Treesearch

Due to the relatively high cost of measuring sample plots in forest inventories, considerable attention is given to sampling and plot designs during the forest inventory planning phase. A two-stage design can be efficient from a field work perspective as spatially proximate plots are grouped into work zones. A comparison between subsampling with units of unequal size (SUUS) and a simple random sample (SRS) design in a panelized framework assessed the statistical and economic implications of using the SUUS design for a case study in the Northeastern USA. The sampling errors for estimates of...

Populations of the Eastern Whip-poor-will (Antrostomus vociferus) are thought to be declining because of a range of potential factors including habitat loss, pesticide use, and predation. However, this species is nocturnal and, as a consequence, it is poorly studied, and its population status is not well assessed by traditional diurnal bird surveys. We used nocturnal road surveys to study habitat associations and distribution of Eastern Whip-poor-wills to better understand and contextualize their population status and to provide a framework for subsequent research and management. We used...

Background: Human activities have diverse and profound impacts on ecosystem carbon cycles. The Piedmont ecoregion in the eastern United States has undergone significant land use and land cover change in the past few decades. The purpose of this study was to use newly available land use and land cover change data to quantify carbon changes within the ecoregion. Land use and land cover change data (60-m spatial resolution) derived from sequential remotely sensed Landsat imagery were used to generate 960-m resolution land cover change maps for the Piedmont ecoregion. These maps were used in...

Ecological economics assigns value to resources. Valuation can be difficult when the resource is a species, particularly one that does not directly impact humans. The endangered golden-cheeked warbler (Setophaga chrysoparia) is a songbird that breeds exclusively in central Texas. Using a door-to-door survey design, we investigated knowledge and willingness to pay for golden-cheeked warbler recovery actions in Austin, Texas, a city attempting to balance human population growth with conservation of several endangered species. Approximately half of respondents had knowledge of this species;...

A female of Oobius depressus (Girault) (Hymenoptera: Encyrtidae), collected in a modified Malaise trap in the canopy of a black locust tree, Robinia pseudoacacia, at Rose Lake State Wildlife Area in Bath Charter Township, Clinton Co., Michigan, U.S.A., is re-described and illustrated. This species was previously known only from the type series of headless specimens of both sexes from the type locality in Morristown, Henry Co., Illinois, U.S.A. These type specimens were from a single cohort of locust borer, Megacyllene robiniae (Forster) (Coleoptera: Cerambycidae), eggs collected and reared...

Residential yards across the US look remarkably similar despite marked variation in climate and soil, yet the drivers of this homogenization are unknown. Telephone surveys of fertilizer and irrigation use and satisfaction with the natural environment, and measurements of inherent water and nitrogen availability in six US cities (Boston, Baltimore, Miami, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Phoenix, Los Angeles) showed that the percentage of people using irrigation at least once in a year was relatively invariant with little difference between the wettest (Miami, 85%) and driest (Phoenix, 89%) cities....

Water temperature is a primary driver of stream ecosystems and commonly forms the basis of stream classifications. Robust models of stream temperature are critical as the climate changes, but estimating daily stream temperature poses several important challenges. We developed a statistical model that accounts for many challenges that can make stream temperature estimation difficult. Our model identifies the yearly period when air and water temperature are synchronized, accommodates hysteresis, incorporates time lags, deals with missing data and autocorrelation and can include external...

The premise of this chapter is that human engagement of city dwellers in acts of urban greening, or environmental stewardship, collectively constitutes a social movement for greater access to the natural environment. The power of urban greening as a social movement is particularly salient for disadvantaged communities in promoting greater resilience, health, and well-being. Grounded in the geographies of urban greening associated with Buffalo and New York City, we consider how some civic environmental stewardship programs positively impact youth. More specifi cally, we contend that such...

The metabolism of glutamate into ornithine, arginine, proline, and polyamines is a major network of nitrogen-metabolizing pathways in plants, which also produces intermediates like nitricoxide, and g-aminobutyric acid (GABA) that play critical roles in plant development and stress. While the accumulations of intermediates and the products of this network depend primarily on nitrogen assimilation, the overall regulation of the interacting sub-pathways is not well understood. We tested the hypothesis that diversion of ornithine into polyamine biosynthesis (by transgenic approach) not only...