Decadal changes in stream fish communities and contemporary ecological drivers of species occupancy in two Appalachian U.S. National Parks

Although conserving fish biodiversity in lotic systems is challenging, protected areas can provide refuge from certain environmental stressors. In the Appalachian region, USA, the National Park Service manages Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area (DEWA) and New River Gorge National Park & Preserve (NERI) which both contain abundant and diverse freshwater resources. To assess the effectiveness of these protected areas in conserving fishes and aquatic habitat, we evaluated decadal changes and contemporary ecological drivers of stream fish species occupancy and detection. This code release provides the R scripts necessary to perform the statistical analysis.