Search USGS⌕ Search

SEARCH · Search USGS

Results for “Journal of Land Change Science”

Search indexed USGS publications on groundwater, aquifers, geologic maps, mineral resources and earthquakes. Explore source records by subject and place.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources
USGS2013

Biodiversity losses and conservation trade-offs: Assessing future urban growth scenarios for a North American trade corridor

The Sonoran Desert and Apache Highlands ecoregions of North America are areas of exceptionally high plant and vertebrate biodiversity. However, much of the vertebrate biodiversity is supported by only a few vegetation types with limited distributions, some of which are increasingly threatened by changing land uses. We assessed the impacts of two future urban growth scenarios on biodiversity in a binational watershed in Arizona, USA and Sonora, Mexico. We quantified and mapped terrestrial vertebrate species richness using Wildlife Habitat Relation models and validated the results with data from National Park Service biological inventories. Future urban growth, based on historical trends, was projected to the year 2050 for 1) a “Current Trends” scenario and, 2) a “Megalopolis” scenario that represented a transnational growth corridor with open-space conservation attributes. Based on Current Trends, 45% of existing riparian woodland (267 of 451species), and 34% of semi-desert grasslands (215 of 451 species) will be lost, whereas, in the Megalopolis scenario, these types would decline by 44% and 24% respectively. Outcomes of the two models suggest a trade-off at the taxonomic class level: Current Trends would reduce and fragment mammal and herpetofauna habitat, while Megalopolis would result in loss of avian-rich riparian habitat.

International Journal of Biodiversity Science, Eco↗
USGS2008

Near-decadal changes in nitrate and pesticide concentrations in the South Platte River alluvial aquifer, 1993-2004

The lower South Platte River basin of Colorado and Nebraska is an area of intense agriculture supported by surface-water diversions from the river and ground-water pumping from a valley-fill alluvial aquifer. Two well networks consisting of 45 wells installed in the South Platte alluvial aquifer were sampled in the early 1990s and again in the early 2000s to examine near-decadal ground-water quality changes in irrigated agricultural areas. Ground-water age generally increases and dissolved-oxygen content decreases with distance along flow paths and with depdi below the water table, and denitrification is an important natural mitigation mechanism for nitrate in downgradient areas. Ground-water travel time from upland areas to the river ranges from 12 to 31 yr on the basis of apparent ground-water ages. Ground-water nitrate concentrations for agricultural land-use wells increased significantly for oxidized samples over the decade, and nitrogen isotope ratios for oxidized samples indicate synthetic fertilizer as the predominant nitrate source. Ground-water concentrations of atrazine, DEA, and prometon decreased significandy. The decrease in pesticide concentrations and a significant increase in the ratio of DEA to atrazine suggest decreases in pesticide concentrations are likely caused by local decreases in application rates and/or degradation processes and that atrazine degradation is promoted by oxidizing conditions. The difference between results for oxidizing and nitrate-reducing conditions indicates redox state is an important variable to consider when evaluating ground-water quality trends for redox-sensitive constituents such as nitrate and pesticides in the South Platte alluvial aquifer. Copyright ?? 2008 by the American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America, and Soil Science Society of America. All rights reserved.

Journal of Environmental Quality↗
USGS2021

An empirically based simulation model to inform flow management for endangered species conservation

Increasing water demand, water development, and ongoing climate change have driven extensive changes to the hydrology, geomorphology and biology of arid-land rivers globally, driving an increasing need to understand how annual hydrologic conditions affect the distribution and abundance of imperiled desert fish populations. We analyzed the relationship between annual hydrologic conditions and the endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow ( Hybognathus amarus ) in the Middle Rio Grande, New Mexico, USA, using hurdle models to predict both presence and density as a function of integrated annual hydrologic metrics. Both presence and density were positively related to spring high flow magnitude and duration and negatively related to summer drying, as indicated by an integrated flow metric. Simulations suggest hydrologic conditions near the wettest observed in the data set would be required to meet recovery goals in a single year in all reaches. We demonstrate how the models developed herein can be used to examine alternative water management strategies, including strategies that may currently be socially and logistically infeasible to implement, to identify strategies minimizing trade-offs between conservation and other management goals.

New Mexico↗
USGS1970

Waterfowl in relation to land use and water levels on the Spring Run Area

Low water levels during critical phases of the breeding cycle appear to have caused population declines of waterfowl and other marsh birds on the Spring Run Game Management Area. Pair-counts indicated a decline from 70 pairs of waterfowl in 1965 to 2 pairs in 1968. Nest success of upland nesting blue-winged teal (Anas discors) averaged 33% and mallards (Anas platyrhyncos) averaged 23%. Blue-winged teal selected nest sites closer to water than did mallards (314 feet versus 424 feet). Teal nested in ungrazed bluegrass (Poa pratensis) in preference to alfalfa (Medicago sativa) hayland. Bromegrass (Bromus inermis) was readily used by teal and mallards when it became available for nesting. Nest success of species nesting overwater was considerably higher: Redheads (Aythya americana) were 55% successful and 93% of 75 coot (Fulica americana) nests hatched. A study of dummy-nests showed nest success significantly higher on ungrazed than on grazed bluegrass. Grazing did not significantly lower total mouse populations but did change species composition because deer mice (Peromyscus maniculatus) increased as other species declined with grazing.

Iowa State Journal of Science↗
USGS2009

Past and current trends of change in a dune prairie/oak savanna reconstructed through a multiple-scale history

The history of a rapidly changing mosaic of prairie and oak savanna in northern Indiana was reconstructed using several methods emphasizing different time scales ranging from annual to millennial. Vegetation change was monitored for 8 yr using plots and for 30 yr using aerial photographs. A 20th century fire history was reconstructed from the stand structure of multiple-stemmed trees and fire scars. General Land Office Survey data were used to reconstruct the forest of A.D. 1834. Fossil pollen and charcoal records were used to reconstruct the last 4000 yr of vegetation and fire history. Since its deposition along the shore of Lake Michigan about 4000 yr ago, the area has followed a classical primary dune successional sequence, gradually changing from pine forest to prairie/oak savanna between A.D. 264 and 1007. This successional trend, predicted in the models of Henry Cowles, occurred even though the climate cooled and prairies elsewhere in the region retreated. Severe fires in the 19th century reduced most tree species but led to a temporary increase in Populus tremuloides . During the last few decades, the prairie has been invaded by oaks and other woody species, primarily because of fire suppression since A.D. 1972. The rapid and complex changes now occurring are a response to the compounded effects of plant succession, intense burning and logging in the 19th century, recent fire suppression, and possibly increased airborne deposition of nitrates. The compilation of several historical research techniques emphasizing different time scales allows this study of the interactions between multiple disturbance variables.

Journal of Vegetation Science↗
USGS2004

Structural complexity and land-surface energy exchange along a gradient from arctic tundra to boreal forest

Question: Current climate changes in the Alaskan Arctic, which are characterized by increases in temperature and length of growing season, could alter vegetation structure, especially through increases in shrub cover or the movement of treeline. These changes in vegetation structure have consequences for the climate system. What is the relationship between structural complexity and partitioning of surface energy along a gradient from tundra through shrub tundra to closed canopy forest? Location: Arctic tundra-boreal forest transition in the Alaskan Arctic. Methods: Along this gradient of increasing canopy complexity, we measured key vegetation characteristics, including community composition, biomass, cover, height, leaf area index and stem area index. We relate these vegetation characteristics to albedo and the partitioning of net radiation into ground, latent, and sensible heating fluxes. Results: Canopy complexity increased along the sequence from tundra to forest due to the addition of new plant functional types. This led to non-linear changes in biomass, cover, and height in the understory. The increased canopy complexity resulted in reduced ground heat fluxes, relatively conserved latent heat fluxes and increased sensible heat fluxes. The localized warming associated with increased sensible heating over more complex canopies may amplify regional warming, causing further vegetation change in the Alaskan Arctic.

Alaska↗
USGS2007

Mars reconnaissance orbiter's high resolution imaging science experiment (HiRISE)

The HiRISE camera features a 0.5 m diameter primary mirror, 12 m effective focal length, and a focal plane system that can acquire images containing up to 28 Gb (gigabits) of data in as little as 6 seconds. HiRISE will provide detailed images (0.25 to 1.3 m/pixel) covering ∼1% of the Martian surface during the 2‐year Primary Science Phase (PSP) beginning November 2006. Most images will include color data covering 20% of the potential field of view. A top priority is to acquire ∼1000 stereo pairs and apply precision geometric corrections to enable topographic measurements to better than 25 cm vertical precision. We expect to return more than 12 Tb of HiRISE data during the 2‐year PSP, and use pixel binning, conversion from 14 to 8 bit values, and a lossless compression system to increase coverage. HiRISE images are acquired via 14 CCD detectors, each with 2 output channels, and with multiple choices for pixel binning and number of Time Delay and Integration lines. HiRISE will support Mars exploration by locating and characterizing past, present, and future landing sites, unsuccessful landing sites, and past and potentially future rover traverses. We will investigate cratering, volcanism, tectonism, hydrology, sedimentary processes, stratigraphy, aeolian processes, mass wasting, landscape evolution, seasonal processes, climate change, spectrophotometry, glacial and periglacial processes, polar geology, and regolith properties. An Internet Web site (HiWeb) will enable anyone in the world to suggest HiRISE targets on Mars and to easily locate, view, and download HiRISE data products.

Journal of Geophysical Research E: Planets↗
USGS2015

Water availability and land subsidence in the Central Valley, California, USA

The Central Valley in California (USA) covers about 52,000 km 2 and is one of the most productive agricultural regions in the world. This agriculture relies heavily on surface-water diversions and groundwater pumpage to meet irrigation water demand. Because the valley is semi-arid and surface-water availability varies substantially, agriculture relies heavily on local groundwater. In the southern two thirds of the valley, the San Joaquin Valley, historic and recent groundwater pumpage has caused significant and extensive drawdowns, aquifer-system compaction and subsidence. During recent drought periods (2007–2009 and 2012-present), groundwater pumping has increased owing to a combination of decreased surface-water availability and land-use changes. Declining groundwater levels, approaching or surpassing historical low levels, have caused accelerated and renewed compaction and subsidence that likely is mostly permanent. The subsidence has caused operational, maintenance, and construction-design problems for water-delivery and flood-control canals in the San Joaquin Valley. Planning for the effects of continued subsidence in the area is important for water agencies. As land use, managed aquifer recharge, and surface-water availability continue to vary, long-term groundwater-level and subsidence monitoring and modelling are critical to understanding the dynamics of historical and continued groundwater use resulting in additional water-level and groundwater storage declines, and associated subsidence. Modeling tools such as the Central Valley Hydrologic Model, can be used in the evaluation of management strategies to mitigate adverse impacts due to subsidence while also optimizing water availability. This knowledge will be critical for successful implementation of recent legislation aimed toward sustainable groundwater use.

California↗
USGS2008

Land cover and forest formation distributions for St. Kitts, Nevis, St. Eustatius, Grenada and Barbados from decision tree classification of cloud-cleared satellite imagery

Satellite image-based mapping of tropical forests is vital to conservation planning. Standard methods for automated image classification, however, limit classification detail in complex tropical landscapes. In this study, we test an approach to Landsat image interpretation on four islands of the Lesser Antilles, including Grenada and St. Kitts, Nevis and St. Eustatius, testing a more detailed classification than earlier work in the latter three islands. Secondly, we estimate the extents of land cover and protected forest by formation for five islands and ask how land cover has changed over the second half of the 20th century. The image interpretation approach combines image mosaics and ancillary geographic data, classifying the resulting set of raster data with decision tree software. Cloud-free image mosaics for one or two seasons were created by applying regression tree normalization to scene dates that could fill cloudy areas in a base scene. Such mosaics are also known as cloud-filled, cloud-minimized or cloud-cleared imagery, mosaics, or composites. The approach accurately distinguished several classes that more standard methods would confuse; the seamless mosaics aided reference data collection; and the multiseason imagery allowed us to separate drought deciduous forests and woodlands from semi-deciduous ones. Cultivated land areas declined 60 to 100 percent from about 1945 to 2000 on several islands. Meanwhile, forest cover has increased 50 to 950%. This trend will likely continue where sugar cane cultivation has dominated. Like the island of Puerto Rico, most higher-elevation forest formations are protected in formal or informal reserves. Also similarly, lowland forests, which are drier forest types on these islands, are not well represented in reserves. Former cultivated lands in lowland areas could provide lands for new reserves of drier forest types. The land-use history of these islands may provide insight for planners in countries currently considering lowland forest clearing for agriculture. Copyright 2008 College of Arts and Sciences.

Caribbean Journal of Science↗
USGS2009

Snow and ice in a changing hydrological world

On the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences, the 100th and 50th anniversaries of the First and Second International Polar Years, and the 25th anniversary of the International Geophysical Year, it seems appropriate to re-examine the world's water balance and the role of snow and ice in the global hydrological climatic system. Snow cover on land (especially in the Northern Hemisphere) and sea ice (especially in the Southern Hemisphere) vary seasonally, and this seasonal change has an important effect on the world climate because snow and sea ice reflect solar radiation efficiently and affect other heat flow processes between atmosphere and land or ocean. Glaciers, including ice sheets, store most of the fresh water on Earth, but change dimensions relatively slowly. There is no clear evidence that the glacier ice volume currently is declining, but more needs to be known about mountain glacier and ice sheet mass balances. The current rise in sea level poses an enigma: thermal expansion of the oceans may account for half of the present rise, but the other half is unexplained. Although major changes in the large ice sheets take place over time scales of 10 4 to 10 5 years, marine ice sheets may be subject to rapid disintegration due to grounding line instability, perhaps accompanied by surging. Ice cores may produce remarkably complete histories of air temperature, precipitation, fallout, and atmospheric composition. A recent core through the Greenland Ice Sheet shows an abrupt transition from glacial to modern climate just over 10000 years ago, suggesting that climate is an “almost intransitive” system. Because of the possibility of abrupt climate transitions and the uncertain stability of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, future climatic variations are difficult to predict. The calculated heating of the atmosphere in the polar regions due to CO 2 increase is, therefore, of special interest.

Hydrological Sciences Journal↗
USGS2009

Analysis of lidar elevation data for improved identification and delineation of lands vulnerable to sea-level rise

The importance of sea-level rise in shaping coastal landscapes is well recognized within the earth science community, but as with many natural hazards, communicating the risks associated with sea-level rise remains a challenge. Topography is a key parameter that influences many of the processes involved in coastal change, and thus, up-to-date, high-resolution, high-accuracy elevation data are required to model the coastal environment. Maps of areas subject to potential inundation have great utility to planners and managers concerned with the effects of sea-level rise. However, most of the maps produced to date are simplistic representations derived from older, coarse elevation data. In the last several years, vast amounts of high quality elevation data derived from lidar have become available. Because of their high vertical accuracy and spatial resolution, these lidar data are an excellent source of up-to-date information from which to improve identification and delineation of vulnerable lands. Four elevation datasets of varying resolution and accuracy were processed to demonstrate that the improved quality of lidar data leads to more precise delineation of coastal lands vulnerable to inundation. A key component of the comparison was to calculate and account for the vertical uncertainty of the elevation datasets. This comparison shows that lidar allows for a much more detailed delineation of the potential inundation zone when compared to other types of elevation models. It also shows how the certainty of the delineation of lands vulnerable to a given sea-level rise scenario is much improved when derived from higher resolution lidar data.

Journal of Coastal Research↗
USGS2024

Estimates of soil taxonomic change due to near-surface permafrost loss in Alaska

Gelisols (permafrost-affected soils in U.S. Soil Taxonomy) are extensive in Alaska, currently occurring on approximately 45% of the land area of the state. Gelisol taxonomic criteria rely on the presence of near-surface (less than 2m deep) permafrost, but ongoing climatic and environmental change has the potential to affect the presence of near-surface permafrost across much of Alaska throughout the 21st century. In this study, we utilized scenarios of near-surface permafrost loss and active layer deepening through the 21st century under low (SRES B1, RCP 4.5), mid- (SRES A1B) and high (SRES A2, RCP8.5) emissions scenarios, in conjunction with the statewide STATSGO soil map, to generate spatially-explicit predictions of the susceptibility of Gelisols and Gelisol suborders to taxonomic change in Alaska. We find that 15-53% of Alaskan Gelisols are susceptible to taxonomic change by mid-century and 41-69% of Alaskan Gelisols are susceptible to taxonomic change by the end of the century. The extent of potential change varies between suborders and geographic regions, with Gelisols in Northern Alaska being the most resilient to taxonomic change and Western and Interior Alaskan Gelisols most susceptible to taxonomic change. The Orthel suborder is likely to be highly restricted by the late 21st century, while Histels and Tubels are more likely to be of greater extent. These results should be taken into consideration when designing initial survey and re-mapping efforts in Alaska, and suggest that Alaskan Gelisol taxa should be considered threatened soil taxa due to the proportional extent of likely loss.

Alaska↗
USGS2025

Reconciling scale using the Resist-Accept-Direct (RAD) Framework to improve management of woody encroachment in grasslands

Implementing strategies to navigate large-scale ecological transitions in grasslands is one of this century's greatest conservation challenges. In the US Great Plains, managing areas impacted by woody transitions have been reactive, short-lived, costly, and ineffective. Along with current technological innovation in rangeland monitoring, the promise of early warning science is to provide managers with sufficient time to be better prepared for novel signals of ecological change. Combining the science of early warning signals and frameworks such as the Resist – Accept – Direct (RAD) can provide land managers with guidelines to identify proactive strategies when facing ecological change. Using this approach, we found that opportunities to resist woody transitions decreased from 84 % to 60 % between 1990 and 2020 over the entire biome but remained highest in the northern and western Great Plains, which contributes to large scale conservation targets. These are key areas to prioritize resist opportunities. In contrast, 11 % of the biome exhibited early warning transition signals across all hierarchical scales by 2020, a fourfold increase since 1990. Lastly by 2020, 30 % of the biome exhibited early warning signals across multiple but not all scales. Here, efforts may be more effective when management is directed to conserve fragmented grassland legacies within a woody-dominated matrix and avoid large-scale monocultures of problematic encroaching woody species. Our multi-scale study indicates that 1) anchoring to the last remaining grassland core areas with no early warning of transitions and 2) strategically investing in these intact grasslands may provide the best results for grassland conservation.

Great Plains↗
USGS2009

Identifying pathways and processes affecting nitrate and orthophosphate inputs to streams in agricultural watersheds

Understanding nutrient pathways to streams will improve nutrient management strategies and estimates of the time lag between when changes in land use practices occur and when water quality effects that result from these changes are observed. Nitrate and orthophosphate (OP) concentrations in several environmental compartments were examined in watersheds having a range of base flow index (BFI) values across the continental United States to determine the dominant pathways for water and nutrient inputs to streams. Estimates of the proportion of stream nitrate that was derived from groundwater increased as BFI increased. Nitrate concentration gradients between groundwater and surface water further supported the groundwater source of nitrate in these high BFI streams. However, nitrate concentrations in stream-bed pore water in all settings were typically lower than stream or upland groundwater concentrations, suggesting that nitrate discharge to streams was not uniform through the bed. Rather, preferential pathways (e.g., springs, seeps) may allow high nitrate groundwater to bypass sites of high biogeochemical transformation. Rapid pathway compartments (e.g., overland flow, tile drains) had OP concentrations that were typically higher than in streams and were important OP conveyers in most of these watersheds. In contrast to nitrate, the proportion of stream OP that is derived from ground water did not systematically increase as BFI increased. While typically not the dominant source of OP, groundwater discharge was an important pathway of OP transport to streams when BFI values were very high and when geochemical conditions favored OP mobility in groundwater. Copyright ?? 2009 by the American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America, and Soil Science Society of America. All rights reserved.

Journal of Environmental Quality↗
USGS1991

Variability of an unsaturated sand unit underlying a radioactive- waste trench

Properties of soils vary considerably within any field. This study was conducted to investigate the variability in properties of an unsaturated sand unit that lies at a depth of 13 m below land surface. Four-hundred-forty soil core samples, obtained from a 1.75 by 18-m horizontal plane within a sand unit underlying a waste trench, were used to describe the variability of moisture content, tritium concentration, and several physical properties. A simple model based on unit-gradient theory was used to calculate fluxes of water and tritium through the study plane. The effects of including spatial variability of properties in model calculations were examined. The sand was uniform in terms of median particle size, bulk density, and proposity, but several variables, including saturated hydraulic conductivity ( K s ) and tritium concentration, showed considerable variability. In general, correlation coefficients calculated between variables were low. Spatial correlation structures were identified for moisture content, tritium concentration, and a few particle-size variables, but were absent for K s and most other variables. Variances of K s and field-measured volumetric moisture content (θ) were lower than published values for soils. Model-calculated fluxes of water and tritium that accounted for spatial variability of properties were considerably higher than those that did not account for the variability. Model results were more sensitive to changes in θ and residual moisture content (each parameters of the relative hydraulic conductivity function) than to changes in K s .

Illinois↗
USGS2009

Simulated long-term changes in river discharge and soil moisture due to global warming

By use of a coupled ocean atmosphere-land model, this study explores the changes of water availability, as measured by river discharge and soil moisture, that could occur by the middle of the 21st century in response to combined increases of greenhouse gases and sulphate aerosols based upon the "IS92a" scenario. In addition, it presents the simulated change in water availability that might be realized in a few centuries in response to a quadrupling of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Averaging the results over extended periods, the radiatively forced changes, which are very similar between the two sets of experiments, were successfully extracted. The analysis indicates that the discharges from Arctic rivers such as the Mackenzie and Ob' increase by up to 20% (of the pre-Industrial Period level) by the middle of the 21st century and by up to 40% or more in a few centuries. In the tropics, the discharges from the Amazonas and Ganga-Brahmaputra rivers increase substantially. However, the percentage changes in runoff from other tropical and many mid-latitude rivers are smaller, with both positive and negative signs. For soil moisture, the results of this study indicate reductions during much of the year in many semiarid regions of the world, such as the southwestern region of North America, the northeastern region of China, the Mediterranean coast of Europe, and the grasslands of Australia and Africa. As a percentage, the reduction is particularly large during the dry season. From middle to high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, soil moisture decreases in summer but increases in winter.

Hydrological Sciences Journal↗
USGS2015

Dynamic hypoxic zones in Lake Erie compress fish habitat, altering vulnerability to fishing gears

Seasonal degradation of aquatic habitats from hypoxia occurs in numerous freshwater and coastal marine systems and can result in direct mortality or displacement of fish. Yet, fishery landings from these systems are frequently unresponsive to changes in the severity and extent of hypoxia, and population-scale effects have been difficult to measure except in extreme hypoxic conditions with hypoxia-sensitive species. We investigated fine-scale temporal and spatial variability in dissolved oxygen in Lake Erie as it related to fish distribution and catch efficiencies of both active (bottom trawls) and passive (trap nets) fishing gears. Temperature and dissolved oxygen loggers placed near the edge of the hypolimnion exhibited much higher than expected variability. Hypoxic episodes of variable durations were frequently punctuated by periods of normoxia, consistent with high-frequency internal waves. High-resolution interpolations of water quality and hydroacoustic surveys suggest that fish habitat is compressed during hypoxic episodes, resulting in higher fish densities near the edges of hypoxia. At fixed locations with passive commercial fishing gear, catches with the highest values occurred when bottom waters were hypoxic for intermediate proportions of time. Proximity to hypoxia explained significant variation in bottom trawl catches, with higher catch rates near the edge of hypoxia. These results emphasize how hypoxia may elevate catch rates in various types of fishing gears, leading to a lack of association between indices of hypoxia and fishery landings. Increased catch rates of fish at the edges of hypoxia have important implications for stock assessment models that assume catchability is spatially homogeneous.

Ohio↗
USGS2014

U.S. Geological Survey Science for the Wyoming Landscape Conservation Initiative - 2013 Annual Report

This is the sixth report produced by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) for the Wyoming Landscape Conservation Initiative (WLCI) to detail annual activities conducted by USGS for addressing specific management needs identified by WLCI partners. In FY2013, there were 25 ongoing and new projects conducted by the USGS. These projects fall into 8 major categories: (1) synthesizing and analyzing existing data to describe (model and map) current conditions on the landscape; (2) developing models for projecting past and future landscape conditions; (3) monitoring indicators of ecosystem conditions and the effectiveness of on-the-ground habitat projects; (4) conducting research to elucidate the mechanisms underlying wildlife and habitat responses to changing land uses; (5) managing and making accessible the large number of databases, maps, and other products being developed; (6) helping to integrate WLCI outcomes with future habitat enhancement and research projects; (7) coordinating efforts among WLCI partners; and (8) providing support to WLCI decision-makers and assisting with overall evaluation of the WLCI program. The two new projects initiated in FY2013 address (1) important agricultural lands in southwestern Wyoming, and (2) the influence of energy development on native fish communities. The remaining activities entailed our ongoing efforts to compile data, model landscape conditions, monitor trends in habitat conditions, conduct studies of wildlife responses to energy development, and upgrade Web-based products in support of both individual and overall WLCI efforts. Milestone FY2013 accomplishments included completing the development of a WLCI inventory and monitoring framework and the associated monitoring strategies, protocols, and analytics; and initial development of an Interagency Inventory and Monitoring Database, which will be accessible through the Monitoring page of the WLCI Web site at http://www.wlci.gov/monitoring. We also completed the initial phase of the mountain shrub-mapping project in the Big Piney-La Barge mule deer winter range. Finally, a 3-year survey of pygmy rabbits in four major gas-field areas was completed and used to validate the pygmy rabbit habitat model/map developed earlier in the project. Important products that became available for use by WLCI partners included publication of USGS Data Series report (http://pubs.usgs.gov/ds/800/pdf/ds800.pdf) that compiles our WLCI land cover and land use data, which depict current and historical patterns of sage-grouse habitat in relation to energy development and will be used to pose “what-if” scenarios to evaluate possible outcomes of alternative land-use strategies and practices on habitat and wildlife. Another important FY2013 product was a journal article (http://aapgbull.geoscienceworld.org/content/97/6/899.full) that describes the Mowry Shale and Frontier formation, which harbors coalbed methane and shale gas resources in Wyoming, Colorado, and Utah, for use in future scenario-building work. We also produced maps and databases that depict the structure and condition of aspen stands in the Little Mountain Ecosystem, and then presented this information to the Bureau of Land Management, Wyoming Game and Fish Department, and other interested entities for supporting aspen-management objectives.

Open-File Report↗