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Publications

This list of publications includes peer-review journal articles, official USGS publications series, reports and more authored by scientists in the Ecosystems Mission Area. A database of all USGS publications, with advanced search features, can be accessed at the USGS Publications Warehouse.  

Filter Total Items: 41771

Evolutionary and ecological connectivity in westslope cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii lewisi) and mountain whitefish (Prosopium williamsoni) in relation to the potential influences of Boundary Dam, Washington, Idaho, and parts of British Columbia

In this report, we consider evolutionary and ecological connectivity for westslope cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarkii lewisi) and mountain whitefish (Prosopium williamsoni) within the Pend Oreille River in northeastern Washington State, northern Idaho, and adjacent portions of southeastern British Columbia, Canada. Specifically, we focused on the rationale for active translocation of individual
Authors
Jason B. Dunham, Eric B. Taylor, Ernest R. Keeley

Freshwater mussels show elevated viral richness and intensity during a mortality event

Freshwater mussels (Unionida) are among the world’s most imperiled taxa, but the relationship between freshwater mussel mortality events and infectious disease is largely unstudied. We surveyed viromes of a widespread and abundant species (mucket, Actinonaias ligamentina; syn: Ortmanniana ligamentina) experiencing a mortality event of unknown etiology in the Huron River, Michigan, in 2019–2020 and
Authors
Jordan Richard, Eric Leis, Christopher D. Dunn, Cleyo Harris, Rose Agbalog, Lewis J. Campbell, Susan Knowles, Diane L. Waller, Joel G. Putnam, Tony Goldberg

Size distribution and reproductive phenology of the invasive Burmese python (Python molurus bivittatus) in the Greater Everglades Ecosystem, Florida, USA

The design of successful invasive species control programs is often hindered by the absence of basic demographic data on the targeted population. Establishment of invasive Burmese pythons (Python molurus bivittatus) in the Greater Everglades Ecosystem, Florida USA has led to local precipitous declines (> 90%) of mesomammal populations and is also a major threat to native populations of reptiles an
Authors
Andrea Faye Currylow, Bryan Falk, Amy A. Yackel Adams, Christina M. Romagosa, Jillian Josimovich, Michael R. Rochford, Michael Cherkiss, Melia Gail Nafus, Kristen Hart, Frank J. Mazzotti, Ray W. Snow, Robert Reed

Vegetative buffer strips show limited effectiveness for reducing antibiotic transport in surface runoff

Vegetative buffer strips (VBS) have been demonstrated to effectively reduce loads of sediment, nutrients, and herbicides in surface runoff, but their effectiveness for reducing veterinary antibiotic (VA) loads in runoff has not been well documented. The objective of this study was to determine the effectiveness of VBS vegetation and width on surface runoff loads of the VAs sulfamethazine (SMZ) and
Authors
Adam H. Moody, Robert N. Lerch, Keith W. Goyne, Stephen H. Anderson, David Mendoza-Cózatl, David Alvarez

A review of current capabilities and science gaps in water supply data, modeling, and trends for water availability assessments in the Upper Colorado River Basin

The Colorado River is a critical water resource in the southwestern United States, supplying drinking water for 40 million people in the region and water for irrigation of 2.2 million hectares of land. Extended drought in the Upper Colorado River Basin (UCOL) and the prospect of a warmer climate in the future pose water availability challenges for those charged with managing the river. Limited wat
Authors
Fred D. Tillman, Natalie K. Day, Matthew P. Miller, Olivia L. Miller, Christine Rumsey, Daniel Wise, Patrick Cullen Longley, Morgan C. McDonnell

Hawaiian waterbird movement across a developed landscape

A key component for biologists managing mobile species is understanding where and when a species occurs at different locations and scaling management to fit the spatial and temporal patterns of movement. We established an automated radio-telemetry tracking network to document multi-year movement in 2016–2018 of 3 endangered waterbirds among wetlands on Oʻahu, Hawaiʻi, USA: ʻalae ʻula or Hawaiian g
Authors
Eben H. Paxton, Kristina L. Paxton, Martha Kawasaki, P. Marcos Gorresen, Charles B. van Rees, Jared G. Underwood

Piñon and juniper tree removal increases available soil water, driving understory response in a sage-steppe ecosystem

Over the past century, piñon and juniper trees have encroached into sagebrush steppe lands of the interior United States, and managers have for many years removed trees to stimulate the favored understory. While consistent understory response to tree removal in these semiarid lands suggests that trees outcompete other plants for water, no studies have linked increased soil water to understory resp
Authors
James D. McIver, James Grace, Bruce A. Roundy

Addressing detection uncertainty in Bombus affinis (Hymenoptera: Apidae) surveys can improve inferences made from monitoring

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service developed national guidelines to track species recovery of the endangered rusty patched bumble bee [Bombus affinis Cresson (Hymenoptera: Apidae)] and to investigate changes in species occupancy across space and time. As with other native bee monitoring efforts, managers have specifically acknowledged the need to address species detection uncertainty and determine
Authors
Clint R.V. Otto, Alma Schrage, Larissa L. Bailey, John Michael Mola, Tamara A. Smith, Ian Pearse, Stacy C. Simanonok, Ralph Grundel

Density surface and excursion sets modeling as an approach to estimating population densities

Effective species management and conservation require knowledge of species distribution and status. We used point-transect distance sampling surveys of the endangered palila (Loxioides bailleui), a honeycreeper currently found only on the Island of Hawai'i, USA, to generate robust estimates of total abundance and simultaneously model the distribution, abundance, and spatial correlation of the spec
Authors
Richard J. Camp, Chauncey K. Asing, Paul C. Banko, Lainie Berry, Kevin W. Brinck, Chris Farmer, Ayesha Genz

Automatic recorders monitor wolves at rendezvous sites: do wolves adjust howling to live near humans?

We used automatic sound recorders to study spontaneous vocalizations of wild wolves during the pup-rearing season around rendezvous sites from 24 wolf packs in six study areas across North America, Asia, and Europe. Between 2018 and 2021, for a total of 1225 pack-days, we recorded 605 spontaneous wolf chorus howls and 224 solo-howl series. Howling occurrence varied across areas, from 12.50 to 94.1
Authors
Vicente Palacios, Bárbara Martí-Domken, Shannon Barber-Meyer, Bilal Habib, José Vicente López-Bao, Douglas W. Smith, Daniel R. Stahler, Emilio José García, Víctor Sazatornil, L. David Mech

A near four-decade time series shows the Hawaiian Islands have been browning since the 1980s

The Hawaiian Islands have been identified as a global biodiversity hotspot. We examine the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) using Climate Data Records products (0.05 × 0.05°) to identify significant differences in NDVI between neutral El Niño-Southern Oscillation years (1984, 2019) and significant long-term changes over the entire time series (1982–2019) for the Hawaiian Islands and s
Authors
Austin Madson, Monica Dimson, Lucas Fortini, Kapua Kawelo, Tamara Tickin, Matt Keir, Chunyu Dong, Zhimin Ma, David W Beilman, Kelly Kay, Jonathan Pando Ocón, Erica Gallerani, Stephanie Pau, Thomas W Gillespie

Animal tracing with sulfur isotopes: Spatial segregation and climate variability in Africa likely contribute to population trends of a migratory songbird

Climatic conditions affect animals but range-wide impacts at the population level remain largely unknown, especially in migratory species. However, studying climate–population relationships is still challenging in small migrants due to a lack of efficient and cost-effective geographic tracking method.Spatial distribution patterns of environmental stable isotopes (so called ‘isoscapes’) generally o
Authors
Vojtech Brlik, Petr Prochazka, Bengt Hansson, Craig A. Stricker, Elizabeth Yohannes, Rebecca L Powell, Michael B. Wunder