Life Sciences Commons^™

Identification And Analysis Of Ichthyofaunal Remains From Late Pleistocene-Holocene Deposits Of Cheek Bend Cave (40mu261), Maury County, Tennessee, William Clark Dickinson

Doctoral Dissertations

Knowledge of the character of the late Pleistocene-Holocene ichthyofauna of the middle Duck River was acquired as a result of identification and biostratigraphic analysis of numerous fish bone fragments from the well-stratified deposits of Cheek Bend Cave, a small rockshelter situated in the limestone bluffs along the Duck River in Maury County, Tennessee. Forty-five unequivocal fish taxa (representing 12 families) were identified, of which 25 taxa occurred in the Late Wisconsin strata, 33 in Holocene strata, and 13 in both depositional sequences. Fifteen of the Late Wisconsin taxa and 18 Holocene taxa appear to represent initial records for these periods, …

Systematics, Distribution, And Biology Of Fishes Currently Allocated To Erimystax (Jordan), A Subgenus Of Hybopsis (Cyprinidae), John Lowrey Harris

Doctoral Dissertations

Intra- and interspecific variation of species of the subgenus Erimystax, genus Hybopsis, are analyzed using multivariate statistical techniques. Diagnoses, descriptions, figures, supporting tables, and distribution maps are provided to facilitate identification of the subgenus and component species. Results of multivariate analyses support the elevation of the Ozark subspecies of Hybopsis dissimilis to specific standing as Hybopsis i. insignis distributed in the lower Tennessee and Cumberland river drainages and H. insignis eristigma found in eastern tributaries of the upper Tennessee River drainage. Populations interpreted as intergrades occur in the Clinch, Powell, and Holston rivers. Two subspecies of Hybopsis x-punctata are recognized …

The Decline Of Log House Construction In Blount County, Tennessee, John T. Morgan

Doctoral Dissertations

The log house is an important element of architectural heritage of much of the eastern United States. In some areas, such as East Tennessee, log construction was not replaced by frame construction until the late nineteenth century.

Several reasons have been presented in the literature for the decline of log house construction, but none of them had been tested empirically. This study determined to what extent the reasons given for the decline of the log house construction explain the decline of log dwelling construction in Blount County, Tennessee. The study analyzed the influence of five factors: (1) relative affluence of …

Between Population Comparison Of Resource Acquisition In The Long Jawed Orb Weaving Spider Tetragnatha Elongata, Rosemary Grace Gillespie

Doctoral Dissertations

Behavioral adaptations for resource acquisition in the long jawed orb weaving spider Tetragnatha elongata Walckenaer (Araneae: Tetragnathidae) are documented in this study. It examines the form and mechanism of spider foraging behavior, an essential prerequisite to the realization of the commercial use of spiders in integrated pes t management. Being the most common and ubiquitous of insect predators, spiders offer tremendous potential as stabilizers in agro ecosystems with unstable cycling of phytophagous insects. The initial part of this study examines the mechanisms employed by T. elongata in selecting a habitat, and demonstrates that spiders do not build webs where the …

The Development Of Smallholder Tea Production In Tanzania: An Economic Analysis Of Factors Influencing Green Leaf Tea Output, Joseph Tarmo Nagu

Doctoral Dissertations

This study focused on smallholder tea production as one strategy for Tanzanian economic development. The central research question was the economic evaluation of the potential of this strategy for increasing peasant farmer income streams in an economy comprised of mostly subsistence farming.

Two objectives were: (1) the assessment of the extent to which selected production factors explain the variability in the annual output of green tea leaf (output) and (2) the estimation of the physical resource productivities and the computation of marginal value products (MVP's) of selected resources for a sample 150 smallholder tea farms in Njombe, Tanzania to determine …

Comparative Bioavailability Of Sediment-Sorbed Hexachlorobiphenyl, C. Michael Swindoll

Doctoral Dissertations

The bioavailability of sediment-sorbed hexachlorobiphenyl (HCB) to bacteria, midge larvae (Chironomus tentans), and mosquitofish (Gambusia affinis) was examined in order to elucidate the influence of abiotic and biotic factors on the bioaccumulation process. Factors examined included sediment type, sediment organic matter, HCB concentration, temperature, and biological viability. Additional experiments were conducted to evaluate the relative role of sediment and dietary HCB sources to the accumulation of HCB in mosquitofish.

In general, the bioavailability of sediment-sorbed HCB was inversely related to the surface area and the organic content of the sediment. The organic content of the sediment …