VARIATION OF STREAM STABILITY WITH STREAM TYPE AND LWESTOCK BANK DAMAGE IN NORTHERN NEVADA1

ABSTRACT: Many natural and anthropogenic factors contribute to the stability or erodibility of stream channels. Although a stream rating procedure used by more than 60 percent of the U.S. National Forests provides an estimate of overall stability, it does not identify the cause of instability or indicate corrective management. To better sort natural from livestock influences, stream stability rating indicator variables were related to stream types and levels of ungulate bank damage in a large data base for streams in northern Nevada. Stability and the range in stability varied naturally with stream type. Ungulate bank damage had different effects on different stream types and on different parts of their cross-sections. Vegetation is more important for stability on certain stream types than on other types. Streams with noncohesive sand and gravel banks are most sensitive to livestock grazing. Range managers should consider the stream type when setting local standards, writing management objectives, or determining riparian grazing strategies.     

Critical Risk Indicators (CRIs) for the electric power grid: a survey and discussion of interconnected effects

The electric power grid is a critical societal resource connecting multiple infrastructural domains such as agriculture, transportation, and manufacturing. The electrical grid as an infrastructure is shaped by human activity and public policy in terms of demand and supply requirements. Further, the grid is subject to changes and stresses due to diverse factors including solar weather, climate, hydrology, and ecology. The emerging interconnected and complex network dependencies make such interactions increasingly dynamic, posing novel risks, and presenting new challenges to manage the coupled human–natural system. This paper provides a survey of models and methods that seek to explore the significant interconnected impact of the electric power grid and interdependent domains. We also provide relevant critical risk indicators (CRIs) across diverse domains that may be used to assess risks to electric grid reliability, including climate, ecology, hydrology, finance, space weather, and agriculture. We discuss the convergence of indicators from individual domains to explore possible systemic risk, i.e., holistic risk arising from cross-domain interconnections. Further, we propose a compositional approach to risk assessment that incorporates diverse domain expertise and information, data science, and computer science to identify domain-specific CRIs and their union in systemic risk indicators. Our study provides an important first step towards data-driven analysis and predictive modeling of risks in interconnected human–natural systems.

     

Support for environmental protection: an integration of ideological-consistency and information-deficit models

The divergent roles of education in predicting environmental support among liberals, conservatives, and moderates in the United States are explained by integrating ideological-consistency and information-deficit models. Increased political polarization among elites has led to divergent environmental positions advocated by liberal and conservative political and media leaders; it was predicted that education would increase public attention to these elite cues and, consistent with the ideological-consistency model, increased education would lead to attitudes in line with consensual positions endorsed by party elites. Across two nationally representative data sets, higher levels of education were associated with stronger environmental support among liberals and weaker environmental support among conservatives. Moderates were predicted to have fewer elite cues on which to base their attitudes; consistent with the information-deficit model, higher levels of education among moderates were associated with strengthened environmental support. A moderated-mediation model supported the differential application of these two theories.     

A generalized approach for producing,quantifying, and validating citizen science data from wildlife images

Citizen science has the potential to expand the scope and scale of research in ecology and conservation, but many professional researchers remain skeptical of data produced by nonexperts. We devised an approach for producing accurate, reliable data from untrained, nonexpert volunteers. On the citizen science website www.snapshotserengeti.org , more than 28,000 volunteers classified 1.51 million images taken in a large‐scale camera‐trap survey in Serengeti National Park, Tanzania. Each image was circulated to, on average, 27 volunteers, and their classifications were aggregated using a simple plurality algorithm. We validated the aggregated answers against a data set of 3829 images verified by experts and calculated 3 certainty metrics—level of agreement among classifications (evenness), fraction of classifications supporting the aggregated answer (fraction support), and fraction of classifiers who reported “nothing here” for an image that was ultimately classified as containing an animal (fraction blank)—to measure confidence that an aggregated answer was correct. Overall, aggregated volunteer answers agreed with the expert‐verified data on 98% of images, but accuracy differed by species commonness such that rare species had higher rates of false positives and false negatives. Easily calculated analysis of variance and post‐hoc Tukey tests indicated that the certainty metrics were significant indicators of whether each image was correctly classified or classifiable. Thus, the certainty metrics can be used to identify images for expert review. Bootstrapping analyses further indicated that 90% of images were correctly classified with just 5 volunteers per image. Species classifications based on the plurality vote of multiple citizen scientists can provide a reliable foundation for large‐scale monitoring of African wildlife.     

OPTIMIZATION OF WATER ALLOCATION DECISIONS AFFECTING ESTUARINE ECOLOGY1

ABSTRACT .The problem analyzed in this paper is how to allocate optimally the available surface water in a river system among those who compete for its use, while acknowledging explicitly that for coastal states the ecology of bays and estuaries must be numbered among the competitors. The objective is to maximize the benefit resulting from water use while satisfying a set of constraints on flow. Benefit is assumed to be a function of the amount of water used and the time period in which the water is used. A mathematical model of this problem is shown to fit the format of the minimum cost circulation network flow problem. The Out-of-Kilter algorithm of D. R. Fulkerson is proposed as a solution technique. Sensitivity analysis on the input data is described as a means of determining the minimum economic benefit required to justify the allocation of a given volume of water needed to sustain the ecology of an estuary.     

Starch-plastic materials—Preparation,physical properties,and biodegradability (a review of recent USDA research)

Recent starch-plastic research at the National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research is reviewed and related worldwide efforts are noted. Properties of starch that influence its formulation and performance in plastics are discussed. Methods are given for preparation of starch-poly(methyl acrylate) graft copolymer, starch-poly(ethylene-co-acrylic acid), and starch-poly(ethylene-co-acrylic acid)-polyethylene plastics. Their physical properties are discussed, as is degradability by enzymes or amylolytic organisms from soil, ponds, and streams.The mention of firm names or trade products does not imply that they are endorsed or recommended by the U.S. Department of Agriculture over other firms or similar products not mentioned.     

RIO GRANDE VALLEY,COLORADO, NEW MEXICO,AND TEXAS1

ABSTRACT: The Rio Grande Valley National Water-Quality Assessment study unit encompasses about 45,700 square miles in Colorado, New Mexico, and Texas upstream from the gaging station Rio Grande at El Paso, Texas, and includes surface-water closed basins east of the Continental Divide in New Mexico, and the San Luis Closed Basin in Colorado. The mean annual precipitation ranges from less than 6 to more than 50 inches; potential evapo-transpiration ranges from less than 35 to more than 80 inches per year. Land use is mainly rangeland, forest land, and cropland. Total irrigated acreage in 1990 was about 914,000 acres and water use was about 3,410,000 acre-feet. Two structural settings are found in the study unit: alluvial basins and bedrock basins. The alluvial basins can have through-flowing surface water or be closed basins. The discussion of streamflow and water quality for the surface-water system is based on four river reaches for the 750 miles of the main stem. The quality of the ground water is affected by both natural process and human activities and by nonpoint and point sources. Nonpoint sources for surface water include agriculture, hydromodification, and mining operations; point sources are mainly discharge from wastewater treatment plants. Nonpoint sources for ground water include agriculture and septic tanks and cesspools; point sources include leaking underground storage tanks, unlined or manure-lined holding ponds used for disposal of dairy wastes, landfills, and mining operations.     

Amino acid synthesis in the symbiotic sea anemone Aiptasia pulchella

Symbiotic Aiptasia pulchella and freshly isolated zooxanthellae were incubated in NaH¹⁴CO₃ and NH₄Cl for 1 to 240 min, and samples were analysed by reverse-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and an online radiochemical detector. NH₄ ⁺ was first assimilated into ¹⁴C-glutamate and ¹⁴C-glutamine in the zooxanthellae residing in A. pulchella. The specific activities (dpm nmol⁻¹) of ¹⁴C-glutamate and ¹⁴C-glutamine in vivo, were far greater in the zooxanthellae than in the host tissue, indicating that NH₄ ⁺ was principally incorporated into the glutamate and glutamine pools of the zooxanthellae. ¹⁴C-α-ketoglutarate was taken up from the medium by intact A. pulchella and assimilated into a small amount of ¹⁴C-glutamate in the host tissue, but no ¹⁴C-glutamine was detected in the host fraction. The ¹⁴C-glutamate that was synthesized was most likely produced from transamination reactions as opposed to the direct assimilation of NH₄ ⁺. The free amino acid composition of the host tissue and zooxanthellae of A. pulchella was also measured. The results presented here demonstrate that NH₄ ⁺ was initially assimilated by the zooxanthellae of A. pulchella. Received: 3 February 1997 / Accepted: 24 October 1997