Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Commons^™

Water Quality Of Madari Khal Tributary Of The Halda River, Chattogram, Bangladesh, Md. Shafiqul Islam, M.A. Azadi

Journal of Bioresource Management

Tidal canal Madari-Khal is one of the important tributaries of the river Halda, through which nearby hill stream water, agricultural washings, and effluents (treated or untreated) of Chattogram Asian paper Mill are drained to the Halda River. In this paper water quality and pollution level of Madari Khal are presented. A one-year study was conducted to ascertain the water quality and pollution level by using different physicochemical parameters i.e. Air temperature, Water temperature, Transparency, EC (Electrical Conductivity), TDS (Total Dissolved Solids), pH, DO (Dissolved Oxygen), freeCO₂, Ca⁺⁺ (Calcium), TH (Total Hardness), TA (Total Alkalinity), and Biological Oxygen …

The Pepsis Menechma Lepeletier (Hymenoptera: Pompilidae: Pepsinae) Taxonomic And Nomenclatural Problem, Frank E. Kurczewski

Insecta Mundi

Hurd (1952), in revising the Nearctic species of Pepsis Fabricius, separated P. cerberus Lucas from P. elegans Lepeletier based on external morphology and geography. Vardy (2005), in his Western Hemisphere Pepsis revision, combined these taxa and several Neotropical color and structural variants in a broad defini­tion of P. menechma Lepeletier extending across ~11,250 km and two continents. Vardy (2005) synonymized the familiar and well-documented, 160-year-old P. elegans under P. menechma probably because it appeared several pages later in Lepeletier’s (1845) Histoire Naturelle des Insectes. Hyménoptères. Vardy’s (2005) interpre­tation of Pepsis menechma as a viable species presents a taxonomic and …

Establishment Of Sinoxylon Anale Lesne (Coleoptera: Bostrichidae) In Brazil And Its Potential Implications, Luana De Souza Covre, Robert A. Hack, Carlos A.H. Flechtmann

Insecta Mundi

Bostrichidae (Coleoptera) are a family of beetles with specialized xylophagous feeding habits that allow consumption of dry woody plant tissues. Bostrichids are often polyphagous and therefore pose a sig­nificant threat to many agricultural and forestry products, particularly in tropical regions. Bostrichids are commonly detected in solid wood packaging material at international ports of entry. Notably, Sinoxylon anale Lesne has been intercepted in wood crates and pallets worldwide and has now become established in Brazil. This paper reports the first documented establishment of S. anale in Brazil, being found both in domestic wood pallets and within native forest and monoculture. The …

Chinese Species Of The Genus Tricondyla Latreille, 1822 (Coleoptera: Cicindelidae) And A New Record For The Country, Xinxin Xiong, Jürgen Wiesner

Insecta Mundi

Tricondyla wiesneri Naviaux, 2002 (Coleoptera: Cicindelidae) is reported from China for the first time. Photographs, short descriptions, and an identification key for all six taxa of the genus Tricondyla La­treille, 1822 known from China are given.

The first author recently received several specimens of Tricondyla wiesneri Naviaux, 2002 that had been collected in Yingjiang County, Dehong Dai and Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan Province, China. The second author compared them with the type specimens and confirmed the identification. The species was originally described from Laos, Louang Namtha province (Naviaux 2002: 48), later reported from Vietnam, Dien Bien province (Wiesner 2022: 191), …

First Report Of The Stinkbug Edessa Leucogramma (Perty) (Hemiptera: Heteroptera: Pentatomidae: Edessinae) Attacking Handroanthus Chrysanthus (Jacq.) S.O. Grose (Bignoniaceae), With Descriptions Of The Adult And Immatures And Notes On Associated Fungi And Protozoa, Gonzalo Abril R., Allan H. Smith-Pardo

Insecta Mundi

The stinkbug Edessa leucogramma (Perty) (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae: Edessinae) is reported as a pest of young yellow guayacán trees (Handroanthus chrysanthus (Jacq.) S.O. Grose, Bignoniaceae) in the met­ropolitan area of the Aburra Valley in Antioquia, Colombia (AMVA). We provide a short description of the adult and immature stages and report for the first-time protozoa associated with the digestive system of this species of true bug in addition to information regarding a fungus found associated with Edessa leucogramma in the field.

Se reporta el chinche Edessa leucograma (Perty) (Hemíptera: Pentatomidae: Edessinae), como plaga importante de árboles jóvenes del guayacán amarillo ( …

Cyclocephala Kuijteni (Scarabaeidae: Dynastinae: Cyclocephalini), A New Species From Suriname, Meindert A. Hielkema

Insecta Mundi

Cyclocephala kuijteni, new species (Scarabaeidae: Dynastinae: Cyclocephalini), is described from Suriname. It is illustrated together with its aedeagus, and the characteristics differentiating it from the most similar species C. castanea (Olivier), C. hardyi Endrödi and C. pygidialis Joly are briefly discussed.

The New World genus Cyclocephala Dejean, 1821 contains about 360 described species, with most representatives occurring in the Neotropics (Ratcliffe and Cave 2015). While investigating the scarabaeoid fauna of Suriname with my son Auke, we collected a large number of Cyclocephala specimens with a so-called mothing sheet, including a single male specimen I was unable to identify. The …

Genomic And Transcriptomic Analyses Reveal Polygenic Architecture For Ecologically Important Traits In Aspen (Populus Tremuloides Michx.), Jennifer F. L. Riehl, Christopher T. Cole, Clay J. Marrow, Hilary L. Barker, Carolina Bernhardsson, Kennedy Rubert-Nason, Pär K. Ingvarsson, Richard L. Lindroth

Aspen Bibliography

Intraspecific genetic variations in foundation species such as aspen (Populus tremuloides Michx.) shapes their impact on forest structure and function. Identifying genes underlying ecologically important traits is key to understanding that impact. Previous studies, using single-locus genome-wide association (GWA) analyses to identify candidate genes, have identified fewer genes than anticipated for highly heritable quantitative traits. Mounting evidence suggests that polygenic control of quantitative traits is largely responsible for this "missing heritability" phenomenon. Our research characterized the genetic architecture of 30 ecologically important traits using a common garden of aspect through genomic and transcriptomic analyses. A multilocus association model revealed …

Effects Of Fire On Kangaroo Rats In The San Joaquin Desert Of California, David J. Germano, Lawrence R. Saslaw, Brian L. Cypher, Linda Spiegel

Western North American Naturalist

Fire can alter ecological communities, particularly those that are not fire-adapted, such as desert communities. We examined the effects of fire on rodent communities in the San Joaquin Desert of central California. Of particular interest were the effects on kangaroo rats (Dipodomys spp.) including 2 rare species, the giant kangaroo rat (D. ingens) and the short-nosed kangaroo rat (D. nitratoides brevinasus). Lightning caused multiple fires in arid scrub habitat in western Kern County in 1993. We trapped rodents at 7 sites along paired transects, with one transect in a burned area and one in a …

The First Record Of Orthochirus Glabrifrons (Kraepelin, 1903) (Scorpiones: Buthidae) From The United Arab Emirates, František Kovařík, Ersen A. Yağmur, Alexander Ullrich, Balázs Buzás

Euscorpius

Orthochirus glabrifrons (Kraepelin, 1903) (Scorpiones: Buthidae) was described from Oman (Muscat). Here, we summarize known localities from Oman as well as records from the United Arab Emirates, which is the new country record for this species. Illustrations of morphology of both sexes are given together with a map of distribution. A lectotype of Orthochirus glabrifrons (Kraepelin, 1903) is designated. Paraorthochirus kaspareki Lourenço & Huber, 2000 and Paraorthochirus kinzelbachi Lourenço & Huber, 2000 are synonymized with Orthochirus glabrifrons (Kraepelin, 1903), syn. n.

In Memoriam Rolando Teruel Ochoa (1974 – 2023), Luis F. De Armas, Sheyla Yong

Euscorpius

This is an obituary of Rolando Teruel Ochoa (1974–2023), a great Cuban arachnologist. A full list of his works is appended, as well as a list of scorpions and other arachnids described by Rolando.

The Deep Ecology Movement

The International Journal of Ecopsychology (IJE)

There are two great streams of environmentalism in the latter half of the twentieth century. One stream is reformist, attempting to control some of the worst of the air and water pollution and inefficient land use practices in industrialized nations and to save a few of the remaining pieces of wildlands as "designated wilderness areas." The other stream supports many of the reformist goals but is revolutionary, seeking a new metaphysics, epistemology, cosmology, and environmental ethics of person/planet. This paper is an intellectual archeology of the second of these streams of environmentalism, which I will call deep ecology.

Observations On A 40-Year January Bird Census In Boone County, Nebraska, 1978–2017, Wayne Mollhoff

Zea E-Books Collection

For 40 years Wayne Mollhoff conducted a personal bird census every January. He explains: "After having run several Breeding Bird Survey routes, and participated in several Christmas Bird Counts, I became curious to see what might be found on a winter count under the more tightly controlled parameters of a census, as contrasted with Christmas counts done with variable numbers of observers."

The count was set up similarly to the USGS Breeding Bird Survey routes with 50 stops, one-half mile (800 meters) apart, all birds counted for 3 minutes, with birds counted at one stop not counted again at following …

Diversity And Distribution Of Ascidians, Lauren M. Stefaniak

Marine Science

My research focuses on the biodiversity and biogeography of ascidians, the mechanisms controlling the distribution of species and communities, and how human activities, such as shipping, coastal hardening, and climate changes can alter those distributions. Working with my masters and undergraduate student researchers, I use morphological and molecular taxonomy, molecular ecology, and observational and manipulative field and lab studies to explore these questions...

This article was published Open Access through the CCU Libraries Transformative Agreement Program. The article was first published in genesis, the Journal of Genetics and Development: https://doi.org/10.1002/dvg.23548

An Evolutionary Pathway For Coping With Emerging Infectious Disease, Scott Lyell Gardner, Daniel R. Brooks, Walter A. Boeger, Eric P. Hoberg

Zea E-Books Collection

Emerging infectious disease (EID) represents an existential threat to humanity. EIDs are increasing in frequency and impact because of climate change and other human activities. We are losing the battle against EIDs because of improper assessment of the risk of EID. This stems from adherence to a failed paradigm of pathogen-host associations that suggests EIDs ought to be both unpredictable and rare. That, in turn, leads to policies suggesting that crisis response is the best we can do. Real-time and phylogenetic assessments show EIDs to be neither rare nor unpredictable—this is the parasite paradox that shows the failures of the …

Description Of The Adult Male Scorpiops Tongtongi Tang, 2022, With Further Comments On The Genus Scorpiops Peters, 1861 In China (Scorpiones: Scorpiopidae), Victoria Tang

Euscorpius

Adult male Scorpiops tongtongi Tang, 2022 is described based on recently collected specimens, which revealed a strong sexual dimorphism in the pedipalp finger lobe of this species (present in males, absent in females), lending more support to the separation from its geographic neighbors, S. jendeki Kovařík, 1994, S. shidian (Qi et al., 2005), S. zhangshuyuani Ythier, 2019, and S. beccaloniae (Kovařík, 2005). The morphological studies of Chinese Scorpiops are further discussed. A refined mensurational method of Scorpiops pedipalp chela is proposed. Morphological comparisons of both quantitative and qualitative characters for all Scorpiops from Yunnan are provided, along with a dichotomous …

The Nebraska Bird Review (September 2023) 91(3), Whole Issue

Nebraska Bird Review

Summer Field Report, June–July 2023, by W. Ross Silcock

2023 Limpkin at Crystal Cove Park, Dakota County, NE, by Bill Huser

2022 (34th) Report of the NOU Records Committee, by Mark A. Brogie

Subscription and Organization Information

2023 Limpkin At Crystal Cove Park, Dakota County, Ne, Bill Huser

Nebraska Bird Review

On the morning of October 7, 2023, I observed Nebraska’s second Limpkin (Aramus guarauna) at Crystal Cove Park in South Sioux City, and the bird was subsequently seen by several other observers throughout that afternoon. Photo and video records were obtained (https://ebird.org/checklist/S151656716). The summer and fall of 2023 brought fourteen sightings to Iowa, though it is impossible to determine how many birds were involved (eBird, 2023). One of those sightings occurred in the northwestern part of the state at Bacon Creek Park in Sioux City when a single Limpkin was independently reported by two observers on …

Factors Affecting California Grassland Biodiversity: Two Case Studies, Nora Bales

Master's Theses

Biodiversity loss over the last century has been significant and is projected to increase. Biodiversity loss is accelerating due to climate change and habitat loss and degradation. Biodiversity supports key ecosystem services including pollination services, climate regulation, and water filtration. Biodiversity conservation is a top priority for land managers and researchers, however many ecological studies with practical applications lack a thorough understanding of the soil environment in their study system. We conducted two case studies integrating soil and plant data to answer management questions. The first case study investigated the relationship between a threatened plant, Hooveria purpurea var. purpurea and …

Mineral Licks As A Potential Nidus For Parasite Transmission, William J. Severud, Todd M. Kautz, Jerrold L. Belant, Seth A. Moore

Natural Resource Management Faculty Publications

Discrete landscape features can concentrate animals in time and space, leading to non-random interspecific encounters. These encounters have implications for predator-prey interactions, habitat selection, intraspecific competition, and transmission of parasites and other pathogens. The lifecycle of the parasitic nematode Parelaphostrongylus tenuis requires an intermediate host of a terrestrial gastropod. Natural hosts of P. tenuis are whitetailed deer, and an aberrant host of conservation concern is moose, which are susceptible to high levels of mortality as a naive host to the parasite. Intermediate hosts become infected when P. tenuis larvae are shed in deer feces, then consumed or enter the gastropod …

A Lamprey Neural Cell Type Atlas Illuminates The Origins Of The Vertebrate Brain, Francesco Lamanna, Francisca Hervas-Sotomayor, A. Phillip Oel, David Jandzik, Daniel Sobrido-Cameán, Gabriel N. Santos-Durán, Megan L. Martik, Jan Stundl, Stephen A. Green, Thoomke Brüning, Katharina Mößinger, Julia Schmidt, Celine Schneider, Mari Sepp, Florent Murat, Jeramiah J. Smith, Marianne E. Bronner, María Celina Rodicio, Antón Barreiro-Iglesias, Daniel M. Medeiros, Detlev Arendt, Henrik Kaessmann

Markey Cancer Center Faculty Publications

The vertebrate brain emerged more than ~500 million years ago in common evolutionary ancestors. To systematically trace its cellular and molecular origins, we established a spatially resolved cell type atlas of the entire brain of the sea lamprey—a jawless species whose phylogenetic position affords the reconstruction of ancestral vertebrate traits—based on extensive single-cell RNA-seq and in situ sequencing data. Comparisons of this atlas to neural data from the mouse and other jawed vertebrates unveiled various shared features that enabled the reconstruction of cell types, tissue structures and gene expression programs of the ancestral vertebrate brain. However, our analyses also revealed …

Expanding The Role Of The Temporal Dimension In Ecological Niche Models: A Study On Mexican Montane Small Mammals, Gonzalo E. Pinilla Buitrago

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Ecological niche models (ENMs) are commonly used to estimate the potential geographic distributions of species and have various uses, such as predicting invasive species' potential distribution, assessing vulnerability to climate change, or estimating paleodistributions. However, ENM developments have primarily focused on solving spatially related issues, underemphasizing the temporal dimensionality of occurrence and environmental data collected over the last century. One limitation of ENMs is the common practice of using recent environmental averages that fail to capture the gradual environmental change over the time span of the occurrence records and can hide trends in environmental variables, a critical piece of information …

Determining The Influence Of Abiotic And Biotic Predictors On Ecological Niche Models, Erica Johnson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Biotic variables, including those reflecting interactions such as competition and parasitism, are generally assumed to have negligible effects on broadscale species distributions and are typically excluded from ecological niche models (ENMs). However, the role such interactions play in shaping species distributions is increasingly recognized, sparking the development of methods for their integration into ENMs.

Among the most common approaches are those that limit the ENM output of the focal species by the distribution of biotic interactors (post-processing) and those that incorporate biotic interactors as predictor variables. These endeavors hold widespread and critical usages, such as predicting the impacts of climate …

Sex In The Noisy City: Changes In Vocal Behavior Patterns And Dopamine Neurochemistry In The Auditory System Of Oyster Toadfish (Opsanus Tau), Kelsey N. Hom

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Intense anthropogenic noise can induce stress, behavioral changes, and even hearing loss in aquatic animals. However, there are few studies that have demonstrated how ecologically relevant noise affects aquatic life, and even fewer studies on the effect of noise on animals that require sound for reproduction. The oyster toadfish (Opsanus tau) is an excellent animal model to examine the effects of anthropogenic noise on behavior and neurochemistry since they use a reproductive call to find mates and live near urban areas like New York City. Despite living alongside the most populous city in the United States, these vocal …

Population Genomics, Ecology And Conservation Of Asterias Sea Stars In The North Atlantic, Melenia I. Giakoumis

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Uncovering how species respond to environmental change is a central question in biology (Ehrlén & Morris 2015; Habibullah et al. 2022). It is the key to elucidating the past, understanding the present and predicting the future of species’ population dynamics. This dissertation investigates the influence of environmental change on intertidal species’ distributions and genomics at several timescales, with implications for conservation.

Environmental changes have occurred throughout history, on a geological scale, and have shaped the global patterns of species’ distributions and population sizes. Biologists have long studied how geological history has shaped species distributions (Sanmartín 2012) in both terrestrial (Liu …

Antiviral Susceptibility Of Clade 2.3.4.4b Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza A(H5n1) Viruses Isolated From Birds And Mammals In The United States, 2022, Ha T. Nguyen, Anton Chesnokov, Juan De La Cruz, Philippe Noriel Q. Pascua, Vasiliy P. Mishin, Yunho Jang, Joyce Jones, Han Di, Andrei A. Ivashchenko, Mary Lea Killian, Mia K. Torchetti, Kristina Lantz, David E. Wentworth, Charles T. Davis, Alexandre V. Ivachtchenko, Larisa V. Gubareva

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Clade 2.3.4.4b highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) A(H5N1) viruses that are responsible for devastating outbreaks in birds and mammals pose a potential threat to public health. Here, we evaluated their susceptibility to influenza antivirals. Of 1,015 sequences of HPAI A(H5N1) viruses collected in the United States during 2022, eight viruses (∼0.8%) had a molecular marker of drug resistance to an FDA-approved antiviral: three adamantane-resistant (M2-V27A), four oseltamivir-resistant (NA-H275Y), and one baloxavir-resistant (PA-I38T). Additionally, 31 viruses contained mutations that may reduce susceptibility to inhibitors of neuraminidase (NA) (n = 20) or cap-dependent endonuclease (CEN) (n = 11). A panel of 22 …

2022 (34th) Report Of The Nou Records Committee, Mark A. Brogie

Nebraska Bird Review

The functions and methods of the Nebraska Ornithologists’ Union Records Committee (NOURC) are described in its bylaws (NOURC 2010). The committee’s purpose is to provide a procedure for documenting unusual bird sightings and to establish a list of all documented birds for Nebraska. Species for which the NOURC seeks documentation (NOURC Review List) can be found at the NOU website www.NOUbirds.org. Starting in 2020, the NOURC decided to deal mainly with those species deemed as Accidental on the “Official List of the Birds of Nebraska.” Casual species and out-of-range species are now summarized in the “Seasonal Reports” of the …

Summer Field Report, June–July 2023, W. Ross Silcock

Nebraska Bird Review

There were no new species for Nebraska. This was also a lean season for records of species with few Nebraska records. Probably most significant were continuing Common Ravens in two Sioux Co locations, and possibly the first summer records of Baird’s Sparrow, a recording of the latter currently under NOURC review.

Within-state breeders nesting at new locations. There were several instances of nesting reported away from known breeding areas. These include documented records of first nesting Black-necked Stilts in Cherry Co, Least Terns off river at Offutt Base Lake in Sarpy Co, Mississippi Kite in Adams Co, Yellow-throated Vireo in …

Remote Sensing Characterization Of Ecosystem Structure And Functional Types To Inform On Biodiversity Conservation In The Lowland Chocó Rainforest, Derek Tesser

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation focuses on the utilization of remote sensing techniques to characterize ecosystem structure and functional types to inform on biodiversity conservation. This work is motivated by a guiding hypothesis that increased degradation of tropical forest biodiversity due to human activity results in in measurable changes in ecosystem processes that can be detected using remote sensing technologies. Throughout this dissertation, testing of aspects of this hypothesis involve comparing areas with varying degrees of human-induced degradation in a biodiverse tropical ecoregion, the lowland Chocó rainforest of Ecuador. Remote sensing data is used to evaluate changes in vegetation structure, thermal regimes, and …

Past And Ongoing Field-Based Studies Of Myxomycetes, Steven L. Stephenson

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Evidence from molecular studies indicates that myxomycetes (also called myxogastrids or plasmodial slime molds) have a long evolutionary history, and the oldest known fossil is from the mid-Cretaceous. However, they were not “discovered” until 1654, when a brief description and a woodcut depicting what is almost certainly the common species Lycogala epidendrum was published. First thought to be fungi, myxomycetes were not universally recognized as completely distinct until well into the twentieth century. Biodiversity surveys for the group being carried out over several years are relatively recent, with what is apparently the first example being carried out in the 1930s. …

Comparison Of The Effects Of Catchment Land Use/Land Cover On Freshwater Macroinvertebrate Communities And Water Quality In Three Rivers Of The Dingle Peninsula, Brooke Elizabeth Chesler

Theses

The Dingle Peninsula, a dynamic coastal ecosystem in the southwest of Ireland, provides an appropriate location to study the delicate balance that exists between human activities i.e., tourism, agriculture, and forestry, and their resulting impacts on the environment. Thus, the adjacent Feohanagh, Milltown, and Owenmore catchments were analysed via three-minute kick-samples divided proportionally by substrata for macroinvertebrate community composition, in-situ physico-chemical measurements for water quality parameters, and CORINE classification of land use and land cover (LULC). The overall goal was to identify the effect of LULC on water quality using macroinvertebrates as bioindicators. The presence of sensitive or tolerant macroinvertebrates …