Images

A scientist is working to collect alpine insects by picking through moss below tiny, cold, alpine streams. This spot was below a small seep on a slope above a tributary to the Dry Fork, North of the Two Medicine area in Glacier National Park. 

Salt-encrusted remains of a southwestern pond turtle (Actinemys pallida) as found in the dry lake bed of Elizabeth Lake, Los Angeles County, California. Note the heavy coating of evaporites on the carcass. Most living turtles collected in 2014 had similar but varying degrees of coatings on the head, limbs and shell.

Photograph of Elizabeth Lake in the fourth year of drought and two years after the Powerhouse Fire. Note salt encrustation of surface and small accumulations of water remaining in the foreground and background.

Almost all of the turtles living in a southern California lake died following a large fire and years of drought, according to a new USGS report.

A scientist from the University of California, Berkeley climbs a giant sequoia to measure its drought stress.

Sagebrush around Granby and Willow Creek Reservoirs.             

Determining aboveground biomass of sagebrush, grasses, and forbs is important for estimating fuel loads, measuring carbon storage, and assessing habitat quality in shrublands. Remote sensing may offer a more efficient alternative to common, labor intensive methods of measuring aboveground biomass that are difficult to apply across large areas.

This organism forms a colony that is the size of a pin head and can be seen floating in the water. The filaments glow red from chlorophyll, the yellow-green mass in the center is the mucilage that binds the filaments into the colony and green spots are associated bacteria, illuminated with the DNA stain Sytox Green ®.

This organism forms a colony that is the size of a pin head and can be seen floating in the water. Using ultra violet light, the filaments glow red from chlorophyll, while other pigments give various hues of purple, which may be a hint about the health of the cells.

This organism forms a colony that is the size of a pin head and can be seen floating in the water. Using ultra violet light, the filaments glow red from chlorophyll, while other pigments give various hues of purple, which may be a hint about the health of the cells.

A mother caribou and her offspring, east of Chicken, Alaska (on the Yukon-Alaska border).

Juvenile wolf eel - Scuba divers from the U.S. Geological Survey’s Western Fisheries Research Center, Washington Sea Grant, EPA and the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe collected data and images from a long-term study of the Elwha River dam removals and the resulting effects on the nearshore ecosystem.

Moon snails - Scuba divers from the U.S. Geological Survey’s Western Fisheries Research Center, Washington Sea Grant, EPA and the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe collected data and images from a long-term study of the Elwha River dam removals and the resulting effects on the nearshore ecosystem.

The Asian swamp eel is an invasive species that was introduced into the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area and has persisted for more than 20 years.

Adult Iiwi being removed from a mist net which was used to capture the bird for banding

Adult Iiwi being banded at Hakalau Forest National Wildlife Refuge, Hawaii

A southeastern myotis (Myotis austroriparius) that was caught while mist netting at Cypress Creek National Wildlife Refuge in the summer of 2015.

Alligator transmitter installation and recovery. Pictured: Abby Lawson, Thomas Rainwater, John Lane (Wofford College), and Erin Weeks (South Carolina Department of Natural Resources)

Researchers have deployed 24 external GPS transmitters to male alligators in South Carolina.

Transmitters are programmed to acquire an alligator location once every three hours from April to the end of September each year.

This alligator movement ecology study evaluates home range, daily movement rate, and habitat use patterns of adult male alligators.

Alligators are territorial — an individual’s movements may be influenced by other alligators in close proximity.