Publications

Usually when people hear about a “bug problem” it’s due to an undesirable overabundance of insects (think plague of locusts). In the Colorado River in Grand Canyon, however, we are faced with the opposite predicament: the river is essentially devoid of bugs. Aquatic insects are a fundamental component of a healthy river ecosystem. Most aquatic insects spend their juvenile life stages (egg, larva,

Diamondback terrapins (Malaclemys terrapin) are distributed along the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico (GoM) coasts of the U.S.A. (Hart et al. 2014. Conserv. Genet. DOI 10.1007/s10592-014-0563-6). Under consideration for listing in Florida and proposed for Appendix II listing by the U.S. at CoP16 (CITES), terrapin populations are declining in many parts of their range due to drowning in crab pots, road

The imperative for finding, cataloging, and understanding continental margin diversity derives from the many key functions, goods and services provided by margin ecosystems and by an increasingly deleterious human footprint on our continental slopes (Levin and Dayton 2009). Progress in seafloor mapping technology and direct observation has revealed unexpected heterogeneity, with a mosaic of habita

Abstract not supplied at this time

Abundance estimates facilitate successful fisheries management. Fisheries agencies often monitor abundance through fishery independent standardized protocols generating relative measures such as catch-per-unit-effort (CPUE), where CPUE is assumed proportional to true abundance. Unfortunately, this assumption is rarely met as fish behavior and environmental conditions influence catchability and sam

Accurate and timely data regarding freshwater fish communities is important for informed decision-making by local, state, tribal, and federal land and resource managers; however, conducting traditional gear-based fish surveys can be an expensive and time-consuming process, particularly in remote areas, like those that characterize much of Alaska. To help address this challenge, we developed and te

Variability among climate change scenarios produces great uncertainty in what is the best allocation of resources among investments to protect environmental goods in the future. Previous research shows Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT) can help optimize environmental investment targeting to reduce outcome risk with minimal loss of expected level of environmental benefits, but no work has yet identifie

For federally listed species such as Least Tern Sternula antillarum and Piping Plover Charadrius melodus, correct determination of nest fates and causes of nest failure is crucial for understanding population dynamics and improving monitoring programmes. We used video cameras to evaluate nest fate misclassification rate and to identify factors that may cause researchers monitoring nests at differe

The use of hydroacoustic techniques is increasing as scientists search for less invasive ways to monitor fish populations, and using recreational side‐scan sonar (SSS) imagery for monitoring has become more common in aquatic resource management over the last 15 years due in part to its low cost and user‐friendly interface. The time‐consuming nature of manually counting fish targets has limited the

This Monitoring and Response Plan provides the Asian Carp Regional Coordinating Committee (ACRCC) with updates on FWS and USGS modeling efforts for the Spatially Explicit Asian carp Population (SEAcarP) model. For FY2020, efforts are underway to parameterize and analyze the SEAcarP model. Themes: invasive species; Asian carp; Great Lakes.

Asian carp monitoring and contract removal will continue throughout the Upper Illinois Waterway system as needed for adaptive management to mitigate, control, and contain Asian carp. Compiling data from monitoring and removal efforts into a centralized database (Illinois River Catch Database application) facilitates data standardization, quality, accessibility, sharing, and analysis to aid in Asia

Environmental breakdown of plastics produces synthetic microfibers, a class of microplastics that are most prevalent in surface waters. A main source of these pollutants is wastewater treatment plants which discharge into surface waters, including those that flow into Lake Michigan. Microplastics can settle into aquatic sediment or exist for lengths of time in the swash zone of the lakes; they can