Images

It looks like a holiday ornament, but this lovely object is a single-celled freshwater alga from the desmid family, found in the marshes of Florida’s Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. USGS biologist Barry Rosen photographed it at 200x magnification using ultraviolent light and a fluorescence microscope.

Non-native Cuban treefrogs have established a breeding population in New Orleans, Louisiana, the first such population on the U.S. mainland outside Florida. The treefrogs were discovered at the Audubon Zoo shortly after a shipment of palm trees from Florida were planted in the zoo's elephant enclosure in 2016.

Map of target areas to be surveyed during the first phase of the Deepwater Atlantic Habitats II study, 
DEEP SEARCH, including seep targets. USGS image.

Map of target areas to be surveyed during the first phase of the 
Deepwater Atlantic Habitats II study,  DEEP SEARCH, including seep targets. USGS image.

This single-celled freshwater algae wasa collected as part of the first-ever study of the green algae family called desmids in Florida’s Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge, in the northern Everglades. USGS biologist Barry H.

A rock breakwater and salt marsh planting act as the living shoreline structure along the Fog Point shoreline in Chesapeake Bay, Maryland.

An aerial view of southeast Louisiana coastal marshes. 

Satellite images of the same wetland taken in 2008 and 2016 show a wetland restoration project has produced some gains in marsh area.

This map shows the historic trend in wetland losses, with early losses in red and the most recent ones in purple.

Chart showing changes in vegetation density in the Mississippi River delta in Louisiana, May 2015-May 2016. From a USGS Open File Report published in July 2017 by co-authors Elijah Ramsey III and Amina Rangoonwala,

Brown patches and brown stems show stress in this phagmites (roseau cane) stand in Pass A Loutre Wildlife Management Area, a tract of state-owned land in Louisiana's bird foot delta, where the Mississippi River meets the Gulf of Mexico. An ongoing phragmites was first discovered in spring 2017 and blamed on an invasive scale insect from Asia.

Vegetation assessments are part of an effort to produce seamless, consistent, and high resolution landcover data for the northern portion of the western gulf coastal plain. This geography was once dominated by tallgrass prairie and has undergone dramatic change with less than 1% of this natural habitat in existence.

The sailfin catfish is one of 13 species of nonnative fish that biologists discovered during the Fish Slam in Big Cypress National Preserve, March 23, 2017.

The pike killifish, native to Mexico and Central America, was one of 13 nonnative fish species that biologists discovered during the two-day Fish Slam in Big Cypress National Preserve, March 22 and 23, 2017.

The desmid family of single-celled green algae are never found in abundance, says USGS biologist Barry Rosen. They inhabit the soft, slightly acidic water of wetlands that depend on rainwater, like Florida’s Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. They don’t “bloom” en masse, but their presence is an indicator of good water quality.

USGS conducts a health assessment on a mantee in Crystal River, Florida.

USGS conducts a health assessment on a mantee in Crystal River, Florida. 

USGS conducts a health assessment on a mantee in Crystal River, Florida.

USGS conducts a health assessment on a mantee in Crystal River, Florida.

Frosted flatwoods salamander in St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge, Florida

Frosted flatwoods salamander, St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge, Florida