrations of freeranging bison and elk in the world. A range of alternatives for managing the bison and elk herds in the project area will be developed in an Environmental Impact Statement. The EIS will likely include such issues as habitat management, disease management, winter-feeding and hunting programs related to the NER and GTNP. The purposes of this study are to determine how the current management and EIS alternatives for bison and elk inhabiting the NER and GTNP would change: Visitor use Total visitor expenditures in the local and regional economy Local area employment and income in the local and regional economy Visitor net economic benefits Acceptability of individual elk and bison management practices to visitors and household living in Teton County, rest of Wyoming, and rest of the United States. Assessing public attitudes and economic effects for different EIS alternatives can provide managers with valuable information regarding the advantages and disadvantages of these alternatives. Economic issues such as local job and income effects are often raised by interest groups opposed to changes in current agency management actions. Having objective data on what the job and income impacts are can help to defuse that issue. Survey data on visitor and public preferences is also useful to supplement the traditional public involvement process conducted as part of the EIS process. This is because the survey reaches visitors and a broad geographic array of residents who may not typically participate in the traditional EIS public involvement process. That is, the survey reflects the effort of the EIS planning team reaching out to the public, rather than requiring the public to come to the EIS meeting locations. Attendance at public meetings is often inconvenient for occasional visitors to the NER and GTNP who frequently live long distances from the relevant FWS and NPS offices. It is also inconvenient for residents of states outside the state where the resource is located.

Wyoming↗
USGS2005

Analyzing stakeholder preferences for managing elk and bison at the National Elk Refuge and Grand Teton National Park: An example of the disparate stakeholder management approach

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the National Park Service (NPS) are preparing a management plan for bison and elk inhabiting the National Elk Refuge (NER) and Grand Teton National Park (GTNP) near Jackson Hole, Wyoming. A management plan is needed to evaluate current and possible changes to habitat management, disease management, winter feeding and hunting programs related to the NER and GTNP. In order to make good decisions, managers need to incorporate the opinions and values of the involved stakeholders as well as understand the complex institutional constraints and opportunities that influence the decision making process. Federal, state, local, private and public stakeholders have diverse values and preferences about how to use and manage resources, and underlying institutional factors give certain stakeholders more influence over the outcome. How stakeholders use their influence can greatly affect the time, effort and costs of the decision making process. The overall result will depend both on the stakeholder’s relative power and level of conviction for their preferences. Many programs and tools have been developed by different disciplines to facilitate group negotiation and decision making. Three examples are relevant here. First, decision analysis models such as the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) are commonly used to prioritize the goals and objectives of stakeholders’ preferences for resource planning by formally structuring conflicts and assisting decision makers in developing a compromised solution (Forman, 1998). Second, institutional models such as the Legal Institutional Analysis Model (LIAM) have been used to describe the organizational rules of behavior and the institutional boundaries constraining management decisions (Lamb and others, 1998). Finally, public choice models have been used to predict the potential success of rent-seeking activity (spending additional time and money to exert political pressure) to change the political rules (Becker, 1983). While these tools have been successful at addressing various pieces of the natural resource decision making process, their use in isolation is not enough to fully depict the complexities of the physical and biological systems with the rules and constraints of the underlying economic and political systems. An approach is needed that combines natural sciences, economics, and politics.

Wyoming↗
USGS2018

Ecosystems science: Genes to landscapes

Bountiful fisheries, healthy and resilient wildlife, flourishing forests and vibrant grasslands are coveted resources that benefit all Americans. U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) science supports the conservation and management of the Nation’s fish and wildlife, and the landscapes they inhabit. Our biological resources—ecosystems and the wild things that live in them—are the foundation of our conservation heritage and an economic asset to current and future generations of Americans. The USGS Ecosystems Mission Area, the biological research arm of the Department of the Interior (DOI), provides science to help America achieve sustainable management and conservation of its biological resources. This work is done within the broader mission of the USGS—to serve the Nation with science that advances understanding of our natural resources, informs land and water stewardship, and helps safeguard communities from natural and environmental hazards. The Ecosystems Mission Area provides research, technical assistance, and education conducted by Cooperative Research Units and Science Centers located in nearly every State. The quality of life and economic strength in America hinges on healthy ecosystems that support living things and natural processes. Ecosystem science better enables society to understand how and why ecosystems change and to guide actions that can prevent damage to, and restore and sustain ecosystems. It is through this knowledge that informed decisions are made about natural resources that can enhance our Nation’s economic and environmental well-being.

Fact Sheet↗
USGS2014

The 3D Elevation Program: summary for Oklahoma

Elevation data are essential to a broad range of applications, including forest resources management, wildlife and habitat management, national security, recreation, and many others. For the State of Oklahoma, elevation data are critical for flood risk management, infrastructure and construction management, agriculture and precision farming, natural resources conservation, wildlife and habitat management, and other business uses. Today, high-density light detection and ranging (lidar) data are the primary sources for deriving elevation models and other datasets. Federal, State, Tribal, and local agencies work in partnership to (1) replace data that are older and of lower quality and (2) provide coverage where publicly accessible data do not exist. A joint goal of local, State, and Federal partners is to acquire consistent, statewide coverage to support existing and emerging applications enabled by lidar data. The National Enhanced Elevation Assessment (NEEA; Dewberry, 2011) evaluated multiple elevation data acquisition options to determine the optimal data quality and data replacement cycle relative to cost to meet the identified requirements of the user community. The evaluation demonstrated that lidar acquisition at quality level 2 for the conterminous United States and quality level 5 interferometric synthetic aperture radar (ifsar) data for Alaska with a 6- to 10-year acquisition cycle provided the highest benefit/cost ratios. The 3D Elevation Program (3DEP) initiative selected an 8-year acquisition cycle for the respective quality levels. 3DEP, managed by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the Office of Management and Budget Circular A–16 lead agency for terrestrial elevation data, responds to the growing need for high-quality topographic data and a wide range of other 3D representations of the Nation’s natural and constructed features.

Oklahoma↗
USGS2008

Total mercury, methylmercury, methylmercury production potential, and ancillary streambed-sediment and pore-water data for selected streams in Oregon, Wisconsin, and Florida, 2003-04

Mercury contamination of aquatic ecosystems is an issue of national concern, affecting both wildlife and human health. Detailed information on mercury cycling and food-web bioaccumulation in stream settings and the factors that control these processes is currently limited. In response, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) National Water-Quality Assessment Program (NAWQA) conducted detailed studies from 2002 to 2006 on various media to enhance process-level understanding of mercury contamination, biogeochemical cycling, and trophic transfer. Eight streams were sampled for this study: two streams in Oregon, and three streams each in Wisconsin and Florida. Streambed-sediment and pore-water samples were collected between February 2003 and September 2004. This report summarizes the suite of geochemical and microbial constituents measured, the analytical methods used, and provides the raw data in electronic form for both bed-sediment and pore-water media associated with this study.

Oregon, Wisconsin, Florida↗
USGS1971

Monitoring pesticides in wildlife

Early in the development of the wildlife monitoring program, certain criteria were recognized as being important in the selection of species of wild animals suitable for pesticide monitoring purposes. Ideally, the forms selected should be geographically well distributed, and they should be reasonably abundant and readily available for sampling. In addition, animals occurring near the top of food chains have the capacity to reflect residues in organisms occurring at lower levels in the same food chains. Based on these criteria, species chosen for monitoring include the starling (Sturnus vulgaris), mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) and black ducks (Anas rubripes), and the bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus). The black duck is substituted for the mallard in States where suitable numbers of mallards cannot be obtained. The Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife is held responsible for the execution of the wildlife portion of the National Pesticide Monitoring Program. The primary objective is to ascertain on a nationwide basis and independent of specific treatments the levels and trends of certain pesticidal chemicals and other pollutants in the bodies of selected forms of wildlife. The program was first described by Johnson et al. (4) in 1967. The purpose of this report is to update and redescribe the wildlife monitoring program and briefly review accomplishments.

Pesticides Monitoring Journal↗
USGS2012

Radar analysis of fall bird migration stopover sites in the Northeastern U.S.

The national network of weather surveillance radars (WSR-88D/NEXRAD) detects birds in flight, and has proven to be a useful remote-sensing tool for ornithological study. We used data collected during Fall 2008 and 2009 by 16 WSR-88D and 3 terminal Doppler weather radars in the northeastern U.S. (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Region 5) to study the spatial distribution of landbirds shortly after they leave daytime stopover sites to embark on nocturnal migratory flights. The aerial density of birds, as estimated by radar reflectivity, was georeferenced to the approximate locations on the ground from which birds emerged. We classified bird stopover use by the magnitude and variation of radar reflectivity across nights; areas were considered ‘important’ stopover sites from a conservation perspective if relative bird density was consistently or occasionally high. These results were used to develop models to predict potentially important stopover sites in portions of the region not sampled by the radars, based on land cover, ground elevation, and geographic location. Locally important stopover sites generally were associated with deciduous forests embedded within landscapes dominated by developed or agricultural lands, or near the shores of major water bodies. Large areas of regionally important stopover sites were located along the coastlines of Long Island Sound, throughout the Delmarva Peninsula, in areas surrounding Baltimore and Washington, along the western edge of the Adirondack Mountains, and within the Appalachian Mountains of southwestern Virginia and West Virginia. Important stopover sites, both within and outside radar-sampled areas and on 34 national wildlife refuges sampled by the radars, were mapped in a Geographic Information System, providing base maps for conservation uses and a sampling frame for field surveys to ‘ground truth’ the radar and analytical results. Our analysis indicates that preserving patches of natural habitat, particularly deciduous forests, in developed or agricultural landscapes and along major coastlines should be a priority for conservation plans addressing the stopover requirements of migratory landbirds.

Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachuse↗