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Travis Poitras (Former Employee)

Science and Products

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Kona Coast and Hualalai volcano

Applied Landscape Ecology and Remote Sensing

We focus on landscape studies of natural and working lands, in particular coastal and inland wetlands and rangelands. We quantify ecosystem benefits, find areas vulnerable to future change, and identify potential for climate mitigation and resilience. We conduct research by scaling field measurements to the regional, state and national scale with remote sensing, geospatial analysis, and modeling...
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Land Change Science Program, Western Geographic Science Center
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Applied Landscape Ecology and Remote Sensing

We focus on landscape studies of natural and working lands, in particular coastal and inland wetlands and rangelands. We quantify ecosystem benefits, find areas vulnerable to future change, and identify potential for climate mitigation and resilience. We conduct research by scaling field measurements to the regional, state and national scale with remote sensing, geospatial analysis, and modeling...
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Baseline High Resolution Land Cover Map for the Mainstem Klamath River Corridor Downstream of Iron Gate Dam, Klamath River, CA, 2018

This data release includes a file geodatabase with land cover maps for a 313-kilometer segment along the mainstem Klamath River corridor downstream from Iron Gate Dam, CA. The maps were derived from high-resolution (15cm) imagery and topobathymetric elevation data, collected by NV5 Geospatial (formerly QSI, Inc) and published on Open Topography (https://doi.org/10.5069/G9DN436N). Acquisition dates
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Western Geographic Science Center

Sediment mobility and river corridor assessment for a 140-km segment of the mainstem Klamath River below Iron Gate Dam, CA - vegetation mapping

This report documents river response to hydrologic disturbance along a 140-km segment of the mainstem Klamath River below Iron Gate Dam, CA by assessing fundamental indicators of active sediment transport and dynamic changes in riparian vegetation. A combination of field and remote sensing methods were used to document river response to natural rainfall-runoff events (e.g., 2006 and 2017) and mana
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Western Geographic Science Center

Mapped fire perimeters from the Sky Island Mountains of US and Mexico: 1985-2017

Polygon locations of fire perimeters in the Sky Island mountain ranges in the Madrean Archipelago Ecoregion of the southwestern United States and northern Mexico. These fires occurred from 1985 to 2017 and were mapped using Landsat satellite imagery.
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Western Geographic Science Center

Mapped fire perimeters from the Sky Island Mountains of US and Mexico: 1985-2011

Polygon locations of fire perimeters in the Sky Island mountain ranges in the Madrean Archipelago Ecoregion of the southwestern United States and northern Mexico. These fires occurred from 1985 to 2011 and were mapped using Landsat satellite imagery.
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Western Geographic Science Center

5-year Relative Fractional Vegetation Cover at Abandoned Energy Development Sites on the Colorado Plateau

This data release contains a single vector shapefile and two text documents with code used to generate the data product. This vector shapefile contains the locations of 365 "plugged and abandoned" well sites from across the Colorado Plateau with their respective relative fractional vegetation cover (RFVC) values. Oil and gas pads are often developed for production, and then capped, reclaimed, an
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Western Geographic Science Center

Grassland State and Transition Map of Canyonlands National Park Needles District and Indian Creek Grazing Allotment

This raster data depicts the modeled distribution of three grassland states: Biocrust, Grass-bare, and Annualized-bare. We developed models of bare ground, total vegetation, exotic grasses and biological soil crust using spectral data from three year composites of growing season (March-October) Landsat data in Google Earth Engine and field data that were collected over the same period at monitorin
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Western Geographic Science Center

Differenced Normalized Burn Ratio (dNBR) data of wildfires in the Sky Island Mountains of the southwestern US and Northern Mexico from 1985-2011

This dataset is composed of 253 Differenced Normalized Burn Ratio (dNBR) images. Each dNBR represents a rough measure of fire-related vegetation change for wildfires (>400 ha) that occurred in the Sky Island Mountains within the Madrean Archipelago Ecoregion of the United States and Northern Mexico. These fires occurred between 1985 and 2011 and were mapped using Landsat 5 and Landsat 7 satellite
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Western Geographic Science Center

Sediment mobility and river corridor assessment for a 140-kilometer segment of the main-stem Klamath River below Iron Gate Dam, California

This river corridor assessment documents sediment mobility and river response to flood disturbance along a 140-kilometer segment of the main-stem Klamath River below Iron Gate Dam, California. Field and remote sensing methods were used to assess fundamental indicators of active sediment transport and river response to a combination of natural runoff events and reservoir releases during the study p
Authors
Jennifer Curtis, Travis Poitras, Sandra Bond, Kristin Byrd
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Water Resources Mission Area, California Water Science Center, Western Geographic Science Center

Distant neighbors: recent wildfire patterns of the Madrean Sky Islands of southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico

BackgroundInformation about contemporary fire regimes across the Sky Island mountain ranges of the Madrean Archipelago Ecoregion in the southwestern United States and northern Mexico can provide insight into how historical fire management and land use have influenced fire regimes, and can be used to guide fuels management, ecological restoration, and habitat conservation. To contribute to a better
Authors
Miguel L. Villarreal, Sandra L. Haire, José M. Iniguez, Citlali Cortés Montaño, Travis B. Poitras
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Western Geographic Science Center, Wildland Fire Science

Landsat time series analysis of fractional plant cover changes on abandoned energy development sites

Oil and natural gas development in the western United States has increased substantially in recent decades as technological advances like horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing have made extraction more commercially viable. Oil and gas pads are often developed for production, and then capped, reclaimed, and left to recover when no longer productive. Understanding the rates, controls, and deg
Authors
Eric K. Waller, Miguel L. Villarreal, Travis B. Poitras, Travis W. Nauman, Michael C. Duniway
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Western Geographic Science Center

Identifying optimal remotely-sensed variables for ecosystem monitoring in Colorado Plateau drylands

Water-limited ecosystems often recover slowly following anthropogenic or natural disturbance. Multitemporal remote sensing can be used to monitor ecosystem recovery after disturbance; however, dryland vegetation cover can be challenging to accurately measure due to sparse cover and spectral confusion between soils and non-photosynthetic vegetation. With the goal of optimizing a monitoring approach
Authors
Travis B. Poitras, Miguel L. Villarreal, Eric K. Waller, Travis W. Nauman, Mark E. Miller, Michael C. Duniway
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Species Management Research Program, Western Geographic Science Center

Disturbance automated reference toolset (DART): Assessing patterns in ecological recovery from energy development on the Colorado Plateau

A new disturbance automated reference toolset (DART) was developed to monitor human land surface impacts using soil-type and ecological context. DART identifies reference areas with similar soils, topography, and geology; and compares the disturbance condition to the reference area condition using a quantile-based approach based on a satellite vegetation index. DART was able to represent 26–55% of
Authors
Travis W. Nauman, Michael C. Duniway, Miguel L. Villarreal, Travis B. Poitras
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Ecosystems Mission Area, Species Management Research Program, Southwest Biological Science Center

Liquefaction and Sea-Level Rise

USGS scientists published a storymap explaining the impacts of sea-level rise on liquefaction severity around the San Francisco Bay Area, California for the magnitude 7.0 ‘HayWired’ earthquake scenario along the Hayward Fault.

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Earthquake Hazards Program, Western Geographic Science Center

Science and Products

*Disclaimer: Listing outside positions with professional scientific organizations on this Staff Profile are for informational purposes only and do not constitute an endorsement of those professional scientific organizations or their activities by the USGS, Department of the Interior, or U.S. Government