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Wildfire Effects On Water Temperature And Selection Of Breeding Sites By The Boreal Toad (Bufo Boreas) In Seasonal Wetlands, Blake R. Hossack, Paul Stephen Corn

United States Geological Survey: Staff Publications

Disturbances can significantly affect the thermal regime and community structure of wetlands. We investigated the effect of a wildfire on water temperature of seasonal, montane wetlands after documenting the colonization of recently burned wetlands by the Boreal Toad (Bufo boreas boreas). We compared the daily mean temperature, daily maximum temperature, and accumulated growing degree·days measured on the north shore of three classes of wetlands: unburned wetlands, burned wetlands that were colonized by breeding toads, and burned wetlands that were not colonized. We hypothesized that toads colonized burned wetlands because they were warmer than unburned wetlands and selected specific …

Estimating Evapotranspiration And Seepage For A Sinkhole Wetland From Diurnal Surface-Water Cycles, A. Jason Hill, Vincent S. Neary

KIP Articles

This study used measured diurnal surface-water cycles to estimate daily evapotranspiration (ET) and seepage for a seasonally flooded sinkhole wetland. Diurnal surface-water cycles were classified into five categories based on the relationship between the surface-water body and the surrounding ground-water system (i.e., recharge/discharge). Only one class of diurnal cycles was found to be suitable for application of this method. This subset of diurnal cycles was used to estimate ET and seepage and the relative importance of each transfer process to the overall water budget. The method has limited utility for wetlands with erratic hydrologic regimes (e.g., wetlands in urban environments). …

Evalution Of The Efficacy Of The Photosystem Ii Inhibitor Dcmu In Periphyton And Its Effects On Nontarget Microorganisms And Extracellular Enzymatic Reactions, Steven N. Francoeur, Audrey C. Johnson, Kevin A. Kuehn, Robert K. Neely

Faculty Publications

We examined the efficacy of the photosystem II inhibitor 3-(3,4-diclorophenyl)-1,1-dimethyl urea (DCMU) for inhibition of algal photosynthesis in periphyton associated with submerged decomposing litter of Typha angustifolia. We also investigated the possible nontarget effects of DCMU exposure on heterotrophic microorganisms (i.e., bacteria and fungi) and extracellular enzyme activity associated with decaying litter. Standing-dead Typha leaf litter was submerged for 34 and 73 d, returned to the laboratory, and used for controlled laboratory experiments that examined the effect of DCMU on algal ([¹⁴C]bicarbonate, pulse-amplitude modulated fluorometry), bacterial ([³H]leucine), and fungal ([¹⁴C]acetate) production. Simultaneous assays …

The Impact Of Wetlands Rules On The Prices Of Regulated And Proximate Houses: A Case Study, Katherine Kiel

Economics Department Working Papers

Federal, state and local wetlands protection laws that restrict landowners’ ability to develop their properties in certain ways could decrease the value of the affected properties. However, the regulations could also give benefits to nearby neighbors who no longer need worry about increased development in their area. Given that some properties may decline in value, while others increase, the impact on individual properties must be determined empirically. This study uses a data set from Newton, Massachusetts to examine the impact of wetlands laws on the regulated properties, as well as on proximate properties. Looking at house sales data from 1988 …

Notes On Native Vascular Plants From Mima Mound-Vernal Pool Terrain And The Importance Of Preserving Coastal Terraces In Orange County, California, Richard E. Riefner Jr., Steve Boyd, Roy J. Shlemon

Aliso: A Journal of Systematic and Floristic Botany

We report the following noteworthy collections of native vascular plants from mima mound fields in coastal Orange County, California: Deschampsia danthonioides, Lepidium strictum, and Sagina saginoides (new county records), Lepidium oblongum var. oblongum (previously excluded from the flora), Deinandra paniculata, Holocarpha virgata subsp. elongata, and Navarretia prostrata (new localities in the county), and Hordeum brachyantherum subsp. californicum (uncommon species of local interest). A herbarium study, preparation of voucher specimens, and a generalized distribution, facultative wetland status, and taxonomic notes, where appropriate, are cited for each taxon. An overview of the mima mound micro-relief associated with coastal …

From "Navigable Waters" To "Constitutional Waters": The Future Of Federal Wetlands Regulation, Mark Squillace

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Wetlands regulation in the United States has a tumultuous history. The early European settlers viewed wetlands as obstacles to development, and they drained and filled wetlands and swamps at an astounding rate, often with government support, straight through the middle of the twentieth century. As evidence of the ecological significance of wetlands emerged over the last several decades, programs to protect and restore wetlands became prominent. Most notable among these is the permitting program under section 404 of the Clean Water Act. That provision prohibits dredging or filling of "navigable waters, " defined by law to mean "waters of the …

The Role Of Case Studies In Natural Resources Law [Summary], John Copeland Nagle

The Future of Natural Resources Law and Policy (Summer Conference, June 6-8)

4 pages.

"John Nagle, Univ. of Notre Dame Law School" -- Agenda

Infaunal Abundance And Diversity In Vegetated And Unvegetated Areas Of A Georgia Salt Marsh, Anthony Lee Zukoff

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Various commercially important marine species are known to utilize the salt marsh; research has shown that marsh infauna play an important role in the diets of these species. The distribution and abundance of some of these infauna has been shown to be influenced by vegetative cover. In 2001, salt marshes along the coast of Georgia began to die, resulting in the loss of the dominant vegetation. During the summer of 2005, six 0.5 x 0.5 meter quadrats were haphazardly placed and set up permanently in the low marsh at two study sites along the Crooked River in vegetated and unvegetated …

Survey Says: Army Corps No Scalian Despot, Kim Diana Connolly

Journal Articles

Justice Antonin Scalia and others have described the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers ('the Corps') administration of the permitting process as burdensome and inefficient. Empirical data gathered from the Corps, however, do not bear out this assessment. In this Article, Kim Diana Connolly evaluates data collected from Corps Customer Service Surveys as well as the apparent disconnect between applicant experiences and the public's negative perception of the permitting process. She begins the Article with an overview of the Corps' regulatory permitting process, then lays out the history of and context for the Corps' Customer Service Surveys. Next, she summarizes available …

Cattail Distribution End Abundance In North Dakota, Scott T. Ralston, G. M. Linz, W. J. Bleier, H. J. Homan

USDA Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Wetlands in the Prairie Pothole Region (PPR) of North Dalcota provide important habitats for a plethora of invertebrate and vertebrate animals. Since 1991, glyphosate-based (N-phosphonomethyl-glycine) herbicides have been used to manage dense cattail (Typha spp. L.) stands on 29,522 ha of wetlands in the PPR to disperse blackbird roosts. Limited information exists on the abundance and distribution of this important habitat. We took aerial photographs and used geospatial analysis tools to identify wetland basins and cattail coverage on randomly selected sample sites within the PPR. We found that average wetland density and size were 13 wetlands/ km² and …

Observer Bias In Anuran Call Surveys, Aaron Lotz, Craig R. Allen

United States Geological Survey: Staff Publications

Amphibian monitoring programs rarely question the quality of data obtained by observers and often ignore observer bias. In order to test for bias in amphibian call surveys, we sampled 29 clusters of wetlands from the Rainwater Basin, Nebraska, USA, totaling 228 functionally connected wetlands. Sampling consisted of 3-minute stops where volunteers recorded species heard and made digital recordings. Based on 627 samples, we examined 3 types of observer bias: omission, false inclusion (commission), and incorrect identification. Misidentification rates ranged from 4.2% to 18.3%. Relatively high and unquantified error rates can negatively affect the ability of monitoring programs to accurately detect …

Wetlands Mitigation: Retroactive Application Of Clean Water Act Requirements To Property Destroyed By Natural Disasters, John Stapleford

William & Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review

No abstract provided.

How Well Do We Know Northern Land Cover? Comparison Of Four Global Vegetation And Wetland Products With A New Ground-Truth Database For West Siberia, Karen E. Frey, Laurence C. Smith

Geography

An unprecedented collection of 2161 geolocated, irregularly spaced field observations of land cover spanning ∼106 km2 throughout West Siberia suggests that currently available land cover classification products are remarkably poor indicators of vegetation type and water body extent in this northern Welland environment. The ground-truth data are compared with (1) the Global Land Cover Characteristics database derived from Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer data (GLCC.AVHRR), (2) the Global Land Cover Classification derived from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer data (GLCC.MODIS), (3) the Global Lakes and Wetlands Database (GLWD), and (4) the West Siberian Lowland Peatland Database (WSLPD) using: (1) all land …

The Ramsar Convention On Wetlands: Assessment Of International Designations Within The United States, Kim Diana Connolly

Other Scholarship

The Convention on Wetlands of International Importance Especially as Waterfowl Habitat, more commonly knows as the Ramsar Convention, is one international framework used to protect wetlands. At this time, the United States has designated 22 sites as wetlands of international importance. In this Article, Royal C. Gardner and Kim Diana Connolly analyze survey data collected from each of these 22 sites to determine whether and how Ramsar designation benefits these wetland areas. The authors first provide a brief overview of the Ramsar Convention, including its function within the United States. They then break down the survey data, looking at both …

Implementing Rapanos - Will Justice Kennedy's Significant Nexus Test Provide A Workable Standard For Lower Courts, Regulators And Developers?, Bradford Mank

Faculty Articles and Other Publications

In 2001, the Supreme Court in SWANCC v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers held that the Corps lacked authority under the 1972 Clean Water Act to regulate wetlands isolated from navigable waters. The Court held that the CWA's jurisdiction is limited to non-navigable waters that have a significant nexus to navigable waters. SWANCC did not address the Corps' regulation of wetlands near non-navigable tributaries. The courts of appeals are divided over if the Corps may regulate tributary wetlands. Mank, The Murky Future of the Clean Water Act After SWANCC, 30 ECOLOGY LAW QUARTERLY 811-891 (2003).

In 2006, the Supreme Court …

Science And Mathematics Of Natural Disasters: Wetlands, Percent Change, Spreadsheets, Charts, Center For Science And Mathematics Education

Teacher Resource Documents

No abstract provided.

After Katrina: A Closer Look At Wetlands, Sherry S. Herron

Teacher Resource Documents

No abstract provided.

An Interface Of Drainage Division For Modeling Wetlands And Riparian Buffers In Agricultural Watersheds

Journal of Spatial Hydrology

In a complex watershed, isolated wetlands, riparian wetlands and riparian buffers provide important functions such as flood attenuation and water quality improvement. For conservation purposes, it is critical to properly delineate drainage areas for these features such that their impacts on runoff, sediment and pollutant transport can be reasonably simulated. However, traditional methods for watershed delineation typically fill depressions or ignore riparian features in order to maintain the continuity of surface flow pattern. In this study we develop an ArcView geographic information system (GIS) interface for watershed delineation that accounts for wetlands and riparian buffers. Based on digital elevation model …

Evaluation Of The Wetland Mapping Methods Using Landsat Etm+ And Srtm Data

Journal of Spatial Hydrology

Overarching goal of this paper was to evaluate automated and semi-automated methods of mapping wetlands using Landsat ETM+ and SRTM data.

Automated methods consisted of: (a) slope derived from SRTM, (b) Tasseled cap Wetness Index (TCWI), (c) Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI), (d) multi-band vegetation indices (MBVIs), (e) two band vegetation indices (TBVIs), (f) normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), and (g) data fusion involving ETM+ and SRTM and then classifying the same. The best of these indices or methods provide an accuracy of less than 30 percent with high errors of omissions and\or commissions.

Semi-automated methods consisted of 3 key …

Comment: Rapanos V. United States—A Historical Perspective On The Recent Decline In "Judicial Pioneering" In Wetlands Regulation, Ryan Fortin

William Mitchell Law Review

No abstract provided.

Generalized Geologic Map For Land-Use Planning: Elliott County, Kentucky, Daniel I. Carey

Map and Chart--KGS

This map is not intended to be used for selecting individual sites. Its purpose is to inform land-use planners, government officials, and the public in a general way about geologic bedrock conditions that affect the selection of sites for various purposes. The properties of thick soils may supercede those of the underlying bedrock and should be considered on a site-to-site basis. At any site, it is important to understand the characteristics of both the soils and the underlying rock.

From "Navigable Waters" To "Constitutional Waters": The Future Of Federal Wetlands Regulation, Mark Squillace

Publications

Wetlands regulation in the United States has a tumultuous history. The early European settlers viewed wetlands as obstacles to development, and they drained and filled wetlands and swamps at an astounding rate, often with government support, straight through the middle of the twentieth century. As evidence of the ecological significance of wetlands emerged over the last several decades, programs to protect and restore wetlands became prominent. Most notable among these is the permitting program under § 404 of the Clean Water Act. That provision prohibits dredging or filling of "navigable waters," defined by law to mean "waters of the United …

Opening The Floodgates: The Roberts Court's Decision In Rapanos V. United States Spells Trouble For The Future Of The Waters Of The United States, Bill Currie

Villanova Environmental Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Maieusis Through A Gated Membrane: "Getting The Science Right" In Public Decisionmaking, Deborah Hussey Freeland

Deborah M. Hussey Freeland

Law meets science in a remarkable variety of contexts. While their interactions are often studied in particular contexts, general theories of their interaction are wanting. This paper presents a general model of an interface between law and science that identifies how their interaction must be structured to promote effective interdisciplinary collaboration, and then demonstrates how this model can be used to analyze problems as diverse as: a large-scale intergovernmental attempt at ecosystem restoration; and the effects of a method of science-based alternative dispute resolution on science and negotiated outcomes. In both cases, the model features of a properly functioning law-science …