Publications

From 2014 to 2017, the U.S. Geological Survey’s Florence Bascom Geoscience Center (FBGC) entered into an inter-agency agreement with the Federal Highway Administration’s Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center (TFHRC) to assist in field site selection and auger drilling fieldwork. The TFHRC was developing a device to measure the erosional properties of clay-rich sediments to be used for...

The emerging amphibian pathogen Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans (Bsal) is a severe threat to global urodelan (salamanders, newts, and related taxa) biodiversity. Bsal has not been detected, to date, in North America, but the risk is high because North America is one of the global hotspots for urodelan biodiversity. The North American and United States response to the discovery of Bsal...

The California Department of Transportation, commonly known as CalTrans, and other municipal separate storm sewer system permittees in California as well as other State departments of transportation nationwide need information about potential loads and yields (loads per unit area) of constituents of concern in stormwater runoff and discharges from stormwater best management practices...

A study was conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey in cooperation with the U.S. Navy (the Navy) to determine the status of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) in groundwater at the former Naval Air Warfare Center (NAWC) in West Trenton, New Jersey. Wells contaminated with VOCs were sampled in 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017 as part of the Navy’s...

Amphibian larvae are commonly used as indicators of aquatic ecosystem health because they are susceptible to contaminants. However, there is limited information on how species characteristics and trophic position influence contaminant loads in larval amphibians. Importantly, there remains a need to understand whether grazers (frogs and toads [anurans]) and predators (salamanders) provide

Crustal fragments underlain by high-grade rocks represent a challenge to plate reconstructions, and integrated mapping, geochronology, and geochemistry enable the unravelling of the temporal and spatial history of exotic crustal blocks. The Quinebaug-Marlboro belt (QMB) is an enigmatic fragment on the trailing edge of the peri-Gondwanan Ganderian margin of southeastern New England...

Controlling range expansion of invasive carp (specifically Hypophthalmichthys spp.) on the Tennessee River is important to conserve the ecological and economic benefits provided by the river. We collaborated with State and Federal agencies (the stakeholder group) to develop a decision framework and decision support model to evaluate strategies to control carp expansion in the Tennessee...

Introduction Structure from motion (SFM) has become an integral technique in coastal change assessment; the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) used Agisoft Metashape Professional Edition photogrammetry software to develop a workflow that processes coastline aerial imagery collected in response to storms since Hurricane Florence in 2018. This report details step-by-step instructions to create...

Trout and salmon commonly coexist in stream networks. Exploring similarities and differences among species can help explain coexistence and invasive ability. Here, we describe spatial distribution, cohort strengths and size-at-age of three co-occurring species in a small stream network. Spatial distributions varied dramatically among species; native brook trout occupied all stream...

Isolated, detached sands provide opportunities for large-volume stratigraphic traps in many deepwater petroleum systems. Here we provide a review of the different types of sandbody detachments based on published data from the modern-day seafloor and recent (generally Quaternary-present), shallow-buried strata. Detachment mechanisms can be classified based on their timing of formation...

Stationarity of environmental preferences is a primary assumption required for any paleoenvironmental reconstruction using fossil materials based upon calibration to modern organisms. Confidence in this assumption decreases the further back in time one goes, and the validity of the assumption that species temperature tolerances have not changed over time has been challenged in Pliocene...

As a wildlife population ecologist who wants to conduct useful science, I find the Endangered Species Act (ESA), like other federal wildlife statutes, an intriguing read. The topic is in my wheelhouse—fish, wildlife, and plants, with a focus at the population and species levels. There is an emphasis on science, in fact, the “best scientific and commercial data available.” And there are