Images

Coast Salish canoe journey preparing to launch; sunrise at Pillar Point. The canoe journey pulled a water quality probe, which measured salinity, temperature, pH, and dissolved oxygen.

Panoramic (~180 degree) view of landscape in Denali National Park, Alaska. Photographed on July 27, 2009, during fieldwork on Dall sheep habitat by members of the USGS Southwest Geographic Science Team.

Coast Salish Canoe Journey 2009, preparation in Neah Bay. The journey pulled a water quality probe to measure salinity, temperature, pH, and dissolved oxygen.

Beach Sampling for Forage Fish Spawn on Whidbey Island in Puget Sound.

USGS biologist Randy Bennett and volunteers sample a stream using electro-fishing gear.

Bear digging for food in Shenandoah National Park, Virginia.

During the past decade populations of this honeycreeper have begun to rebound at lower elevations on most of the main Hawaiian Islands, in spite of high prevalence of infection with avian malaria.

Balkan endemic nephropathy (BEN) patient from a BEN village in Romania. The photo was taken at a dialysis clinic in Romania where the patient traveled every 2 to 3 days to receive dialysis, the principal treatment option for people with BEN. This patient died from complications of BEN within a year after this photo was taken in 2000.

USGS Researcher Calin Tatu sampling a spring in a Balkan endemic nephropathy (BEN) village in Romania. Samples of water are tested for the presence of toxic organic compounds that are linked to BEN.

Normal size kidney (left) and a Balkan endemic nephropathy (BEN) kidney (right). The BEN kidney is reduced by one third compared to a normal kidney.

USGS researcher examining bass for abnormalities in the field.

USGS researcher examining bass for abnormalities in the field.

Two Yupik Eskimo students from Chevak, Alaska holding a tundra swan cygnet. These student volunteers were helping with an annual USGS waterfowl banding program along the Kashunuk River near the Bering Sea coast in western Alaska.

USGS scientists Bill Orem (left) and Terry Lerch (right) recording data and collecting samples at a Balkan endemic nephropathy (BEN) household in Serbia. BEN patients typically come from small villages and are often farmers.

Nikola Pavlovic, a kidney specialist and a USGS collaborator on Balkan endemic nephropathy (BEN) studies from Serbia, is shown exposing a small Pliocene lignite bed near a BEN village in the Vratza area of Bulgaria. The Pliocene lignite seams vary greatly in size and extent. BEN villages are always close to these Pliocene lignite deposits.

USGS biologist Paul Cryan releases a bat carrying a miniature radio transmitter. Researchers are increasingly turning to high-tech methods to try to learn more about the mysterious lives of bats.

A hoary bat (Lasiurus cinereus) found dead beneath a wind turbine, an apparent victim of a blade strike or near-contact barotrauma (lung failure from severe and abrupt pressure change; here, caused by the spinning blades). Prior to the problem of bat fatalities at wind turbines, biologists rarely encountered hoary bats.

USGS biologist Paul Cryan examines the carcass of a hoary bat (Lasiurus cinereus) found beneath a wind turbine. By examining the casualties, biologists hope to learn more about why migratory bats are so susceptible to wind turbines.

USGS biologist Paul Cryan. Biologists hope to learn more about the scale and causes of bat fatalities at wind turbines by searching for carcasses of bats beneath turbines and carefully documenting the conditions under which they are found.

USGS researcher Rebecca Lazarus prepares to take a blood sample from an osprey fledgling in a nest on the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, Delaware Bay in 2015. Lazarus and colleagues did similar sampling of 48 chicks on Chesapeake Bay in 2011-2013.

Arizona saquaro will be one of the species looked at by USA-NPN volunteers.