Impact of floodplain and Stage 0 stream restoration on flood attenuation and floodplain exchange during small frequent storms

River flooding impacts human life and infrastructure, yet provides habitat and ecosystem services. Traditional flood control (e.g., levees, dams) reduces habitat and ecosystem services, and exacerbates flooding elsewhere. Floodplain restoration (i.e., bankfull floodplain reconnection and Stage 0) can also provide flood management, but has not been sufficiently evaluated for small frequent storms. We used 1D unsteady Hydrologic Engineering Center's River Analysis System to simulate small storms in a 5 km-long, second-order generic stream from the Chesapeake Bay watershed, and varied % channel restored (starting at the upstream end), restoration location, restoration bank height (distinguishes bankfull from Stage 0 restoration), and floodplain width/Manning's n. Stream restoration decreased (attenuated) peak flow up to 37% and increased floodplain exchange by up to 46%. Floodplain width and % channel restored had the largest impact on flood attenuation. The incremental effects of new restoration projects on flood attenuation were greatest when little prior restoration had occurred. By contrast, incremental effects on floodplain exchange were greatest in the presence of substantial prior restoration, setting up a tradeoff. A similar tradeoff was revealed between attenuation and exchange for project location, but not bank height or floodplain width. In particular, attenuation and exchange were always greater for Stage 0 than for bankfull floodplain restoration. Stage 0 thus may counteract human impacts such as urbanization.     

A Simulation Study to Assess the Sensitivity of a Forest Health Monitoring Network to Outbreaks of Defoliating Insects

The sensitivity of the United States Forest Health Monitoring network to outbreaks of defoliating insects was examined by means of a simulation study. A model constructed specifically for the study was used to generate a wide variety of defoliation patterns in forested landscapes. Forest configuration was that of Minnesota, USA, as expressed by the GAP land cover classification. Combinations of model parameters were based on a Latin Hypercube sample. The relationship between the average number of plots defoliated and outbreak characteristics was then examined via multiple regression. Both theoretical and model results pointed to a strong, linear relationship between the average number of plots defoliated and outbreak size. Model results provided additional insight, suggesting a significant relationship between the average number of plots defoliated and other outbreak characteristics after outbreak size was taken into account.     

Sensitivity analysis of a parameterization of the stomatal component of the DO3SE model for Quercus ilex to estimate ozone fluxes

A sensitivity analysis of a proposed parameterization of the stomatal conductance (g(s)) module of the European ozone deposition model (DO(3)SE) for Quercus ilex was performed. The performance of the model was tested against measured g(s) in the field at three sites in Spain. The best fit of the model was found for those sites, or during those periods, facing no or mild stress conditions, but a worse performance was found under severe drought or temperature stress, mostly occurring at continental sites. The best performance was obtained when both f(phen) and f(SWP) were included. A local parameterization accounting for the lower temperatures recorded in winter and the higher water shortage at the continental sites resulted in a better performance of the model. The overall results indicate that two different parameterizations of the model are needed, one for marine-influenced sites and another one for continental sites.     

Images of war: using satellite images for human rights monitoring in Turkish Kurdistan

In areas of war and armed conflict it is difficult to get trustworthy and coherent information. Civil society and human rights groups often face problems of dealing with fragmented witness reports, disinformation of war propaganda, and difficult direct access to these areas. Turkish Kurdistan was used as a case study of armed conflict to evaluate the potential use of satellite images for verification of witness reports collected by human rights groups. The Turkish army was reported to be burning forests, fields and villages as a strategy in the conflict against guerrilla uprising. This paper concludes that satellite images are useful to validate witness reports of forest fires. Even though the use of this technology for human rights groups will depend on some feasibility factors such as prices, access and expertise, the images proved to be key for analysis of spatial aspects of conflict and valuable for reconstructing a more trustworthy picture.     

Evaluation of Carbon Uptake and Emissions by Forests in Korea During the Last Thirty Years (1973–2002)

The contribution of Korean forests to carbon sequestration for anthropogenic carbon emissions was evaluated. In addition, monitoring of carbon species released from forest fires was conducted. Despite a high carbon uptake by Korean forests, a tremendous increase in fossil fuel burning resulted in a small contribution by forests to carbon removal. The removal efficiency had a 5–31% range with an average of 12% during the period 1973–2002. In 2000, the amount of carbon released from burned trees corresponded to 1.6% of carbon uptake by forests. The distribution of surface CO concentration (ppb) derived from MOPITT (Measurement of Pollution in the Troposphere) showed high CO levels over the East/Japan Sea on April 10, 2000 when the largest forest fires occurred along the east coast of Korea. Trajectory analysis and ground CO measurements also indicated that CO levels over the East/Japan Sea were influenced by forest fires. This study suggests that continuous monitoring of carbon emissions from forest fires is needed for a more reliable estimate of carbon flux in the environment.     

Barriers Beyond the Partners: Bureaucratic and Political Constraints to Implementing Joint Forest Management in Tamil Nadu,India

Whereas past research has treated co-management of common pool resources as if villagers and project implementing authorities were the only relevant actors, numerous external factors beyond the control of these two partners create barriers to successful co-management. This paper draws on discussions with Forest Department officials to examine the influence of these forces on the outcomes of Joint Forest Management (JFM) in Tamil Nadu, India. An empirical inquiry into the operational aspects of JFM indicates the important roles of political parties, powerful people, and other state institutions and functionaries as well as the flow of foreign funding. Further, the strong demand by local people for socio-economic development interventions as opposed to improvement of degraded forests belittles the role of the Forest Department relative to other departments. Numerous other conditioning factors and relationships are explored. The authors call for reforms in public governance to allow better participation of all the actors involved for this participatory management approach to succeed and sustain.     

Paleoecology and dynamics of forest ecosystems in Central Evenkia during the past 2400 years

New data on the composition of surface assemblages of plant macroremains from soil and swamp samples have been obtained in the study of geomorphologically different localities in the middle reaches of the Nizhnyaya Tunguska River. The results of paleocarpological analysis of forest soil sections supported by relevant palynological and geochronological data are presented. Natural changes of the forest cover over the past 2400 years and quantitative characteristics of the paleoclimate during each stage are described.Translated from Ekologiya, No. 1, 2005, pp. 3–10.Original Russian Text Copyright © 2005 by Koshkarova, Koshkarov.     

不同空间划分方式下袁河流域景观结构对水质的影响

近年来景观结构的水文效应受到关注,研究不同空间划分方式下景观结构对河流营养盐、重金属变化的影响机制对于流域生态保护具有重要意义.本文于2018年7月和2019年1月在袁河干流及支流38个采样点采集水样,测定水体营养盐类污染指标（DO、NO₃^--N、NH₄⁺-N、TP和DOC浓度）和重金属类污染指标（Cr、Mn、Fe、Cu、Zn、As、Cd和Pb浓度）.基于前向变量选择、冗余分析等方法,筛选景观结构指标,量化其在不同尺度下对水体营养盐、重金属变化的影响.结果表明：①农田、斑块密度（PD）、斑块聚集指数（COHESION）及散布与并列指数（IJI）是影响水体营养盐变化的主要指标.林地、建设用地（Res）、平均最近邻体距离（ENN_MN）和最大斑块指数（LPI）的组合是影响重金属变化的主要指标.②在河岸缓冲带与圆形缓冲区划分方式下,景观结构均在100 m尺度对营养盐变化解释能力最强,平均解释率分别为31.5%、24.3%,均在1000 m尺度对重金属变化解释能力最强,平均解释率分别为32.0%、42.6%.③100 m河岸缓冲带和子流域尺度分别是景观结构影响水体营养盐、重金属变化的最佳空间尺度,平均解释率分别为31.5%、42.8%.以上结果表明,针对水体不同的污染类型,采用对应的划分方式及缓冲尺度有助于提高定量分析精度,为流域水环境保护、景观优化与管理提供科学依据.     

激励相容理论视角下生态公益林补偿对农户的增收效应——以福建三明为例

基于福建三明499户农户的实地调查数据,用倾向得分匹配法测算了生态公益林现金直接补偿和岗位性补偿对农户的增收效应,结果表明：现金直接补偿和岗位性补偿对生态保护和农户增收都是正效应。现金直接补偿对农户增收效应不显著,而岗位性补偿对农户家庭总收入和家庭人均收入的净效应分别达55.4%和57%。进一步研究发现,两种补偿方式对贫困户和非贫困户的增收效应也不尽相同,其中现金直接补偿不利于贫困户增收,而岗位性补偿对不同收入的农户都具有正向显著增收效应。此外,从生态公益林的根本使命出发,可以发现现金直接补偿和岗位性补偿对生态保护的净效应也存在较大差异。故此,科学规划生态补偿方式和补偿标准是实现生态保护和农户增收双重效应的根源所在。     

基于RF-LSTM的鸡舍恶臭气体预测研究

以鸡舍氨气为研究对象,对鸡舍氨气预测模型进行了研究.首先,利用随机森林算法（RF）对影响鸡舍氨气浓度的环境变量进行重要性排序,选取温度、湿度、光照、气象温度、降雨量作为模型的输入变量;在此基础上,构建了基于长短时记忆神经网络（LSTM）的鸡舍氨气浓度预测模型,并将提出的预测模型应用于江苏省宜兴市某养鸡场的氨气浓度预测中,并与LSTM模型、RF-Elman模型和RF-BP模型进行了对比实验,结果表明,基于RF-LSTM模型的预测效果最好,其平均绝对误差（MAE）、平均绝对百分误差（MAPE）和均方根误差（RMSE）分别为0.9183、4.9637%和1.4262;同时,为了验证该模型的性能,本文还实现了不同时间尺度的鸡舍氨气浓度预测,提前2h、3h、4h、5h氨气预测的平均绝对误差（MAE）分别为1.6218、2.1991、2.8553和3.0677.本文提出的预测模型提高了鸡舍氨气浓度的预测精度,可为减少鸡舍恶臭气体排放提供科学依据.