Images

USGS scientists Dan Powers (left) and Andy Ritchie retrieving a core sample from beneath Lake Ozette aboard research vessel Hadai.

Multibeam bathymetry shown in the spectrum from red (shallower) to blue (deeper) for depths greater than 200 m across the head of Astoria Canyon. The land and continental shelf are shown in grayscale slope shading where darker colors represent steeper slopes.  The modern Columbia River is far right.

Mount St. Helens in southeast Washington erupted on May 18, 1980. The volcano and 110,000 acres of surrounding land are now part of the Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument.

Capital Olympia

Image Source Landsat 8

Population 7,705,281

Bathymetric map of Lake Ozette, showing locations of core samples (red circles).

Earthquakes at Mount Rainier from 2010 to 2019. As shown in the graphic, fluids from the magmatic system beneath the volcano rise through existing cracks and weaknesses in the crust. Along with rainwater and ice/snow melt, these fluids combine to create a hydrothermal system within the volcano.

A native crayfish collected in Diablo Lake for an investigation into food availability for native fish and limitations to their growth. Crayfish are invertebrate prey for salmonids and provide useful representative stable isotope values for benthic members of the food web.

Photograph of the Sanpoil River in northeast Washington State.  The Sanpoil River is upstream of Grand Coulee and is a tributary of the Columbia River.

This photo shows an outcrop of pyroclastic flow deposits near Willow Creek on the Pumice Plain at Mount St. Helens. The dramatic lines crossing the outcrop indicate contacts between different layers of pyroclastic flow deposits. Two participants of the 2019 GeoGirls program are shown studying the outcrop, using it to understand the eruptive history of the volcano.

Researchers placed a juvenile native char into a viewing box to help identify the species. This fish was collected as a part of a food web study on Ross and Diablo Lakes in Washington State in order to evaluate fish growth and limitations to production.

The GeoGirls create field drawings of 1980 pyroclastic flow deposits on Mount St. Helens’ Pumice Plain.

Torrent salamanders are Northwest-U.S. endemic, headwater-stream-associated amphibian species that have a dearth of basic ecological information, but are thought to be highly vulnerable to habitat changes.

The GeoGirls visit a volcano monitoring station on the east side of Mount St. Helens, finding out how scientists use different monitoring methods (seismic, GPS, tiltmeter) to understand more about the volcano.

GeoGirls 2019 group photo, with Mount St. Helens in the background.

GeoGirls hike to Willow Creek, on Mount St. Helens’ Pumice Plain, to learn more about the ecology of the blast zone and how the area has recovered since the catastrophic May 18, 1980, eruption. Here, they look at stream characteristics and how it has influenced the return of life to the area.

The GeoGirls hike the Pumice Plain at Mount St. Helens, examining lava outcrops and volcanic sediment.

GeoGirls venture into Ape Cave, a 2,000-year-old lava tube on the south flank of Mount St. Helens, as they learn about Mount St. Helens’ eruptive history and lava flows.

Evening shot of Ross Lake with boat wake.  Heading back to camp after a day of research. Ross Lake is a large reservoir in the North Cascade mountains of northern Washington state. This photo was taken while conducting food web research to support the Skagit River Hydroelectric Dam FERC relicensing process.

Panoramic views of tidal marsh at Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge under an overcast sky.

Aerial imagery (top) and structure-from-motion data (bottom) from an unmanned aerial system survey of the intertidal zone at Post Point, Bellingham Bay, WA, June 6, 2019.

Stakeholder interests have spurred the reintroduction of the critically endangered populations of Chinook Salmon to tributaries upstream of Shasta Dam, in northern California. We released two groups of acoustically tagged, juvenile hatchery, late-fall Chinook Salmon to determine how juvenile salmon would distribute and survive.

Researchers on their way to sampling site on Diablo Lake. Diablo Lake is a reservoir in the North Cascade mountains of northern Washington. Created by Diablo Dam, the lake is located between Ross Lake and Gorge Lake on the Skagit River.