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USGS2012

The U.S. Geological Survey Ecosystem Science Strategy, 2012-2022 - Advancing discovery and application through collaboration

Ecosystem science is critical to making informed decisions about natural resources that can sustain our Nation’s economic and environmental well-being. Resource managers and policy-makers are faced with countless decisions each year at local, state, tribal, territorial, and national levels on issues as diverse as renewable and non-renewable energy development, agriculture, forestry, water supply, and resource allocations at the urban-rural interface. The urgency for sound decision-making is increasing dramatically as the world is being transformed at an unprecedented pace and in uncertain directions. Environmental changes are associated with natural hazards, greenhouse gas emissions, and increasing demands for water, land, food, energy, mineral, and living resources. At risk is the Nation’s environmental capital, the goods and services provided by resilient ecosystems that are vital to the health and well-being of human societies. Ecosystem science—the study of systems of organisms interacting with their environment and the consequences of natural and human-induced change on these systems—is necessary to inform decision-makers as they develop policies to adapt to these changes. This Ecosystems Science Strategy is built on a framework that includes basic and applied science. It highlights the critical roles that USGS scientists and partners can play in building scientific understanding and providing timely information to decision-makers. The strategy underscores the connection between scientific discoveries and the application of new knowledge. The strategy integrates ecosystem science and decision-making, producing new scientific outcomes to assist resource managers and providing public benefits. The USGS is uniquely positioned to play an important role in ecosystem science. With its wide range of expertise, the agency can bring holistic, cross-scale, interdisciplinary capabilities to the design and conduct of monitoring, research, and modeling and to new technologies for data collection, management, and visualization. Collectively, these capabilities can be used to reveal ecological patterns and processes, explain how and why ecosystems change, and forecast change over different spatial and temporal scales. USGS science can provide managers with options and decision-support tools to use resources sustainably. The USGS has long-standing, collaborative relationships with the DOI and other partners in the natural sciences, in both conducting science and its application. The USGS engages these partners in cooperative investigations that otherwise would lack the necessary support or be too expensive for a single bureau to conduct. The heart of this strategy is a framework and vision for USGS ecosystems science that focuses on five long-term goals, which are seen as interconnected and reinforcing components: • Improve understanding of ecosystem structure, function, and processes. The focus for this goal is an understanding of how ecosystems work, including the dynamics of species, their populations, interactions, and genetics, and how they change across spatial and temporal scales. • Advance understanding of how drivers influence ecosystem change. The challenges here are explaining the drivers of ecosystem change, their spatio-temporal patterns, their uncertainties and interactions, and their influence on ecosystem processes and dynamics. • Improve understanding of the services that ecosystems provide to society. Here the emphasis is on the measurement of environmental capital and ecosystem services, and the identification of sources and patterns of change in space and time. • Develop tools, technologies, and capacities to inform decision-making about ecosystems. This includes developing new technologies and approaches for conducting applications-oriented ecosystem science. A principal challenge will be how to quantify uncertainty and incorporate it in decision analysis. • Apply science to enhance strategies for management, conservation, and restoration of ecosystems. These challenges include development of novel approaches to monitoring, assessment, and restoration of ecosystems; new methods to address species of concern and communities at risk; and innovations in decision analysis and support to address imminent ecosystem changes or those that are underway. Closely integrated with the five goals are four strategic approaches that provide the path forward for the USGS Ecosystems Mission Area. These approaches cross-cut all of the goals and are seen as essential to the implementation of this strategy: • Assess information needs for ecosystem science through enhanced partnerships. Work with the DOI and other agencies and institutions to identify, design, and implement priority decision-driven ecological research. • Promote the use of interdisciplinary ecosystem science. Design and conduct interdisciplinary process-oriented research in ecosystem science. • Enhance modeling and forecasting. Build models to forecast ecosystem change, assess future management scenarios, and reduce uncertainties through an adaptive learning process. • Support decision-making. Use quantitative approaches to assess the vulnerabilities of ecosystems, habitats, and species, and evaluate strategies for adaptation, restoration, and sustainable management. Following the strategic approaches are a set of proposed actions that represent a sampling of specific activities that align with this strategy and that address the Nation’s most pressing environmental needs. The strategy emphasizes coordination of activities across the USGS mission areas pursuant to these goals. Ecosystem science is inherently interdisciplinary and requires a broad perspective that incorporates the biological and physical sciences, climate science, information technology, and scientific capacity in mission areas across the Bureau. With its emphasis on coordination, this strategy can provide a critical underpinning for integrated science efforts with scientists from multiple mission areas of the USGS working together. Of course, the USGS will continue to conduct both discipline-specific and interdisciplinary investigations, and both will continue to be vital parts of the ecosystem science portfolio. Finally, the strategy stresses the importance of coordination with other Federal agencies and organizations in the natural resources community. The USGS collaborates with resource agencies in the DOI and other organizations throughout the world to meet societal needs for species and ecosystem management. Working with these agencies and organizations, the USGS will play a key role over the next decade in advancing the scientific foundation for sustaining the natural resources that diverse, productive, resilient ecosystems provide.

Open-File Report↗
USGS2026

Historical ice jams and associated environmental conditions on Osoyoos Lake

Ice jams occur regularly at the southern outlet of Osoyoos Lake, which spans the border between the State of Washington and British Columbia, Canada. In recent winters, ice jams caused (1) decreases in downstream discharge that may adversely affect salmon spawning habitat and (2) short-duration lake-level rise that can interfere with lake level management agreements. In response, water managers sought to understand the environmental conditions associated with the historical ice-jam occurrences on Osoyoos Lake. Researchers compiled datasets of discharge, lake level, and air temperature from four meteorological and three hydrologic stations near Oroville, Washington, to determine “ice-jam” or “non-ice-jam” days from 1942 to 2024. After confirming known ice jams since 1994 using Landsat 8–9 and Sentinel–2 satellite imagery along with discharge, lake level, and air temperature data, researchers designated ice-jam days. They conducted statistical analyses to examine environmental conditions associated with ice-jam occurrences on Osoyoos Lake. Statistical tests indicated significant differences in wind speed, wind direction, and air temperature between ice-jam and non-ice-jam days. A linear discriminant-analysis model correctly predicted 12 of 13 historical ice-jam days since 1994 and determined that ice jams are more likely under westerly and northwesterly winds near or above 10 kilometers per hour (km/h) and minimum temperatures near or below –9.4 degrees Celsius (°C). An analysis of historical discharge suggests that ice jams have occurred since at least the 1940s, but 13 ice jam days occurred in the past decade (2014–2024), exceeding any previous decade. The daily minimum air temperature in the Osoyoos Lake region has increased at a rate of 0.021 °C per year since the 1940s, but ice jams usually occur in winters with colder average temperatures.

British Columbia, Washington↗
USGS2007

Tracking environmental dynamics and agricultural intensification in southern Mali

The Office de la Haute Vallée du Fleuve Niger (OHVN) zone in southern Mali is a small but important agricultural production region. Against a background of environmental degradation including decades of declining rainfall, soil erosion, and human pressure on forest resources, numerous farming communities stand out through the use of improved soil and water management practices that have improved agricultural and environmental conditions. Field surveys conducted in 1998–2001 indicated that environmental and agricultural conditions have improved in the past decade. In an effort to better quantify environmental trends, we conducted a study using medium- and high-resolution remotely sensed images from 1965 to 2001 in order to analyze land use and land cover trends in 21 village territories. The trends show clear indications of agricultural intensification and diversification among villages that have received assistance from the OHVN agricultural development agency. Some communities have improved environmental conditions by protecting their forest resources through community management actions. Four decades of remotely sensed images played a practical role in tracking and quantifying environmental and agricultural conditions over time.

Agricultural Systems↗
USGS2021

Advancing estuarine ecological forecasts: Seasonal hypoxia in Chesapeake Bay

Ecological forecasts are quantitative tools that can guide ecosystem management. The coemergence of extensive environmental monitoring and quantitative frameworks allows for widespread development and continued improvement of ecological forecasting systems. We use a relatively simple estuarine hypoxia model to demonstrate advances in addressing some of the most critical challenges and opportunities of contemporary ecological forecasting, including predictive accuracy, uncertainty characterization, and management relevance. We explore the impacts of different combinations of forecast metrics, drivers, and driver time windows on predictive performance. We also incorporate multiple sets of state-variable observations from different sources and separately quantify model prediction error and measurement uncertainty through a flexible Bayesian hierarchical framework. Results illustrate the benefits of (1) adopting forecast metrics and drivers that strike an optimal balance between predictability and relevance to management, (2) incorporating multiple data sources in the calibration data set to separate and propagate different sources of uncertainty, and (3) using the model in scenario mode to probabilistically evaluate the effects of alternative management decisions on future ecosystem state. In the Chesapeake Bay, the subject of this case study, we find that average summer or total annual hypoxia metrics are more predictable than monthly metrics and that measurement error represents an important source of uncertainty. Application of the model in scenario mode suggests that absent watershed management actions over the past decades, long-term average hypoxia would have increased by 7% compared to 1985. Conversely, the model projects that if management goals currently in place to restore the Bay are met, long-term average hypoxia would eventually decrease by 32% with respect to the mid-1980s.

Chesapeake Bay↗
USGS2018

A social–ecological perspective for riverscape management in the Columbia River Basin

Riverscapes are complex, landscape-scale mosaics of connected river and stream habitats embedded in diverse ecological and socioeconomic settings. Social–ecological interactions among stakeholders often complicate natural-resource conservation and management of riverscapes. The management challenges posed by the conservation and restoration of wild salmonid populations in the Columbia River Basin (CRB) of western North America are one such example. Because of their ecological, cultural, and socioeconomic importance, salmonids present a complex management landscape due to interacting environmental factors (eg climate change, invasive species) as well as socioeconomic and political factors (eg dams, hatcheries, land-use change, transboundary agreements). Many of the problems in the CRB can be linked to social–ecological interactions occurring within integrated ecological, human–social, and regional–climatic spheres. Future management and conservation of salmonid populations therefore depends on how well the issues are understood and whether they can be resolved through effective communication and collaboration among ecologists, social scientists, stakeholders, and policy makers.

Columbia River Basin↗
USGS1997

Evaluation of agricultural best-management practices in the Conestoga River headwaters, Pennsylvania: Hydrology of a small carbonate site near Ephrata, Pennsylvania, prior to implementation of nutrient management

The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, investigated the effects of agricultural best-management practices on water quality in the Conestoga River headwaters watershed. This report describes environmental factors and the surface-water and ground-water quality of one 47.5-acre field site, Field-Site 2, from October 1984 through September 1986, prior to implementation of nutrient management. The site is partially terraced agricultural cropland underlain by carbonate rock. Twenty-seven acres are terraced, pipe-drained, and are under no-till cultivation. The remaining acreage is under minimum-till cultivation. Corn is the primary crop. The average annual rate of fertilization at the site was 480 pounds per acre of nitrogen and 110 pounds per acre of phosphorus. An unconfined limestone and dolomitic aquifer underlies the site, Depth to bedrock ranges from 5 to 30 feet below land surface. Estimated specific yields range from 0.05 to 0.10, specific capacities of wells range from less than 1 to about 20 gallons per minute per foot of drawdown, and estimates of transmissivities range from 10 to 10,000 square feet per day. Average ground-water recharge was estimated to be about 23 inches per year. The specific capacity and transmissivity data indicate that two aquifer regimes are present at the site. Wells drilled into dolomites in the eastern part of the site have larger specific capacities (averaging 20 gallons per minute per foot of drawdown) relative to specific capacities (averaging less than 1 gallon per minute per foot of drawdown) of wells drilled into limestones in the western part of the site. Median concentrations of soil-soluble nitrate and soluble phosphorus in the top 4 feet of silt- or silty-clay-loam soil ranged from 177 to 329 and 8.5 to 35 pounds per acre, respectively. Measured runoff from the pipe-drained terraces ranged from 10 to 48,000 cubic feet and was 1.7 and 0.8 percent, respectively, of the 1985 and 1986 annual precipitation. An estimated 90,700 cubic feet of surface runoff carried 87 pounds to total nitrogen and 37 pounds of total phosphorus, or less that 0.65 percent of the amount of either nutrient applied during the study period. Rainfall on the snow-covered, frozen ground produced more that half of the runoff and nitrogen and phosphorus loads measured in pipe-drained runoff. Graphical and regression analyses of surface runoff suggest that (1) mean-storm concentrations of total nitrogen species and total phosphorus decreased with increasing time between a runoff event and the last previous nutrient application, and (2) mean total-phosphorus concentrations approached a baseline value (estimated at 2 to 5 milligrams per liter for total-phosphorus concentrations) after several months without nutrient applications. Dissolved nitrate concentrations in ground water in wells unaffected by an on-site ammonia spill ranged from 7.4 to 100 milligrams per liter. Average annual additions and removals of nitrogen were estimated. Nitrogen was added to the site by applications of manure and commercial fertilizer nitrogen, as well as by precipitation and ground water entering across the western site boundary. These sources of nitrogen accounted for 95, 3, 1, and 1 percent, respectively, of estimated additions. Nitrogen was removed from the site in harvested crops, by ground-water discharge, by volatilization, and in surface runoff, which accounted for 42, 28, 29, and less than 1 percent, respectively, of estimated removals.

Pennsylvania↗
USGS2017

Effectiveness of environmental flows for riparian restoration in arid regions: A tale of four rivers

Environmental flows have become important restoration tools on regulated rivers. However, environmental flows are often constrained by other demands within the river system and thus typically are comprised of smaller water volumes than the natural flows they are meant to replace, which can limit their functional efficacy. We review environmental flow programs aimed at restoring riparian vegetation on four arid zone rivers: the Tarim River in China; the Bill Williams River in Arizona, U.S.; the delta of the Colorado River in Mexico; and the Murrumbidgee River in southern Australia. Our goal is to determine what worked and what did not work to accomplish restoration goals. The lower Tarim River in China formerly formed a “green corridor” across the Taklamakan Desert. The riparian zone deteriorated due to diversion of surface and groundwater for irrigated agriculture. A massive restoration program began in 2000 with release of 1038 million cubic meters of water over the first three years. Groundwater levels rose but the ecological response was less than expected politically, socially and within the scientific community. However, releases continued and by 2015 portions of the original iconic Populus euphratica (Euphrates poplar) forest were reestablished. The natural flow regime of the Bill Williams River was disrupted by construction of a dam in 1968, dramatically reducing peak flows along with associated fluvial processes. As a result, the channel narrowed and riparian vegetation expanded and was comprised largely of an introduced shrub species ( Tamarix spp.). Environmental flow releases including small, managed floods and sustained base flows have been implemented since the mid 1990’s to promote establishment and maintenance of native riparian trees (cottonwoods and willows) and have been successful, although in a “downsized” portion of the valley bottom. Experience from the Bill Williams was used to help design the Minute 319 environmental flow in the delta of the Colorado River in 2014. Water was released as a short, one-time pulse during spring with the intent of starting new cohorts of cottonwood and willow. However, fluvial disturbance was limited by the relatively small magnitude pulse, low flows did not continue throughout the growing season in some reaches, native tree recruitment was low, and most of the new plants recruited were Tamarix . The inundated portion of the floodplain did respond with a temporary increase in greenness as measured by satellite vegetation indices, however. The Murrumbidgee River in Australia is a tributary in the Murray-Darling River Basin, which supports iconic red gum ( Eucalyptus camaldulensis ) forests that depend on near-yearly floods for maintenance. During the recent Millennial Drought (2000–2010) environmental flows were provided on an experimental basis to small portions of the Yanga National Forest to see how much water was needed. As with the Colorado River delta, gains in vegetation vigor as measured by satellite vegetation indices following the flows were temporary. Environmental flows in the Bill Williams were able to restore enough overbank flooding and fluvial disturbance to promote some establishment of new cohorts of trees, but on the Colorado and Murrumbidgee Rivers larger volumes of total flows released over longer periods and targeted restoration will be needed to restore the ecosystems. A measure of success in restoring the Euphrates poplar forest on the Tarim and germinating new chorts of willows on the Bill Williams has been achieved after 15–20 years of environmental flows, but the Colorado River delta and Murrumbidgee Rivers have only received one or two flows. Success in enhancing native trees in the Colorado delta has been achieved in restoration plots, but the Murrumbidgee will require large overbank flows on a continuing schedule to rejuvenate the red gum forest.

Ecological Engineering↗
USGS2020

The response of streams to changes in atmospheric deposition of sulfur and nitrogen in the Adirondack Mountains

Acidic deposition is the result of upwind sulfur (S) and nitrogen (N) emissions into the atmosphere from human activities. Environmental impacts from acidic deposition across forested landscapes include acidification of soil and drainage water, depletion of available soil nutrient bases, and impacts to and changes in forest and aquatic species composition and biodiversity. Acidic deposition can mobilize aluminum (Al) from soil-to-soil solution and subsequently to drainage water in forms that can be toxic to aquatic life. When exposed to decreasing levels of acidic deposition, which has been occurring in New York since the late 1970s, some soils and drainage waters have become gradually less acidic. Remaining questions relate to effects on stream resources, anticipated resource recovery under increasingly lower levels of deposition, and the levels of deposition (target loads, TLs) needed to reach a range of stream ecosystem recovery targets. Environmental scientists commonly estimate thresholds of air pollutant emissions and resulting atmospheric deposition at which adverse ecological effects are manifested. This analysis is often done using critical loads (CL) and/or TLs, using approaches that account for the spatial and temporal aspects of acidification and recovery. Exceedance represents the extent to which current levels of acidic deposition exceed the level expected to cause ecological harm. The research reported here is intended to help address S and N deposition TLs and ecosystem recovery of Adirondack streams, a resource that has been less thoroughly investigated than lakes. The overarching goal of this work is to highlight key considerations that will help inform decision-makers and ecosystem managers who are responsible for environmental policy in New York State and beyond. Salient aspects of stream TL modeling are discussed with an aim of informing not only scientists, but also policymakers, ecosystem managers, and nonscientists who are required to make decisions related to the effects of acidic deposition on natural ecosystems. Analyses reported herein quantify relations among chemical indicators and metrics of fish community health and biodiversity in streams of the Adirondack Park. This information is used to indicate levels of atmospheric deposition necessary to alleviate harmful effects on fish populations. Results of this investigation provide a framework that can be applied to better understand how modeled stream acid neutralizing capacity (ANC) values that are developed to support TL investigations can be adjusted to reflect high-flow ANC values that may be associated with toxic conditions. Since process models are often calibrated to a low-flow or average flow condition, the magnitude and spatial extent of TL exceedances increase substantially when episodic acidification is considered.

New York↗
USGS2024

Evaluating the reliability of environmental concentration data to characterize exposure in environmental risk assessments

Environmental risk assessments often rely on measured concentrations in environmental matrices to characterize exposure of the population of interest—typically, humans, aquatic biota, or other wildlife. Yet, there is limited guidance available on how to report and evaluate exposure datasets for reliability and relevance, despite their importance to regulatory decision-making. This paper is the second of a four-paper series detailing the outcomes of a Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry Technical Workshop that has developed Criteria for Reporting and Evaluating Exposure Datasets (CREED). It presents specific criteria to systematically evaluate the reliability of environmental exposure datasets. These criteria can help risk assessors understand and characterize uncertainties when existing data are used in various types of assessments and can serve as guidance on best practice for the reporting of data for data generators (to maximize utility of their datasets). Although most reliability criteria are universal, some practices may need to be evaluated considering the purpose of the assessment. Reliability refers to the inherent quality of the dataset and evaluation criteria address the identification of analytes, study sites, environmental matrices, sampling dates, sample collection methods, analytical method performance, data handling or aggregation, treatment of censored data, and generation of summary statistics. Each criterion is evaluated as “fully met,” “partly met,” “not met or inappropriate,” “not reported,” or “not applicable” for the dataset being reviewed. The evaluation concludes with a scheme for scoring the dataset as reliable with or without restrictions, not reliable, or not assignable, and is demonstrated with three case studies representing both organic and inorganic constituents, and different study designs and assessment purposes. Reliability evaluation can be used in conjunction with relevance evaluation (assessed separately) to determine the extent to which environmental monitoring datasets are “fit for purpose,” that is, suitable for use in various types of assessments. Integr Environ Assess Manag 2024;00:1–23. © 2024 Society of Environmental Toxicology & Chemistry (SETAC). This article has been contributed to by U.S. Government employees and their work is in the public domain in the USA.

Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management↗
USGS2019

Stormwater-quality performance of line permeable pavement systems

Three permeable pavements were evaluated for their ability to improve the quality of stormwater runoff over a 22-month period in Madison, Wisconsin. Using a lined system with no internal water storage, permeable interlocking concrete pavers (PICP), pervious concrete (PC), and porous asphalt (PA) were able to significantly remove sediment and sediment-bound pollutant loads from runoff originating from an asphalt parking lot five times larger than the receiving permeable pavement area. Reductions in total suspended solids were similar for all three surfaces at approximately 60 percent. Clogging occurred after approximately one year, primarily due to winter sand application that led to high sediment load in spring runoff. Winter road salt application resulted in high chloride load that was initially attenuated in all three permeable pavements but later released during subsequent spring runoff events. Total phosphorus load was reduced by nearly 20 percent for PICP and PA, and 43 percent for PC. These values were likely tempered by the export of dissolved phosphorus observed in PICP and PA, but not PC. Average removal efficiencies for metals were 40, 42, and 49 percent in PA, PICP, and PC, respectively. A median pH of 10.2 in PC effluent could explain elevated removal efficiency of phosphorus and select metals in PC over PICP and PA (median = 7.5 and 7.8, respectfully) through enhanced precipitation. Elevated pH values in PC may also have led to higher removal efficiencies for select metals than PICP or PA. The environmental benefits as well as potential unintended consequences of stormwater practices like permeable pavement that utilize infiltration as a form of treatment warrant consideration in management of urban runoff.

Wisconsin↗
USGS2016

Developing fish trophic interaction indicators of climate change for the Great Lakes

This project addressed regional climate change effects on aquatic food webs in the Great Lakes. We sought insights by examining Lake Erie as a representative system with a high level of anthropogenic impacts, strong nutrient gradients, seasonal hypoxia, and spatial overlap of cold- and cool-water fish guilds. In Lake Erie and in large embayments throughout the Great Lakes basin, this situation is a concern for fishery managers, as climate change may exacerbate hypoxia and reduce habitat volume for some species. We examined fish community composition, fine-scale distribution, prey availability, diets, and biochemical tracers for dominant fishes from study areas with medium-high nutrient levels (mesotrophic, Fairport study area), and low nutrient levels (oligotrophic, Erie study area). This multi-year database (2011-2013) provides the ability to contrast years with wide variation in rainfall, winter ice-cover, and thermal stratification. In addition, multiple indicators of dietary and distributional responses to environmental variability will allow resource managers to select the most informative approach for addressing specific climate change questions. Our results support the incorporation of some relatively simple and cost-efficient approaches into existing agency monitoring programs to track the near-term condition status of fish and fish community composition by functional groupings. Other metrics appear better suited for understanding longer-term changes, and may take more resources to implement on an ongoing basis. Although we hypothesized that dietary overlap and similarity in selected species would be sharply different during thermal stratification and hypoxic episodes, we found little evidence of this. Instead, to our surprise, this study found that fish tended to aggregate at the edges of hypoxia, highlighting potential spatial changes in catch efficiency of the fishery. This work has had several positive impacts on a wide range of resource management and stakeholder activities, most notably in Lake Erie. The results were instrumental in the development of an interim decision rule for dealing with data collected during hypoxic events to improve stock assessment of Yellow Perch. In addition, novel findings from this study regarding spatial and temporal variability in hypoxia have aided US-Environmental Protection Agency in the development of a modified sampling protocol to more accurately quantify the central basin hypoxic zone, and this directly addressed a goal of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement of 2012 to reduce the extent and severity of hypoxia. Finally, the study areas developed in this project formed the basis for food web sampling in the 2014 bi-national Coordinated Science and Monitoring Initiative work in Lake Erie.

Report↗
USGS2023

Prioritizing science efforts to inform decision making on public lands

Public land management agencies in the US are committed to using science-informed decision making, but there has been little research on the types and topics of science that managers need most to inform their decisions. We used the National Environmental Policy Act to identify four types of science information needed for making decisions relevant to public lands: (1) data on resources of concern, (2) scientific studies relevant to potential effects of proposed actions, (3) methods for quantifying potential effects of proposed actions, and (4) effective mitigation measures. We then used this framework to analyze 70 Environmental Assessments completed by the Bureau of Land Management in Colorado. Commonly proposed actions were oil and gas development, livestock grazing, land transactions, and recreation. Commonly analyzed resources included terrestrial wildlife, protected birds, vegetation, and soils. Focusing research efforts on the intersection of these resources and actions, and on developing and evaluating the effectiveness of mitigation measures to protect these resources, could strengthen the science foundation for public lands decision making.

Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment↗
USGS2025

Component identification of solid biomass fuels using reflected light microscopy: Interlaboratory study 2

As nations transition toward sustainable energy systems , biomass has become a vital component of global energy portfolios. Derived from organic materials such as wood, agricultural residues, forestry byproducts, and organic waste, biomass is a renewable energy source with significant environmental and economic benefits. Responsible biomass energy production can improve waste management, reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, and mitigate environmental pollution. However, as the diversity of biomass-derived fuels increases, robust quality assessment methods are essential to ensure their efficiency, safety, and minimal environmental impact. Reflected light microscopy (RLM) is one such technique with the potential to complement conventional physico-chemical analyses by enabling a rapid identification of material constituents and impurities. To refine this methodology and evaluate the reproducibility of solid biomass component identification using RLM, an interlaboratory study (ILS) was conducted. The study involved the recognition of 58 components across 45 photomicrographs, with the participation of 65 scientists and students from 25 countries. The participants faced high difficulty identifying some of the marked components, and as a result, the percentage of correct answers ranged from 19.0 % to 98.3 %, with an average correct identification rate of 62.7 %. The most challenging aspects of the identification process included distinguishing between woody and non-woody (agro) biomass, accurately identifying petroleum-derived materials, and differentiating agro biomass from inorganic matter. The results suggest that while RLM is an important tool for characterizing solid biomass, further development of methodology guidelines and training are necessary to enhance its effectiveness. Future research should prioritize preparing detailed, image-rich, microscopic morphological descriptions of biomass fuel components, which could improve the accuracy and reliability of using RLM in biomass fuel characterization.

International Journal of Coal Geology↗
USGS1996

Effects of agricultural best-management practices on the Brush Run Creek headwaters, Adams County, Pennsylvania, prior to and during nutrient management

The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Susquehanna River Basin Commission and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Resources, investigated the effects of agricultural best-management practices on surface-water quality as part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Chesapeake Bay Program. This report characterizes a 0.63-square- mile agricultural watershed underlain by shale, mudstone, and red arkosic sandstone in the Lower Susquehanna River Basin. The water quality of the Brush Run Creek site was studied from October 1985 through September 1991, prior to and during the implementation of nutrient management designed to reduce sediment and nutrient discharges into Conewago Creek, a tributary to the Chesapeake Bay. The original study area was 0.38 square mile and included an area immediately upstream from a manure lagoon. The study area was increased to 0.63 square mile in the fall of 1987 after an extensive tile-drain network was discovered upstream and downstream from the established streamflow gage, and the farm owner made plans to spray irrigate manure to the downstream fields. Land use for about 64 percent of the 0.63 square mile watershed is cropland, 14 percent is pasture, 7 percent is forest, and the remaining 15 percent is yards, buildings, water, or gardens. About 73 percent of the cropland was used to produce corn during the study. The average annual animal population consisted of 57,000 chickens, 1,530 hogs, and 15 sheep during the study. About 59,340 pounds of nitrogen and 13,710 pounds of phosphorus were applied as manure and commercial fertilizer to fields within the subbasin during the 3-year period prior to implementation of nutrient management. During nutrient management, about 14 percent less nitrogen and 57 percent less phosphorus were applied as commercial and manure fertilizer. Precipitation totaled 209 inches, or 13 percent less than the long-term normal, during the 6-year study. Concentrations of total ammonia in precipitation were as high as 2.7 mg/L (milligrams per liter); in dry deposition the concentrations were as high as 5.4 mg/L, probably because of the ammonia that had volatilized from the manure-storage lagoon. Nitrate nitrogen in the upper 4 feet of the soil ranged from 17 to 452 pounds per acre and soluble phosphorus content ranged from 0.29 to 65 pounds per acre. The maximum concentration of total nitrogen was 2,400 mg/L on September 10, 1986, in discharge from the tile drain near the streamflow gage. Median concentrations of total nitrogen and dissolved nitrite plus nitrate in base flow at the water-quality gage were 14 mg/L and 4.4 mg/L, respectively; prior to nutrient management and during nutrient management, median concentrations were 14 mg/L and 6.2 mg/L, respectively. Significant reductions in total phosphorus and suspended-sediment concentrations occurred at the water-quality gage. The maximum concentrations of total phosphorus (160 mg/L) and suspended sediment (3,530 mg/L) were measured at a tile line above the water-quality gage. Concentrations of total nitrogen, dissolved ammonia, and total phosphorus in base flow increased during dry periods when discharges from the tile drain were not diluted. During nutrient management, only base-flow loads of suspended sediment increased. Total streamflow was about 121.8 inches. About 81 percent was storm runoff. Loads of total nitrogen, total phosphorus in stormflow, and suspended sediment increased 14, 44, and 41 percent during nutrient management, respectively. A load of about 787,780 pounds of sediment, 22,418 pounds of nitrogen, and 5,479 pounds of phosphorus was measured during 214 sampled stormflow days that represented 84 percent of the stormflow. About 812,924 pounds of sediment, 38,421 pounds of nitrogen, and 6,377 pounds of phosphorus were discharged during the 6-year study.

Pennsylvania↗
USGS2009

Sustaining visitor use in protected areas: Future opportunities in recreation ecology research based on the USA experience

Recreation ecology, the study of environmental consequences of outdoor recreation activities and their effective management, is a relatively new field of scientific study having emerged over the last 50 years. During this time, numerous studies have improved our understanding of how use-related, environmental and managerial factors affect ecological conditions and processes. Most studies have focused on vegetation and soil responses to recreation-related trampling on trails and recreation sites using indicators such as percent vegetation cover and exposed mineral soil. This applied approach has and will continue to yield important information for land managers. However, for the field to advance, more attention needs to be given to other ecosystem attributes and to the larger aspects of environmental conservation occurring at landscape scales. This article is an effort at initiating a dialog on needed advances in the field. We begin by reviewing broadly generalizable knowledge of recreation ecology, to separate what is known from research gaps. Then, based on the authors’ perspective of research in the USA and North America, several research directions are suggested as essential for continued progress in this field including theoretical development, broadening scale, integration with other disciplines, and examination of synergistic effects.

Environmental Management↗
USGS2024

Season of death, pathogen persistence and wildlife behaviour alter number of anthrax secondary infections from environmental reservoirs

An important part of infectious disease management is predicting factors that influence disease outbreaks, such as R , the number of secondary infections arising from an infected individual. Estimating R is particularly challenging for environmentally transmitted pathogens given time lags between cases and subsequent infections. Here, we calculated R for Bacillus anthracis infections arising from anthrax carcass sites in Etosha National Park, Namibia. Combining host behavioural data, pathogen concentrations and simulation models, we show that R is spatially and temporally variable, driven by spore concentrations at death, host visitation rates and early preference for foraging at infectious sites. While spores were detected up to a decade after death, most secondary infections occurred within 2 years. Transmission simulations under scenarios combining site infectiousness and host exposure risk under different environmental conditions led to dramatically different outbreak dynamics, from pathogen extinction ( R < 1) to explosive outbreaks ( R > 10). These transmission heterogeneities may explain variation in anthrax outbreak dynamics observed globally, and more generally, the critical importance of environmental variation underlying host–pathogen interactions. Notably, our approach allowed us to estimate the lethal dose of a highly virulent pathogen non-invasively from observational studies and epidemiological data, useful when experiments on wildlife are undesirable or impractical.

Etosha National Park↗
USGS2018

Forecasting an invasive species’ distribution with global distribution data, local data, and physiological information

Understanding invasive species distributions and potential invasions often requires broad‐scale information on the environmental tolerances of the species. Further, resource managers are often faced with knowing these broad‐scale relationships as well as nuanced environmental factors related to their landscape that influence where an invasive species occurs and potentially could occur. Using invasive buffelgrass ( Cenchrus ciliaris ), we developed global models and local models for Saguaro National Park, Arizona, USA, based on location records and literature on physiological tolerances to environmental factors to investigate whether environmental relationships of a species at a global scale are also important at local scales. In addition to correlative models with five commonly used algorithms, we also developed a model using a priori user‐defined relationships between occurrence and environmental characteristics based on a literature review. All correlative models at both scales performed well based on statistical evaluations. The user‐defined curves closely matched those produced by the correlative models, indicating that the correlative models may be capturing mechanisms driving the distribution of buffelgrass. Given climate projections for the region, both global and local models indicate that conditions at Saguaro National Park may become more suitable for buffelgrass. Combining global and local data with correlative models and physiological information provided a holistic approach to forecasting invasive species distributions.

Arizona↗
USGS2025

Ecovoltaic solar energy development effects to microclimate, temperature, and soil moisture in panel array interspaces in a warm desert

Solar energy development is increasing in warm deserts of the southwestern United States, and ecovoltaics has emerged as an approach to maintain ecosystem function within solar facilities while meeting increasing regional energy demands. The Solar Gemini Project, located in the northeastern Mojave Desert, USA, is one of largest photovoltaic facilities incorporating an ecovoltaics approach, including novel installation practices to reduce disturbance to soil and vegetation and solar tracking bifacial photovoltaic panels to maximize energy generation. To further understand the influence of the facility on environmental conditions, we compared microclimate, temperature, and soil moisture in bare soil interspaces between panel arrays inside the facility to undisturbed desert in nearby areas outside the facility from June 2023–February 2025. Our comparisons included different seasons (summer versus winter), soil depth (shallow versus deep), and facility operation (inactive versus active panels with solar-tracking). We found lower solar radiation, wind speed, and evaporative demand inside the facility compared to outside the facility, with greater differences when panels were actively tracking. When panels were active, air temperature inside and outside the facility was similar on average, but was higher inside the facility during the day and lower at night. Soil surface temperature was lower inside the facility due to panel shading in the morning and evening, whereas soil temperature (0–15 cm) was consistently higher inside the facility. Soil moisture was higher inside the facility and did not drop to the low levels observed outside the facility. In total, we found lower evaporative demand, less heat loading, and higher soil moisture inside the Gemini facility, potentially benefitting flora and fauna in the harsh desert landscape. Yet, we also found daytime increases in air and soil surface temperature inside the facility, and persistent increases to soil temperature. These findings highlight the potentially positive and negative environmental changes associated with ecovoltaics solar energy development in warm deserts and provide evidence that can inform the optimization of solar photovoltaics design and management.

Nevada↗