调水调沙对黄河下游营养盐变化规律的影响

根据黄河首次调水调沙期间(2002年7月)和2002年在黄河利津站对营养盐的月际观测结果,系统分析了2002年黄河首次调水调沙期间黄河利津站和全年溶解无机态营养盐的变化,讨论了营养盐与水情要素之间的相互关系,计算了调水调沙期间及全年营养盐入海通量,并和历史资料作了比较.结果表明,调水调沙期间NO_3~-N、NO_2~--N、NH_4~+-N浓度的变化范围分别为169.3～273.2、 0.08～0.84、 1.39～5.04 μmol·dm~(-3),平均浓度分别为218.6、 0.16、 2.27 μmol·dm~(-3);PO_4~(3-)-P、 SiO_3~(2-)-Si浓度的变化范围为0.36～0.56、 161.4～195.8 μmol·dm～-3,平均浓度分别为0.48、 166.7 μmol·dm~(-3).在调水调沙期间,NO_3~--N浓度与水量无显著相关性,PO_4~(3-)-P浓度与水沙均无显著相关性,而SiO_3~(2-)-Si浓度与沙量呈显著正相关.与历史资料相比,调水调沙对黄河下游溶解态无机营养盐浓度在全年的变化规律并无明显影响.但黄河首次调水调沙短短不到一个月的时间,所输送的营养盐通量便占到当年输送通量的一半左右.调水调沙对营养盐输送通量在年内的分配产生重大影响,使得黄河营养盐向河口的输送非常集中.     

近50年辽宁热量资源时空演变特征分析

结合GIS技术、气候倾向率以及突变分析方法对辽宁近50年热量资源相关要素的时空演变特征和突变特征进行分析,研究表明：就区域平均值而言,除≥20℃积温以外,其它各界限温度积温都表现出极显著增多趋势,增幅在64~67℃•d /10a之间。≥0℃和≥5℃初日显著提前,≥10℃和≥15℃终日显著延后,持续日数都显著增多。≥0℃、≥5℃和≥10℃积温在1993年前后发生突变,≥15℃和≥20℃积温气候突变发生在1998年前后;≥0℃、≥10℃、≥20℃初日,≥0℃、≥5℃、≥10℃、≥15℃持续日数以及≥20℃终日都发生气候突变。在空间上,近50年≥0℃和≥10℃积温：在辽西大部、中部平原以及大连大部地区极显著增多,且增幅最大,在60℃•d/10a以上;在1970年代减少,从1980年代开始不断增多。≥0℃持续日数在中部平原、辽西南部、东部山区南部和大连南部地区显著增多,其中高值区范围在1980年代减小,低值区范围年代间交替变化。≥10℃持续日数在环渤海部分地区、中部平原和辽北部分地区显著增多,在1970年代大部地区减少,从1980年代开始,大部地区持续增多。     

Restoration of a Canadian Prairie Wetland with Agricultural and Municipal Wastewater

3 /day (800,000 US gallons) of municipal wastewater and beef processing wastewater. A large nongovernmental organization hastened restoration with a development process that outlined restoration goals and management objectives to satisfy a dual mandate of wastewater treatment and wildlife habitat creation. In 1995, after five years of wastewater additions, the basins had been refilled and the surrounding uplands had been acquired and restored. The Frank Lake Conservation Area currently provides high-quality habitat for a variety of wildlife in a region where many of the native plants and animals species have been lost due to habitat loss and fragmentation. The success of upland and water management strategies is reflected in the increase of target species' abundance and richness: 50 shorebird species, 44 waterfowl species, 15 raptor species, and 28 other new bird species have returned to the marsh since restoration. As well, significant N and P reduction occurs as waters flow through the first basin of the marsh. The management strategies of this project that satisfied a dual mandate serve as a model to guide managers of other large-scale wetland restoration projects.     

Maternal response to neonatal sibling conflict in the spotted hyena, <Emphasis Type="Italic">Crocuta crocuta</Emphasis>

Among spotted hyenas, Crocuta crocuta, neonatal aggression in twins is a well-known phenomenon and serves to establish intra-litter dominance soon after birth. As the stronger more aggressive cub presumably attains dominance over its twin, intra-litter dominance presents mothers with an ideal opportunity to assess individual cub fitness and, thereafter, to selectively favor one cub over the other. This study quantified maternal response to sibling conflict in 26 sets of twins born to 16 wild-living females to determine whether mothers of different social ranks exhibited favoritism towards sons or daughters, or in the case of same-sex twins, the dominant or subordinate cub. Maternal response to sibling conflict did not vary with litter sex composition, suggesting that mothers do not favor offspring of one sex over the other. All mothers intervened when their cubs fought and sometimes punished their cubs. Higher-ranking mothers more often punished both cubs, while lower-ranking mothers were more selective and punished the dominant cub. Where sibling aggression was most extreme, rather than favor the dominant sibling, mothers of all ranks made concessions to the subordinate cub that included procuring private nursing bouts for the subordinate and temporarily housing twins in separate dens, presumably to decrease sibling conflict. These findings represent a complex example of parent–offspring conflict and support both the insurance cub hypothesis and resource tracking hypothesis that mothers endeavor to keep all offspring alive for as long as possible in the event that the dominant sibling dies or that resources provide for the rearing of twins.     

CBM-CFS3: A model of carbon-dynamics in forestry and land-use change implementing IPCC standards

The scientific community, forest managers, environmental organizations, carbon-offset trading systems and policy-makers require tools to account for forest carbon stocks and carbon stock changes. In this paper we describe updates to the Carbon Budget Model of the Canadian Forest Sector (CBM-CFS3) implemented over the past years. This model of carbon-dynamics implements a Tier 3 approach of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Good Practice Guidance for reporting on carbon stocks and carbon stock changes resulting from Land Use, Land-use Change and Forestry (LULUCF). The CBM-CFS3 is a generic modelling framework that can be applied at the stand, landscape and national levels. The model provides a spatially referenced, hierarchical system for integrating datasets originating from different forest inventory and monitoring programs and includes a structure that allows for tracking of land areas by different land-use and land-use change classes. Ecosystem pools in CBM-CFS3 can be easily mapped to IPCC-defined pools and validated against field measurements. The model uses sophisticated algorithms for converting volume to biomass and explicitly simulates individual annual disturbance events (natural and anthropogenic). Several important scientific updates have been made to improve the representation of ecosystem structure and processes from previous versions of CBM-CFS. These include: (1) an expanded representation of dead organic matter and soil carbon, particularly standing dead trees, and a new algorithm for initializing these pools prior to simulation, (2) a change in the input data requirement for simulating growth from biomass to readily available merchantable volume curves, and new algorithms for converting volume to biomass, (3) improved prediction of belowground biomass, and (4) improved parameters for soil organic matter decay, fire, insect disturbances, and forest management. In addition, an operational-scale version of CBM-CFS3 is freely available and includes tools to import data in standard formats, including the output of several timber supply models that are commonly used in Canada. Although developed for Canadian forests, the flexible nature of the model has enabled it to be adapted for use in several other countries.     

Aquatic plant community invasibility and scale-dependent patterns in native and invasive species richness

Invasive species richness often is negatively correlated with native species richness at the small spatial scale of sampling plots, but positively correlated in larger areas. The pattern at small scales has been interpreted as evidence that native plants can competitively exclude invasive species. Large-scale patterns have been understood to result from environmental heterogeneity, among other causes. We investigated species richness patterns among submerged and floating-leaved aquatic plants (87 native species and eight invasives) in 103 temperate lakes in Connecticut (northeastern USA) and found neither a consistently negative relationship at small (3-m2) scales, nor a positive relationship at large scales. Native species richness at sampling locations was uncorrelated with invasive species richness in 37 of the 60 lakes where invasive plants occurred; richness was negatively correlated in 16 lakes and positively correlated in seven. No correlation between native and invasive species richness was found at larger spatial scales (whole lakes and counties). Increases in richness with area were uncorrelated with abiotic heterogeneity. Logistic regression showed that the probability of occurrence of five invasive species increased in sampling locations (3 m2, n = 2980 samples) where native plants occurred, indicating that native plant species richness provided no resistance against invasion. However, the probability of three invasive species' occurrence declined as native plant density increased, indicating that density, if not species richness, provided some resistance with these species. Density had no effect on occurrence of three other invasive species. Based on these results, native species may resist invasion at small spatial scales only in communities where density is high (i.e., in communities where competition among individuals contributes to community structure). Most hydrophyte communities, however, appear to be maintained in a nonequilibrial condition by stress and/or disturbance. Therefore, most aquatic plant communities in temperate lakes are likely to be vulnerable to invasion.     

Media and bushfires: A community perspective of the media during the Grampians Fires 2006

This paper examines the ways residents in the Grampians area in the Australian state of Victoria used their local and their state and national based media before, during and after the 2006 bushfires (wildfires). The researchers were particularly concerned to understand how residents evaluated media sources as trustworthy and credible in relation to bushfire warnings and information about the fires delivered in the media.

Analysis of data derived from two separate focus group sessions conducted by the researchers reveals four main themes. (1) The media are perceived as part of a broader information gathering process. (2) Local knowledge is the most important aspect in broadcast information. (3) Members of small communities can feel disenfranchised and resentful of the media when media coverage focuses on larger towns, and (4) the effects of media reporting, including specific warnings, are both immediate and long lasting.

The paper explores some of the tensions that result from the ways rural residents use and distinguish between local/regional and metropolitan and out-of-state bushfire information; and it encourages better use of the local/regional media to increase community safety and awareness in relation to bushfire mitigation, preparedness and crisis management issues before, during and after the fires. It is suggested that risk communications professionals need to understand that when mediated risk-related communications are provided, a key evaluative criterion is whether or not those media and the messages represent and reflect local knowledge.     

退田还湖对洞庭湖鸟类群落结构的影响

通过5年的跟踪调查,发现洞庭湖的民宅堤垸与退田还湖的垸子鸟类群落有着明显的区别,前者的常见鸟类有22种,后者有66种,且群落成分差异明显（Moumtforyd系数：0.371 62）。无论耕作区还是退田还湖区的鸟类群落结构都具有明显的季相变化。每年10月底至翌年的3月为冬季鸟类群落;4~9月为夏季鸟类群落。退田还湖后的鸟类群落变迁具有特定的规律性,共分为3个时期：第一阶段为群落结构混乱期,时间为1年左右;第二阶段为新的群落格局初现期,时间为2~4年;第三阶段为稳定的野生鸟类物群落期,时间在退田还湖后的4~5年。     

Potential Applications for Pyrolysis-GC/MS in Bioremediation

Preliminary data are presented from a set of experiments designed to promote the use of pyrolysis-GC/MS in bioremediation. Studies were designed to aid researchers in developing a pyrolysis-GC/MS method and identifying how the method could help characterize bioremediation, particularly in organic soils. Since sample size affects the results of pyrolytic analyses, the first experiment demonstrated how an appropriate sample size might be selected for pyrolysis-GC/MS testing. In order to show how quantitative results can be obtained from pyrolysis-GC/MS, a second experiment determined the 'goodness of fit' for a standard curve relating the chromatographic area under a pyrogram to actual mass units. The third experiment investigated ways in which pyrolysis-GC/MS analyses could improve our understanding of bioremediation in organic soils contaminated with crude oil. Experimental results confirmed that differences in analyte mass affect the extent of pyrolytic cracking. In pyrograms of the test soil, the ratio of toluene to total product showed that for a sample mass between 1.8 and 2.0 mg, variability in the cracking pattern was minimized. Unlike deviations outside this range, small deviations within the range did not appreciably effect the toluene ratio. A standard curve was prepared for pyrolytic analyses by plotting the total chromatographic area of all pyrolysis products versus the mass of organic material pyrolyzed. These data were fit with a straight line having an 'R²' of 0.73. Based on a bench scale bioremediation experiment, preliminary pyrolysis-GC/MS results were used to predict that compounds derived from lignin and carbohydrates would be degraded faster in uncontaminated than contaminated soils. Appreciable degradation of both compounds, however, occurred in contaminated soils. In addition, results suggested that using pyrolysis-GC/MS to quantify the sum of all n-alkanes and the ratio of odd to even chain n-alkanes could help researchers distinguish between the degradation of petroleum and non-petroleum hydrocarbons in contaminated and uncontaminated soils.     

Assigning trend-based conservation status despite high uncertainty

Estimates of temporal trends in species’ occupancy are essential for conservation policy and planning, but limitations to the data and models often result in very high trend uncertainty. A critical source of uncertainty that degrades scientific credibility is that caused by disagreement among studies or models. Modelers are aware of this uncertainty but usually only partially estimate it and communicate it to decision makers. At the same time, there is growing awareness that full disclosure of uncertainty is critical for effective translation of science into policies and plans. But what are the most effective approaches to estimating uncertainty and communicating uncertainty to decision makers? We explored how alternative approaches to estimating and communicating uncertainty of species trends could affect decisions concerning conservation status of freshwater fishes. We used ensemble models to propagate trend uncertainty within and among models and communicated this uncertainty with categorical distributions of trend direction and magnitude. All approaches were designed to fit an established decision-making system used to assign species conservation status by the New Zealand government. Our results showed how approaches that failed to fully disclose uncertainty, while simplifying the information presented, could hamper species conservation or lead to ineffective decisions. We recommend an approach that was recently used effectively to communicate trend uncertainty to a panel responsible for setting the conservation status of New Zealand's freshwater fishes.