Publications

The black brant is a sea goose that depends on coastal habitats from high arctic nesting sites in Canada, Alaska, and Russia to wintering areas in the Pacific coastal states, the Baja California peninsula, and mainland Mexico estuaries. Population estimates are based on aerial surveys in Mexico, California, Oregon, and Washington during mid-winter. Despite much annual variability in...

Following the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Prince William Sound, Alaska, sea otters (Enhydra lutris) that appeared to be contaminated with oil, that were in danger of becoming contaminated, or that were behaving abnormally were captured and taken to rehabilitation centers. Exposure to oil was assessed by visual examination when otters arrived at the centers. Degree of oil exposure was...

No abstract available.

Spatial genetic structure in populations of mosquitofish (Gambusia) sampled throughout the south-eastern United States was characterized using mitochondrial (mt) DNA and allozyme markers. Both sets of data revealed a pronounced genetic discontinuity (along a broad path extending from south-eastern Mississippi to north-eastern Georgia) that corresponds to a recently recognized distinction...

Black-legged Kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla) are widely distributed in the subarctic North Pacific and adjacent seas, with a total breeding population of about 2.6 million individuals. Red-legged Kittiwakes (R. brevirostris) breed in four locations, and at least 95% of their estimated world population of 230,000 birds nest on one island (St. George, Pribilof Islands). Compared to Black...

Because artificial nests can facilitate controlled experiments of nest success, we used them to assess whether human visitation, nest density, vegetation structure, and proximity to habitat edge could affect depredation of duck nests on Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska. More (P 0.01) nests in a plot visited daily (100%) were depredated than those in plots visited at...

Deep-water lithofacies of the Lisburne Group (chiefly Carboniferous) occur in thurst sheets in the western part of the foreland fold-and-thrust belt of the Brooks Range and represent at least three discrete units. The Kuna Formation (Brooks Range allochthon) consists mostly of spiculitic mudstone and lesser shale; subordinate carbonate layers are chiefly diagenetic dolomite. The Akmalik...

Fault-bounded successions of pre-Carboniferous (meta)carbonate rocks occur throughout northern Alaska. Successions studied in detail are those in the York Mountains (Seward Peninsula), the western and eastern Baird Mountains (western Brooks Range), the Snowden Mountain area (central Brooks Range), and the Sublik and Sadlerochit Mountains (eastern Brooks range); they are correlated on the...

This collection of papers continues the annual series of U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) reports on geologic investigations in Alaska. From 1975 through 1988, the series was published as USGS circulars. The first of these appeared under the title "The United States Geological Survey in Alaska: Accomplishments during 1975," and the series continued to the last annual circular entitled...

Sediments recovered during Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) Leg 123 from the Argo Abyssal Plain (AAP) consist largely of turbidites derived from the adjacent Australian continental margin. The oldest abundant turbidites are Valanginian-Aptian in age and have a mixed (smarl) composition; they contain subequal amounts of calcareous and siliceous biogenic components, as well as clay and lesser...

Within-clutch variability in shape of 1743 eggs from 301 nests of Emperor Geese (Chen canagicus) laid over a 5-yr period was measured. Individual females laid similar shaped eggs in successive years, and eggs among clutches within females could not be distinguished. Cluster analysis correctly identified 69.9% of 136 known conspecific parasitic eggs. Repeatability estimates of elongation...

A composite Mesozoic geological history for the Gondwana margins to the Eastern Tethys Ocean can be assembled from stratigraphic successions on the Australian and Himalayan margins and from drill sites of Ocean Drilling Program Legs 122 and 123. During the Triassic, this region drifted northwards, entering tropical paleolatitudes during the Late Triassic-Early Jurassic, then returned to...