Natural Resources and Conservation Commons^™

Ferrihydrite Reduction Increases Arsenic And Uranium Bioavailability In Unsaturated Soil, Arindam Malakar, Michael Kaiser, Daniel D. Snow, Harkamal Walia, Banajarani Panda, Chittaranjan Ray

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Redox driven mobilization and plant uptake of contaminants under transiently saturated soil conditions need to be clarified to ensure food and water quality across different irrigation systems. We postulate that solid-phase iron reduction in anoxic microsites present in the rhizosphere of unsaturated soil is a key driver for mobilization and bioavailability of contaminants under nonflooded irrigation. To clarify this, two major crops, corn and soybean differing in iron uptake strategies, were grown in irrigated synthetic soil under semiarid conditions with gravimetric moisture content ∼12.5 ± 2.4%. 2-line ferrihydrite, which was coprecipitated with uranium and arsenic, served as the only iron …

Use Of Multiple Environment Variety Trials Data To Simulate Maize Yields In The Ogallala Aquifer Region: A Two Model Approach, Vaishali Sharda, Mesfin Mekonnen, Chittaranjan Ray, Prasanna H. Gowda

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

With a long-term goal to optimize use of groundwater in the Ogallala Aquifer Region (OAR) to sustain food production systems, this study was conducted to calibrate Decision Support System for Agrotechnology Transfer (DSSAT) and AquaCrop crop modeling platforms to simulate maize production at a regional scale using historic datasets. Calibration of the models with local crop growth data and crop management practices is important, but usually this in-season crop growth information is not available. This study determined the possibility of using maize variety trial data for the evaluation of the CSM-Crop Estimation through Resources and Environmental Synthesis-Maize and AquaCrop models …

Biotic And Abiotic Factors Influencing Arsenic Biogeochemistry And Toxicity In Fluvial Ecosystems: A Review, Laura Barral-Fraga, María Teresa Barral, Keeley L. Macneill, Diego Martiñá-Prieto, Soizic Morin, María Carolina Rodríguez-Castro, Baigal-Amar Tuulaikhuu, Helena Guasch

School of Natural Resources: Faculty Publications

This review is focused on the biogeochemistry of arsenic in freshwaters and, especially, on the key role that benthic microalgae and prokaryotic communities from biofilms play together in through speciation, distribution, and cycling. These microorganisms incorporate the dominant iAs (inorganic arsenic) form and may transform it to other arsenic forms through metabolic or detoxifying processes. These transformations have a big impact on the environmental behavior of arsenic because different chemical forms exhibit differences in mobility and toxicity. Moreover, exposure to toxicants may alter the physiology and structure of biofilms, leading to changes in ecosystem function and trophic relations. In this …

Paleofloods And Landform Development Influence Carbon Storage In A Humid-Subtropical River Valley, Christopher Lance Stewart

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Floodplains can store large amounts of soil organic carbon (SOC) despite covering a small fraction of the global land area. Since these valley-bottom landforms build through the action of flooding, the century to millennial-scale record of overbank deposition could be important in understanding controls on deep (>30 cm) SOC storage. Yet, the influence of flood history and landform development on carbon content is surprisingly not well known. I use a combined geological and pedological approach to characterize the sedimentation, soil development, and SOC of fluvial terraces along an impounded reach of the humid-subtropical Tennessee River valley, U.S.A. The standardized …

Droughtscape, Winter 2019, Cory Matteson

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

Contents

From the Director

4th quarter climate summary

2019 year in review summary

4th quarter drought impact summary

2019 drought impact summary

New form helps ‘see more’ drought

Landscape photographers invited to submit photos

Helping Central and South America planning

Database includes more drought planning

Corn Response To Wastewater-Recycled Phosphorus Fertilizers, Shane R. Ylagan, Kristofor R. Brye

Discovery, The Student Journal of Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences

The ability to recycle phosphorus (P) from wastewaters could provide a sustainable, continuous source of P that might also help protect surface water quality from P enrichment. The mineral struvite (MgNH4PO4 · 6H2O) is an understudied material that can be created from P- and nitrogen (N)-containing wastewater and has been shown to have agricultural fertilizer value. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of electrochemically precipitated struvite (ECST), chemically precipitated struvite (Crystal Green; CG), diammonium phosphate (DAP), monoammonium phosphate (MAP), rock phosphate (RP), and triple superphosphate (TSP) on corn (Zea mays) response in a greenhouse pot study. …

Microdialysis: A Method For Quantifying In Situ Nitrogen Fluxes In Soil Microsites, Srusti Maddala, Mary C. Savin, Julie A. Stenken, Lisa S. Wood

Discovery, The Student Journal of Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences

Microdialysis, a diffusion-based sampling technique commonly used in biomedical research, has recently been recognized as a candidate for monitoring chemical changes in the rhizosphere. The information it provides about nutrient diffusion may improve nitrogen use efficiency, leading to enhanced management and success of restoration projects. The objective of this study was to determine the efficacy of microdialysis sampling to quantify the relative recoveries (RR%) of nitrate-N and ammonium-N, the two inorganic nitrogen compounds typically found in soil. The effects of microdialysis flow rate, sample medium concentration, and the presence of both analytes in solution on the relative recoveries obtained from …

Distribution Of Invasive Plant Species On Debris Cones At Mount Rainier National Park, Shaun Morrison

All Master's Theses

Invasive plant populations within Mount Rainier National Park are a biological and ecological threat to the unique mountain landscape. A better understanding of their distribution and transport within the landscape is needed to improve invasive species monitoring for National Park Service management. This study investigates how invasive plant populations in Stevens Canyon are utilizing the debris cone disturbances and associated geomorphic processes to facilitate movement within the park. Vegetation transects were performed along Stevens Canyon Road (to observe the roadside community composition) and on the debris cone features (to observe species movement from the roadside). These vegetation observations are presented …

Green Strategic Planning Approach For International Shipping Activities, Xiaofang Wu, Luoping Zhang, Huan Feng

Department of Earth and Environmental Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Sustainability is a long-term and ultimate goal for international shipping, although it is slowly making progress. The shipping perspective that moves away from “port-to-port” operations to “door-to-door” services also requires international shipping to take a long-term and holistic view instead of fragmented efforts. How to achieve the long-term sustainability goal becomes a key issue for door-to-door international shipping. Hence, green strategic planning for door-to-door international shipping was proposed with green development that puts forward the eco-centric point of view as its basic theory for sustainability. This study used a strategic decision-making approach, a so-called multi-dimensional decision-making (MDDM), coupled with the …

Resolving Time-Space Histories Of Late Cenozoic Bedrock Incision Along The Upper Colorado River, Usa, Andres Aslan, Karl E. Karlstrom, Eric Kirby, Matthew T. Heizler, Darryl E. Granger, James K. Feathers, Paul R. Hanson, Shannon A. Mahan

School of Natural Resources: Faculty Publications

The upper Colorado River basin drains the western slope of the Rocky Mountains province of North America and hosts a rich record of fluvial terraces and volcanic deposits that provide an archive of bedrock river incision since the Late Miocene. Here we present new geochronology from fluvial deposits and associated volcanic units using multiple methods (luminescence, cosmogenic-burial, 40Ar/39Ar basalt and detrital sanidine, and U/Pb detrital zircon) to reconstruct a detailed record of bedrock incision in the upper Colorado River over timescales ranging from Miocene to Late Pleistocene. Late Miocene (ca. 11–8 Ma) basalt flows perched 800–1700 m above the Colorado …

Improving Aquifer Characterization Through Integration Of Airborne Electromagnetics (Aem) And Well Hydrographs, Jacqueline Polashek

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The objective of this study is to evaluate methods of hydrostratigraphic modeling using geophysics and well hydrographs at the eastern edge of the High Plains aquifer (HPA) in Platte and Colfax counties within Nebraska, USA. The HPA is very heterogeneous in the study area, being hosted by architecturally complex glacial sediments and having many irregular hydraulic boundaries. Further, the HPA exhibits local variations between unconfined and confined conditions. Pumping in such bounded aquifers can be unsustainable because of cost increases and lost agricultural productivity. Moreover, the large drawdowns typical of confined aquifers can contribute to well interference during heavy pumping. …

Small Ruminant Health Intervention Calendar In Ethiopia, Mesfin Mekonnen, Ayalew Assefa, Tesfalem Nane, Firdawok Ayele, Asrat Arke, Belay Elias, Barbara Wieland

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Contents

1 Background................................................................................................... 3
2 Developing the health intervention calendar............................................................ 4
The treatment calendar ......................................................... 4 Applying the calendar..................................................................... 5 4 References................................................................... 8

Effect Of Foliar Spray Application Of Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles On Quantitative, Nutritional, And Physiological Parameters Of Foxtail Millet (Setaria Italica L.) Under Field Conditions, Marek Kolenčík, Dávid Ernst, Matej Komár, Martin Šebesta, Martin Urík, Edmund Dobročka, Ivan Černý, Ramakanth Illa, Raghavendra Kanike, Qian Yu, Huan Feng, Denisa Orlová, Gabriela Kratošová

Department of Earth and Environmental Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

It has been shown that the foliar application of inorganic nano-materials on cereal plants during their growth cycle enhances the rate of plant productivity by providing a micro-nutrient source. We therefore studied the effects of foliarly applied ZnO nanoparticles (ZnO NPs) on Setaria italica L. foxtail millet’s quantitative, nutritional, and physiological parameters. Scanning electron microscopy showed that the ZnO NPs have an average particle size under 20 nm and dominant spherically shaped morphology. Energy dispersive X-ray spectrometry then confirmed ZnO NP homogeneity, and X-ray diffraction verified their high crystalline and wurtzite-structure symmetry. Although plant height, thousand grain weight, and grain …

The Lampenflora In Show Caves And Its Treatment: An Emerging Ecological Problem, Carlos Baquedano Estévez, Luis Moreno Merino, Almudena De La Losa Román, Juan J. Durán Valsero

International Journal of Speleology

The artificial lighting of caves adapted for touristic visits, leads to the appearance and propagation of a complex community of phototrophic organisms known as “lampenflora”. Formed mainly by algae and cyanobacteria, they produce the degradation of the colonized substrates and decrease the show value of the caves. This phenomenon became famous worldwide in the 1960s due to the damage caused to the paintings in the Lascaux Cave (France). Since then it has become an issue of serious concern to both managers of show caves and to the international scientific community. Over time, the problem has been approached following two complementary …

Art And The Environment, Ellen Dexter, Lydia Dexter

Honors Program: Expanded Learning Clubs

After school club that teaches the importance of sustainable practices and conversation activities through art projects and imagination.

Stakeholders’ Perceptions Of Geographical Criteria For Loblolly Pine Management For Bioenergy Production In Virginia, Meghann Smith, Gia Nguyen, Taylor Wieczerak, Bernabas Wolde, Pankaj Lal, John Munsell

Department of Earth and Environmental Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

This study analyzed the perceptions of four stakeholder groups (forest landowners, private forest consultants, forest management researchers or educators, and federal or state agency foresters), regarding their management practices and preferred geographic growing conditions of loblolly pine in Virginia by combining AHP (analytical hierarchy process) and regression modeling. By ranking the importance of different geographical conditions for managing loblolly pine, we aimed to identify ways to support loblolly growth as a potential feedstock for biofuel generation. We achieved this through collecting survey responses from 43 stakeholders during the 2019 Virginia Forestry Summit. The results showed that the landowner, researcher/educator, and …

Identification Of Mined Areas That May Contribute To Water Quality Degradation At Hobet Coal Mine, West Virginia, Brian P. Murphy

IdeaFest: Interdisciplinary Journal of Creative Works and Research from Cal Poly Humboldt

No abstract provided.

Modeling Irrigation Behavior In Groundwater Systems, Timothy Foster, Nicholas Brozovic, Adrian P. Butler

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Integrated hydro-economic models have been widely applied to water management problems in regions of intensive groundwater-fed irrigation. However, policy interpretations may be limited as most existing models do not explicitly consider two important aspects of observed irrigation decision making, namely the limits on instantaneous irrigation rates imposed by well yield and the intraseasonal structure of irrigation planning. We develop a new modeling approach for determining irrigation demand that is based on observed farmer behavior and captures the impacts on production and water use of both well yield and climate. Through a case study of irrigated corn production in the Texas …

Water Productivity In Meat And Milk Production In The Us From 1960 To 2016, Mesfin Mekonnen, C.M.U. Neale, Chittaranjan Ray, Galen E. Erickson, Arjen Y. Hoekstra

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Global demand for livestock products is rising, resulting in a growing demand for feed and potentially burdening freshwater resources to produce this feed. To offset this increased pressure on water resources, the environmental performance of livestock sector should continue to improve. Over the last few decades, product output per animal and feedstuff yields in the US have improved, but before now it was unclear to what extent these improvements influenced the water productivity (WP) of the livestock products. In this research, we estimate changes in WP of animal products from 1960 to 2016. We consider feed conversion ratios (dry matter …

Traffic Noise And Sexual Selection: Studies Of Anthropogenic Impact On Bird Songs And Undergraduate Student Reasoning Of Evolutionary Mechanisms, Sarah Spier

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Humans have transformed much of the natural landscape and are continuing to do so at an accelerated rate, compromising natural areas that serve as important habitat for many species. Roads impact much of the environment as they fragment habitat and introduce traffic noise into the acoustic environment, deferentially affecting wildlife in roadside habitat. I explored how traffic noise affects the detection of birds based on whether their vocalizations were masked by traffic noise. Masked species detection was not affected by an increase in traffic noise amplitude, while there was a negative effect of traffic noise amplitude on unmasked species detection, …

Drought Impacts Assessment In Brazil: A Remote Sensing Approach, Denis Mariano

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Climate extremes are becoming more frequent in Brazil; studies project an increase in drought occurrences in many regions of the country. In the south, drought events lead to crop yield losses affecting the value chain and, therefore, the local economy. In the northeast, extended periods of drought lead to potential land degradation, affecting the livelihood and hindering local development. In the southern Amazon, an area that experienced intense land use change (LUC) in the last, the impacts are even more complex, ranging from crop yield loss and forest resilience loss, affecting ecosystem health and putting a threat on the native …

Regime Detection Measures For The Practical Ecologist, Jessica L. Burnett

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Forecasting undesirable change is, arguably, the holy grail of ecology. Paired with an understanding of system interactions, a forecast is ideal if it provides reliable predictions in sufficient time to prevent or mitigate unwanted systemic change. Early warning systems (or early warning signals, early warning indicators) have been developed and tested for some ecological systems data, but have been mostly applied to marine fisheries time series and nutrient loadings in shallow lakes. Despite the numerous quantitative methods proposed for identifying or forecasting regime shifts in ecological data, few are used in practice. This dissertation contributes to our understanding of the …

Nitrate Removal And Placement Of Floating Treatment Wetlands In The Midwest, Mary G. Keilhauer

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The Midwestern United States is vulnerable to eutrophic conditions from high nutrient concentrations. Recommendations for nonpoint source pollution management include runoff treatment (i.e., filter strips, riparian buffers) and in-situ lake treatment practices (i.e., aluminum sulfate (alum) treatments, aeration, up/downdraft pumping, floating treatment wetlands). Floating treatment wetlands (FTWs) are an innovative wetland design for nutrient removal from nonpoint sources and provide a unique in-situ treatment. Best management practice studies have commonly focused on adjacent to water practices, which have resulted in a gap for guidance for in-situ treatment placement and design. Therefore, the objectives of this project were to (1) Quantify …

Evaluation Of The Metric Model For Mapping Energy Balance Components And Actual Evapotranspiration For A Super-Intensive Drip-Irrigated Olive Orchard, Samuel Ortega

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

A field experiment was carried out to evaluate the METRIC (Mapping EvapoTranspiration at high Resolution Internalized with Calibration) model for mapping net radiation (Rni), soil heat flux (Gi), sensible heat flux (Hi), latent heat flux (LEi), actual evapotranspiration (ETa) and crop coefficient (Kc) of a superintensive drip-irrigated olive (Olea europeae L. cv Arbequina) orchard located in Pencahue Valley, Region del Maule, Chile (35 23’ LS; 71 44’ LW; 96 m above sea level). The study was conducted in an experimental plot of 21.1 hectares using 9 satellite images (Landsat 7 ETM+) acquired on clear sky days during 2011/2012 and 2012/2013 …

Developing A Framework To Link Multi-Sector Drought Impacts To Drought Severity At The State Level, Mary Noel

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The United States Drought Monitor, a weekly map depicting severity and spatial extent of drought, is a key indicator for federal and state policy decisions including the annual distribution of hundreds of millions of dollars for agricultural financial relief in the United States. However, the current table describing potential drought impacts for the map’s severity levels fails to adequately represent a state’s unique environmental, economic, and social values affected by drought. One approach to improve this broad, national-scale assessment is to transition from the former platform to a more detailed characterization of drought impacts at the state level. To accomplish …

Droughtscape, Fall 2019, Cory Matteson

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

Contents

From the Director

Quarterly drought summary

Quarterly drought impacts

Ranchers delayed response to drought

Drought Monitor celebrates 20 years

Drought Monitor state impact tables

Directorcontributesto U.N.droughtproject

Updated Drought Risk Atlas

New fact sheet lists recovery resources

Droughtscape, Summer 2019, Cory Matteson

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

Contents

From the Director

Quarterly drought summary

Quarterly drought impacts

NDMC welcomes African visitors

Ready for Drought game debuts

U.S. Virgin Islands added to USDM

Australian programmer visits NDMC

Upcoming events

Partnerships with NDMC extended

Investigation Of Grace-Derived Information On Forest Drought Stress Across The Contiguous Us, Beichen Zhang

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This research derives z-score monthly groundwater storage (GWS) anomalies and z-score monthly root zone soil moisture (RZSM) anomalies from products of Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Data Assimilation (GRACE-DA). Z-score monthly GWS and RZSM anomalies are compared to two drought indicators: Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) and Standardized Precipitation-Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI) to investigate the usefulness of GRACE-DA information to detect drought conditions at tree-ring sites. This study also compares z-score monthly GWS and RZSM anomalies with the Tree Ring Standardized Growth Index (TRSGI) that is resampled by bootstrapping to investigate the capability of monitoring forest drought stress. Finally, this research uses …

Cogongrass (Imperata Cylindrica (L.) Beauv.) In Louisiana: Cause And Consequence, Lorissa A. Radunzel-Davis

LSU Master's Theses

Cogongrass (Imperata cylindrica (L.) Beauv.), an invasive species from East Asia, is found worldwide and is problematic in several countries. In the United States, it grows primarily in the Southeast, reducing biodiversity by growing in dense patches and potentially causing mortality and reducing value of native and planted pinelands due to a high burning temperature. Using Lee Memorial Forest, a Louisiana State University AgCenter property in Washington Parish as a study site, this thesis explores cogongrass in Louisiana with emphasis on soil microbes and soil legacy effects on native plant species. Cogongrass populations at Lee Memorial Forest were more …

Structural Control Of Mesic Vegetation Communities Within The Owl And Bear Creek Watersheds, Fort Hood Military Installation, Texas, Melinda S. Faulkner, Matthew Mcbroom, Kenneth W. Farrish, Kevin Stafford

Faculty Publications

The Fort Hood Military Installation is a karst landscape, dominated by Lower Cretaceous carbonates of the Trinity and Fredericksburg groups. The study area is the northeastern peninsula known as the Owl Mountain Province, utilized by the U.S. Army for troop maneuvers and training. The geomorphic evolution of the province has been controlled by the structural development of incised canyons in the Owl and Bear creek watersheds, following the deformational trend of the Balcones/Ouachita fault system and the transverse Belton High-Central Texas Reef Trend. These trends control cave development in the subsurface, karst manifestations at the surface, joints in outcrop, stream …