Publications

This study employed ground and remote sensing methods to monitor the effects of grazing on leaf area index (LAI), fractional cover (fc) and evapotranspiration (ET) of a desert phreatophyte community over an 11 year period at a former uranium mill site on the Colorado Plateau, U.S. Nitrate, ammonium and sulfate are migrating away from the mill site in a shallow alluvial aquifer. The phreatophyte co

No abstract available.

How plant populations, communities, and ecosystems respond to climate change is a critical focus in ecology today. The responses of introduced species may be especially rapid. Current models that incorporate temperature and precipitation suggest that future Bromus tectorum invasion risk is low for the Colorado Plateau. With a field warming experiment at two sites in southeastern Utah, we tested th

Biological soil crusts (biocrusts) are common to drylands worldwide. We employed replicated, spatially nested sampling and 16S rRNA gene sequencing to describe the soil microbial communities in three soils derived from different parent material (sandstone, shale, and gypsum). For each soil type, two depths (biocrusts, 0–1 cm; below-crust soils, 2–5 cm) and two horizontal spatial scales (15 cm and

Water releases from Glen Canyon Dam, Arizona, are the primary determinant of streamflow, sediment transport, water quality, and aquatic and riparian habitat availability in the Colorado River downstream of the dam in Grand Canyon. The presence and operation of the dam have transformed the seasonally warm Colorado River into a consistently cold river because of hypolimnetic, or deep-water, releases

Theoretical models predict that drylands can cross critical thresholds, but experimental manipulations to evaluate them are non-existent. We used a long-term (13-year) pulse-perturbation experiment featuring heavy grazing and shrub removal to determine if critical thresholds and their determinants can be demonstrated in Chihuahuan Desert grasslands. We asked if cover values or patch-size metrics c

Eradication of populations of nonnative aquatic species for the purpose of reintroducing native fish is often difficult because very few effective tools are available for removing aquatic organisms. This creates the need to evaluate new chemicals that could be used as management tools for native fish conservation. Ammonia is a natural product of fish metabolism and is naturally present in the envi

Identifying areas of scientific uncertainty is a critical step in the adaptive management process (Walters, 1986; Runge, Converse, and Lyons, 2011). To identify key areas of scientific uncertainty regarding biologic resources of importance to the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Program, the Grand Canyon Monitoring and Research Center (GCMRC) convened Knowledge Assessment Workshops in May and J

In 2012, 2,045 observers contributed 1,592 sites to the NPDb, encompassing all 50 states, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico.  At the close of 2012 the NPDb contained a total of over 1.6 million phenophase status records.  More than half of these records were submitted in 2012.  Observers submitted records on 547 species in 2012, including 371 plant species (comprised of 5,584 individual pla

Construction and operation of Glen Canyon Dam has dramatically impacted the flow of the Colorado River through Glen, Marble, and Grand Canyons. Extremes in both streamflow and water temperature have been suppressed by controlled releases from the dam. Trapping of sediment in Lake Powell, the reservoir formed by Glen Canyon Dam, has also dramatically reduced the supply of suspended sediment enterin

Nitrogen (N) deposition in the western U.S. is on the rise and is already dramatically affecting terrestrial ecosystems. For example, N deposition has repeatedly been shown to lower air and water quality, increase greenhouse gas emissions, alter plant community composition, and significantly modify fire regimes. Accordingly, the effects of N deposition represent one of our largest environmental ch

The riparian corridor in the delta of the Colorado River in Mexico supports internationally important bird habitat. The vegetation is maintained by surface flows from the U.S. and Mexico and by a high, non-saline aquifer into which the dominant phreatophytic shrubs and trees are rooted. We studied the effects of a regional drought on riparian vegetation and avian abundance and diversity from 2002