Life Sciences Commons^™

Mapping Fetch And Diel Movements Of Silver Carp Hypophthalmichthys Molitrix Within Kentucky Lake And Lake Barkley With Gis, Levi Umland

Scholars Week

Title: Mapping Silver Carp movements, relative exposure, and fetch within inland reservoirs using Geographic Information Systems.

Author: Levi G Umland

Invasive species across our country have continued to threaten our native species, compete for habitat via interspecific competition, and have caused economic impacts. Silver Carp (Hypophthalmichthys molitrix), commonly referred to as Asian Carp, have remained in the invasive species spotlight throughout the southern and mid-western states as they have continued to spread. Silver Carp have successfully spread through our rivers and reservoirs, but little is known about Silver Carp movement rates/behavior within reservoirs due to their lower abundance within …

Examining The Relationship Between Climate And Seasonal Stream Thermal Regimes In A High Desert Ecosystem, Hannah Moore, Melody Feden

Scholars Week

Climate change is negatively affecting ecosystems around the world, and in the coming years, scientists predict that these changes will only intensify and accelerate. In the western mountains of North America, climate change projections predict elevated temperatures, reduced snowpack, and earlier snowmelt. Elevated air temperatures have the propensity to affect water temperatures in sensitive freshwater ecosystems. Temperature increases may cause streams to reach the upper thermal limit for many aquatic organisms, such as aquatic invertebrates and fish, and result in death or dispersal for these organisms. This makes the availability of cold-water refugia in streams that much more important for …

Can Omnivores Mediate The Effects Of Degradation?, Hannah Moore

Scholars Week

Omnivores feed at multiple trophic levels and have large effects on community structuring and stability. The magnitude and direction of such effects, whether omnivores stabilize or destabilize communities, remains unresolved. Shifts in omnivore diet and trophic position may be of particular importance to community stability in degraded habitats, where resources are sparse. For example, omnivores may reduce the severity and duration of community responses to degradationby dampening the effects of any disturbance-mediated trophic cascade. The relatively simple food webs of freshwater systems are ideal for studying trophic ecology, and in the western U.S., streams are heavily degraded by overgrazing, beaver …