Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology Commons^™

Feeding Ecology Of The Invasive Lionfish (Pterois Spp.) And Comparison With Two Native Species: Schoolmaster Lutjanus Apodus (Walbaum, 1792) And Graysby Cephalopholis Cruentata (Lacepède, 1802), Jesse J. Secord

HCNSO Student Theses and Dissertations

Predator satiation and prey-size preference were determined for locally caught lionfish, schoolmaster, and graysby, all co-occurring predatory fishes in the Florida coral reef ecosystem. Individuals were evaluated by exposing them to wild-caught killifish over a gradient of four size classes (20 mm to 60 mm, in 10 mm increments). Preference trials extended over a 2 hr time period and were filmed to determine the order in which each prey item was consumed. Satiation was evaluated by exposing the predators to an equal number of excess prey items for 24 hrs and evaluating consumed prey weight. Lionfish and schoolmaster showed a …

Hydrology-Biology Response Relationships In The Ozark Highlands, Dustin Thomas Lynch

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

I examined flow-ecology relationships among stream communities in the Ozark Highlands, USA. I sampled fish, crayfish, and benthic macroinvertebrates during two consecutive summers, including a drought year (2012) and a flood year (2013). Biological response variables related to community structure were assessed via two different statistical methods: an Information Theoretic approach relating response variables to a priori selected predictor variables incorporating hydrology, habitat, geomorphology, and water quality, and canonical ordination using forward selection to relate these same response variables to a large assortment of hydrologic metrics. In addition to assessing metrics related to predicted natural flow, flow alteration at gaged …

Macrobenthic Communities In The Northern Gulf Of Mexico Hypoxic Zone: Testing The Pearson-Rosenberg Model, Shivakumar Shivarudrappa

Dissertations

The Pearson and Rosenberg (P-R) conceptual model of macrobenthic succession was used to assess the impact of hypoxia (dissolved oxygen [DO] ≤ 2 mg/L) on the macrobenthic community on the continental shelf of northern Gulf of Mexico for the first time. The model uses a stress-response relationship between environmental parameters and the macrobenthic community to determine the ecological condition of the benthic habitat. The ecological significance of dissolved oxygen in a benthic habitat is well understood. In addition, the annual recurrence of bottom-water hypoxia on the Louisiana/Texas shelf during summer months is well documented.

The P-R model illustrates the decreasing …

Climate. A Period Of Consequence: Environmental Literature Of 2006 (2006), Shaun O’Connell

New England Journal of Public Policy

The author talks about the consequences of not respecting the climate and understanding global warming will cause ecocide and our own extinction.

Reprinted from New England Journal of Public Policy 21, no. 2 (2007), article 5.

Diel Vertical Distribution Patterns Of Zooplankton Along The Western Antarctic Peninsula, Patricia S. Thibodeau, John A. Conroy, Deborah K. Steinberg

Presentations

The Western Antarctic Peninsula (WAP) is a region that has undergone significant change over the past several decades due to unprecedented increases sea surface temperature and decreases in sea ice cover. The ongoing Palmer Antarctica Long-Term Ecological Research (PAL LTER) study shows that these environmental changes are significantly affecting the marine pelagic ecosystem along the WAP. The goal of this study was to analyze diel vertical distribution patterns of zooplankton along the WAP.

Temporal Variation In Optical Properties Of Chromophoric Dissolved Organic Matter (Cdom) In Southern California Coastal Waters With Nearshore Kelp And Seagrass, Catherine D. Clark, Warren J. De Bruyn, Paige Aiona

Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles and Research

Optical properties of chromophoric dissolved organic matter (CDOM) were measured in surf zone waters in diurnal field studies at a Southern California beach with nearshore kelp and seagrass beds and intertidal plant wrack. Absorption coefficients (aCDOM(300 nm)) ranged from 0.35 m21 to 3.7 m21 with short-term variability<1 h, increases at ebb and flood tides and higher values (6 m21) during an offshore storm event. Spectral slopes (S) ranged from 0.0028 nm21 to 0.017 nm21, with higher values after the storm; S was generally inversely correlated with aCDOM(300 nm). 3-D excitation–emission matrix spectra (EEMs) for samples with lower S values had humic-type peaks associated with terrestrial material (A, C), marine microbial material (M) and protein peaks, characteristic of freshly produced organic material. Samples with high S values had no or reduced protein peaks, consistent with aged material. Fluorescent indexes (f450/f500 >2.5, BIX>1.1) were consistent with microbial aquatic sources. Leachates of senescent kelp and seagrass had protein and humic-type EEM peaks. After solar simulator irradiation (4 h), protein peaks rapidly photochemically degraded, humic-type peak C increased in intensity and peak M disappeared. Optical characteristics of kelp leachates were most similar to field samples, …

Century-Scale Patterns And Trends Of Global Pyrogenic Carbon Emissions And Fire Influences On Terrestrial Carbon Balance, Jia Yang, Hanqin Tian, Bo Tao, Wei Ren, Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu, Shufen Pan, Yuhang Wang, Yongqiang Liu

Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu

Fires have consumed a large amount of terrestrial organic carbon and significantly influenced terrestrial ecosystems and the physical climate system over the past century. Although biomass burning has been widely investigated at a global level in recent decades via satellite observations, less work has been conducted to examine the century-scale changes in global fire regimes and fire influences on the terrestrial carbon balance. In this study, we investigated global pyrogenic carbon emissions and fire influences on the terrestrial carbon fluxes from 1901 to 2010 by using a process-based land ecosystem model. Our results show a significant declining trend in global …

Disentangling Climatic And Anthropogenic Controls On Global Terrestrial Evapotranspiration Trends, Jiafu Mao, Wenting Fu, Xiaoying Shi, Daniel M. Ricciuto, Joshua B. Fisher, Robert E. Dickinson, Yaxing Wei, Willis Shem, Shilong Piao, Kaicun Wang, Christopher R. Schwalm, Hanqin Tian, Mingquan Mu, Altaf Arain, Philippe Ciais, Robert Cook, Yongdiu Dai, Daniel Hayes, Forrest M. Hoffman, Maoyi Huang, Suo Huang, Deborah N. Huntzinger, Akihiko Ito, Atul Jain, Anthony W. King, Huimin Lei, Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu, Huimin Lei, Anna M. Michalak, Changhui Peng, Shushi Peng, Benjamin Poulter, Kevin Schaefer, Elshin Jafarov, Peter E. Thornton, Weile Wang, Ning Zeng, Zhenzhong Zeng, Fang Zhao, Qiuan Zhu, Zaichun Zhu

Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu

We examined natural and anthropogenic controls on terrestrial evapotranspiration (ET) changes from 1982 to 2010 using multiple estimates from remote sensing-based datasets and process-oriented land surface models.A significant increasing trend of ET in each hemisphere was consistently revealed by observationally-constrained data and multi-model ensembles that considered historic natural and anthropogenic drivers. The climate impacts were simulated to determine the spatiotemporal variations in ET. Globally, risingCO2 ranked second in these models after the predominant climatic influences, and yielded decreasing trends in canopy transpiration and ET, especially for tropical forests and high-latitude shrub land. Increasing nitrogen deposition slightly amplified global ET via …

Climate Extremes Dominating Seasonal And Interannual Variations In Carbon Export From The Mississippi River Basin, Hanqin Tian, Wei Ren, Jia Yang, Bo Tao, Wei-Jun Cai, Steve E. Lohrenz, Charles S. Hopkinson, Mingliang Liu, Qichun Yang, Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu, Bowen Zhang, Kamaljit Banger, Shufen Pan, Ruoying He, Zuo Xue

Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu

Knowledge about the annual and seasonal patterns of organic and inorganic carbon (C) exports from the major rivers of the world to the coastal ocean is essential for our understanding and potential management of the global C budget so as to limit anthropogenic modification of global climate. Unfortunately our predictive understanding of what controls the timing, magnitude, and quality of C export is still rudimentary. Here we use a process-based coupled hydrologic/ecosystem biogeochemistry model (the Dynamic Land Ecosystem Model) to examine how climate variability and extreme events, changing land use, and atmospheric chemistry have affected the annual and seasonal patterns …

Coastal Sediment Elevation Change Following Anthropogenic Mangrove Clearing, Heather Lyn Hayden, Elise F. Granek

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

Coastal mangrove forests along tropical shorelines serve as an important interface between land and sea. They provide a physical buffer protecting the coastline from erosion and act as sediment “traps” catching terrestrial sediment, thus preventing smothering of subtidal coral reefs. Coastal development that removes mangrove habitat may impact adjacent nearshore coral reefs through sedimentation and nutrient loading. We examined differences in sediment elevation change between patches of open-coast intact and anthropogenically cleared red mangroves (Rhizophora mangle) on the east side of Turneffe Atoll, Belize, to quantify changes following mangrove clearing. Samples were collected over a 24 month period at five …

Radiocarbon Isotopic Classification Of Deep Tropical Forest Soils, Brooke Butler, Karis J. Mcfarlane, Jennifer Pett-Ridge, Katherine A. Heckman

STAR Program Research Presentations

Tropical forest soils have an important role in global carbon (C) stocks. Small changes in the cycling of C could drastically affect atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations and active cycling of carbon in a forest community. Currently, little is understood of how tropical forest soils will respond to the increasing global temperatures. To examine the effects of warming/ drought on losses of older versus younger soil C pools, we implemented radiocarbon (14C) isotopic characterization of various soil plot samples and depths from the Luquillo Experimental Forest, Puerto Rico. 14C was measured using Accelerated Mass Spectrometry (AMS) from catalytically condensed carbon …

Urban Stream Burial Increases Watershed-Scale Nitrate Export, Jake J. Beaulieu, Heather E. Golden, Christopher D. Knightes, Paul M. Mayer, Sujay S. Kaushal, Michael J. Pennino, Clay P. Arango, David A. Balz, Colleen M. Elonen, Ken M. Fritz, Brian H. Hill

All Faculty Scholarship for the College of the Sciences

Nitrogen (N) uptake in streams is an important ecosystem service that reduces nutrient loading to downstream ecosystems. Here we synthesize studies that investigated the effects of urban stream burial on N-uptake in two metropolitan areas and use simulation modeling to scale our measurements to the broader watershed scale. We report that nitrate travels on average 18 times farther downstream in buried than in open streams before being removed from the water column, indicating that burial substantially reduces N uptake in streams. Simulation modeling suggests that as burial expands throughout a river network, N uptake rates increase in the remaining open …

The Impacts Of Climate Change Mitigation Strategies On Animal Welfare, Sara Shields, Geoffrey Orme-Evans

Sara Shields, PhD

The objective of this review is to point out that the global dialog on reducing greenhouse gas emissions in animal agriculture has, thus far, not adequately considered animal welfare in proposed climate change mitigation strategies. Many suggested approaches for reducing emissions, most of which could generally be described as calls for the intensification of production, can have substantial effects on the animals. Given the growing world-wide awareness and concern for animal welfare, many of these approaches are not socially sustainable. This review identifies the main emission abatement strategies in the climate change literature that would negatively affect animal welfare and …

Toward “Optimal” Integration Of Terrestrial Biosphere Models, Christopher R. Schwalm, Deborah N. Huntzinger, Joshua B. Fisher, Anna M. Michalak, Kevin Bowman, Philippe Ciais, Robert Cook, Bassil El-Masri, Daniel Hayes, Maoyi Huang, Akihiko Ito, Atul Jain, Anthony W. King, Hiumin Lei, Junjie Liu, Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu, Jaifu Mao, Shushi Peng, Benjamin Poulter, Daniel Ricciuto, Kevin Schaefer, Xiaoying Shi, Bo Tao, Hanqin Tian, Weile Wang, Yaxing Wei, Jia Yang, Ning Zeng

Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu

Multimodel ensembles (MME) are commonplace in Earth system modeling. Here we perform MME integration using a 10-member ensemble of terrestrial biosphere models (TBMs) from the Multiscale synthesis and Terrestrial Model Intercomparison Project (MsTMIP). We contrast optimal (skill based for present-day carbon cycling) versus naïve (“one model-one vote”) integration. MsTMIP optimal and naïve mean land sink strength estimates (−1.16 versus −1.15 Pg C per annum respectively) are statistically indistinguishable. This holds also for grid cell values and extends to gross uptake, biomass, and net ecosystem productivity. TBM skill is similarly indistinguishable. The added complexity of skill-based integration does not materially change …

Exploration Of Spatial And Temporal Changes In Trophic Status Of Lakes In The Northern Temporal Forest Biome Using Remote Sensing, Aleksey Paltsev

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

There is a critical need for detailed surveys of lakes covering large spatial (>100 km²) and temporal scales (decades) to determine if there is an increase in the magnitude and frequency of phytoplankton blooms. Remote sensing was used to: (1) develop a regression model that relates chlorophyll a (chl-a) as a proxy of lake phytoplankton biomass to Landsat TM and ETM+ optical reflectance (r²=0.85, p

Ship-Induced Solitary Riemann Waves Of Depression In Venice Lagoon, Kevin E. Parnall, Tarmo Soomere, Luca Zaggia, Artem Rodin, Giuliano Lorenzetti, John Rapaglia, Gian Marco Scarpaf

Biology Faculty Publications

We demonstrate that ships of moderate size, sailing at low depth Froude numbers (0.37–0.5) in a navigation channel surrounded by shallow banks, produce depressions with depths up to 2.5 m. These depressions (Bernoulli wakes) propagate as long-living strongly nonlinear solitary Riemann waves of depression substantial distances into Venice Lagoon. They gradually become strongly asymmetric with the rear of the depression becoming extremely steep, similar to a bore. As they are dynamically similar, air pressure fluctuations moving over variable-depth coastal areas could generate meteorological tsunamis with a leading depression wave followed by a devastating bore-like feature.

Global Methane And Nitrous Oxide Emissions From Terrestrial Ecosystems Due To Multiple Environmental Changes, Hanqin Tian, Guangsheng Chen, Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu, Xiaofeng Xu, Wei Ren, Bowen Zhang, Kamaljit Banger, Bo Tao, Shufen Pan, Mingliang Liu, Chi Zhang, Lori Bruhwiler, Steven Wofsy

Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu

Greenhouse gas (GHG)-induced climate change is among the most pressing sustainability challenges facing humanity today, posing serious risks for ecosystem health. Methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) are the two most important GHGs after carbon dioxide (CO2), but their regional and global budgets are not well known. In this study, we applied a process-based coupled biogeochemical model to concurrently estimate the magnitude and spatial and temporal patterns of CH4 and N2O fluxes as driven by multiple environmental changes, including climate variability, rising atmospheric CO2, increasing nitrogen deposition, tropospheric ozone pollution, land use change, and nitrogen fertilizer use. The estimated CH4 …

Global Warming And Population Responses Among Great Plains Birds, Paul A. Johnsgard

Zea E-Books Collection

Based on an analysis of 47 years (1967–2014) of Audubon Christmas Bird Counts (CBC), evidence for population changes and shifts in early winter (late December) ranges of nearly 150 species of birds in the Great Plains states is summarized, a region defined as including the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and the Texas panhandle. The rationale for this study had its origins in Terry Root’s 1988 Atlas of North American Wintering Birds. Root’s landmark study provided a baseline for evaluating the nationwide winter distributions of 253 North American birds in the mid-20th century, using data from the National Audubon Society’s …

Responses Of Global Terrestrial Evapotranspiration To Climate Change And Increasing Atmospheric Co2 In The 21st Century, Shufen Pan, Hanqin Tian, Shree R. S. Dangal, Qichun Yang, Jia Yang, Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu, Bo Tao, Wei Ren, Zhiyun Ouyang

Chaoqun (Crystal) Lu

Quantifying the spatial and temporal patterns of the water lost to the atmosphere through land surface evapotranspiration (ET) is essential for understanding the global hydrological cycle, but remains much uncertain. In this study, we use the Dynamic Land Ecosystem Model to estimate the global terrestrial ET during 2000–2009 and project its changes in response to climate change and increasing atmospheric CO2 under two IPCC SRES scenarios (A2 and B1) during 2010–2099. Modeled results show a mean annual global terrestrial ET of about 549 (545–552) mm yr−1 during 2000–2009. Relative to the 2000s, global terrestrial ET for the 2090s would increase …