Evaluating the environmental performance of a university

An increasing number of organisations are moving towards assessing and reporting their environmental performance in a supply-chain context. Not only are such “footprint”-type assessments seen as more rigorous than sustainability reports created in-house, they also offer more abatement options than assessments limited to an organisation’s premises. Hybrid life-cycle assessment methods combining input-output analysis and process analysis are ideally suited to enumerate organisational footprints, because they were developed to enable overall complete results whilst being application-specific. We apply one of these hybrid methods, the Path Exchange Method to the task of planning for a sustainable campus at the University of Sydney in Australia. We show how this method can be used by an environmental or procurement officer for exploring environmental performance and abatement options across supply chains. We also show how parts of an organisation, for example University faculties, can be assessed and compared against each other. Whilst tools like ones used in this work enable quantitative decision support for procurement and operations policies, it takes staff awareness, engagement and training to successfully put such tools into practice.     

Mouse lemurs in space and time: a test of the socioecological model

Socioecological theory predicts that the distribution of fertile females in space and time is the major determinant of male spacing behavior and mating strategies. Using a small nocturnal Malagasy primate, the gray mouse lemur (Microcebus murinus), we determined the spatiotemporal distribution of estrous females during the brief annual mating season to examine the predictive power of the socioecological model for male mating strategies. Mouse lemurs are particularly interesting in this respect because this polygynous species is characterized by seasonal reproduction, seasonally reversed sexual dimorphism, and relatively large testes. All resident animals in our 8-ha study area, a total of 30 adult males and 27 adult females, were individually marked and regularly recaptured to determine female reproductive status and to obtain home range data. We found that the mating season is limited to 4 weeks following female emergence from hibernation. Only 3-9 females could have synchronized estruses during a given week, indicating a moderately high male monopolization potential. However, receptive females were not spatially clumped and male ranges overlapped with those of many other rivals. Therefore, we suggest that individual powerful males may be unable to defend exclusive permanent access to receptive females because of prohibitive costs of range defense resulting from the strongly male-biased operational sex ratio and the corresponding intruder pressure. Our general conclusions are (1) that the socioecological model provides a useful heuristic framework for the study of mating systems, but that (2) it does not specify the degree of spatiotemporal clumping of receptive females at which male mating strategies switch among mate guarding, spatial exclusion of rivals, and roaming, and that (3) the operational sex ratio can have profound effects on male mating strategies as well.     

Kin-based male mating preferences in two species of halictine bee

Summary In both of the social bee species Lasioglossum (Dialictus) zephyrum and Lasioglossum (Evylaeus) malachurum (Hymenoptera: Halictidae), males are shown to be attracted to females in field experiments by a pheromone which covaries among female relatives. Females sampled from a nesting aggregation other than the one in which the tested males occur are slightly more attractive than females from the males' own aggregation, and always significantly more attractive than females whose pheromones have been extracted. Furthermore, in L. malachurum experience with a female alters the response of the males towards that female and towards her nestmates (most probably close relatives) in further encounters, but does not alter the males' responses towards females who were non-nestmates of the experienced one. These data indicate that some form of learning of female kin-identity takes place in adult males, and influences the mating system. How males may integrate kinship information into a mating strategy is discussed.     

SOIL MOISTURE VARIATION PATTERNS OBSERVED IN HAND COUNTY,SOUTH DAKOTA1

ABSTRACT: Sail moisture data were taken during nine sampling events (1976-1978) at a test site in South Dakota as part of the ground truth used in NASA's aircraft experiments studying the microwave sensing of soil moisture. This portion of the study dealt only with the spatial variability observed with regard to the ground data. Samples were taken over three surface depths at each point, and the data reported as the mean field moisture content within each of three surface horizons. The results shed additional light on the relationship between ground sampling and remote sensing of soil moisture. First, it was found that it is best to partition data of well drained sites from poorly drained areas when attempting to characterize the surface moisture content throughout an area of varying soil and cover conditions. It was also found that the moisture coefficient of variation within a field decreased as the mean field soil moisture increased, and that the standard deviation was at a maximum in the mid-range of observed moisture conditions (15-25 percent). Within field sample variation also decreases as the sample is integrated over a greater surface depth. It was determined that a sampling intensity of 10 samples per kilometer was adequate to characterize the mean field soil moisture at all three depths along a transect in the areas of moderate to good drainage-.