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SFS Annual Meeting

Thursday, May 24, 2018
09:00 - 10:30

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09:00 - 09:15: / 330 B PATTERNS IN ARCTIC FRESHWATER LANDSCAPES ANALYZED USING REMOTE SENSING

5/24/2018  |   09:00 - 09:15   |  330 B

PATTERNS IN ARCTIC FRESHWATER LANDSCAPES ANALYZED USING REMOTE SENSING The lack of location data of fish species makes conservation of freshwater biodiversity difficult in remote places like the National Petroleum Reserve Alaska on the Alaskan North Slope. Species distribution models (SDMs) are one way to estimate species distributions, but to apply SDMs across entire landscapes, we need environmental data for all watersheds in that landscape. To analyze watersheds across thousands of watersheds, we adapted a process for accumulating watershed environmental data developed by the EPA for the contiguous US (StreamCat) to characterizing North Slope environments. We then applied the StreamCat process for characterizing watershed environments to both remotely sensed and other spatial data such as characterizations of soil and permafrost. Summarizing satellite measurements of water vapor, temperature, and vegetation from MODIS satellites allowed us to also characterize temporal environmental variability. We saw several interesting inter-year and spatial patterns. An example of which would be land surface temperature were cooler at sites at lower latitudes and higher elevation than sites at higher latitudes. StreamCat watershed data showed the effects of stream source (foothills vs. coastal plain) on local environments, with coastal plain rivers being colder than ones originating in foothills.

Jessie Doyle (Co-Presenter/Co-Author), ORISE Research Fellow, jdoyle@csumb.edu;


John Olson (Primary Presenter/Author), Dept of Applied Environmental Science, California State University Monterey Bay, CA, USA, joolson@csumb.edu;


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09:15 - 09:30: / 330 B EFFECTS OF FORESTED BUFFERS ON BIOTIC INDICATORS OF WATER QUALITY IN THE WESTERN FINGER LAKES

5/24/2018  |   09:15 - 09:30   |  330 B

EFFECTS OF FORESTED BUFFERS ON BIOTIC INDICATORS OF WATER QUALITY IN THE WESTERN FINGER LAKES Forested riparian buffers have become a management solution to reduce nutrient and sediment runoff into bodies of water, and have been shown to be effective in streams and rivers. However, little has been done to show the efficacy of these buffers when implemented on the shorelines of lakes. My research explored whether relationships exist between individual watershed land use and water quality and whether having a near-shore forest buffer improves water quality, as determined by biotic indices using benthic macroinvertebrates in the western Finger Lakes. Conesus, Hemlock, Canadice and Honeoye lakes are among the smallest Finger Lakes, but they are important for drinking water and recreation. Hemlock and Canadice are within a state forest, which provides a shoreline buffer, and are considered to be pristine, while Conesus and Honeoye are unregulated and are considered to be degraded. While significant differences were found in the benthic community compositions between the lakes, biotic indices indicated no significant differences in water quality between the lakes and no correlation between land use in watersheds and water quality. This suggests that partial-watershed management in Hemlock and Canadice Lakes has no effect on water quality.

Mitchell Owens (Primary Presenter/Author), Indiana University - Bloomington , owensm42@gmail.com;


Clayton Williams (Co-Presenter/Co-Author), University of Vermont, clayton.j.williams@uvm.edu;


James Haynes (Co-Presenter/Co-Author), The College at Brockport, State University of New York, jhaynes@brockport.edu;


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09:30 - 09:45: / 330 B DECLINES IN AERIAL INSECTIVOROUS BIRDS LINKED TO NATIONAL TRENDS IN WATER QUALITY

5/24/2018  |   09:30 - 09:45   |  330 B

DECLINES IN AERIAL INSECTIVOROUS BIRDS LINKED TO NATIONAL TRENDS IN WATER QUALITY Changes in flying insect prey have been implicated in population declines of North American aerial insectivorous birds. Emergent aquatic insects can be an important prey resource for many species within this guild, and might be expected to be strongly impacted by deteriorating water quality. We synthesized trends in water quality, land use and climate, and benthic-macroinvertebrate data and related these to aerial insectivorous bird populations (1970-2011) across the United States. We found negative effects of road density, % sand and fines, and total phosphorus on the proportion of the macroinvertebrate community with an emerging adult life stage. Further, the odds that a given individual macroinvertebrate was from a non-emergent taxon increased 3.5× as a function of pollution tolerance values. Multiple aerial insectivorous bird species showed positive trends with the relative abundance of emergent macroinvertebrates, particularly riparian species such as Purple Martin (Progne subis), Willow Flycatcher (Empidonax traillii), and Northern Rough-Winged Swallow (Stelgidopteryx serripennis), and these relationships tended to be stronger east of the Rocky Mountains. Our findings suggest that the effects of water quality can extend into terrestrial ecosystems, influencing terrestrial consumer populations of significant conservation concern.

David W. P. Manning (Primary Presenter/Author), The Ohio State University, manning.413@osu.edu;


S. Mažeika Patricio Sulliván (Co-Presenter/Co-Author), The Ohio State University, sullivan.191@osu.edu;


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09:45 - 10:00: / 330 B THE IMPACTS OF AN AGRICULTURAL TO URBAN LAND COVER GRADIENT ON HABITAT, FISH, AND MACROINVERTEBRATES IN A COLDWATER STREAM

5/24/2018  |   09:45 - 10:00   |  330 B

THE IMPACTS OF AN AGRICULTURAL TO URBAN LAND COVER GRADIENT ON HABITAT, FISH, AND MACROINVERTEBRATES IN A COLDWATER STREAM Throughout the United States and world, urban areas are often built along large rivers and surrounded by agricultural land cover. Examples are metropolitan areas along the Grand River in Michigan, USA. Tributaries that flow through these areas have agricultural headwaters and an urbanized lower watershed. This land cover gradient can have significant impacts on the chemical, physical, and biological attributes of lotic ecosystems. Our objective was to assess the impacts of environmental stressors (riffle and pool habitat variability, riparian vegetation condition, sediment loading, substrate composition, stream temperature, water velocity, and instream woody debris abundance) on fish and macroinvertebrate communities across a gradient of agricultural to urban land cover in a coldwater tributary of the Grand River called Indian Mill Creek. Instream woody debris was the strongest driver of EPT abundance and richness, especially in agricultural headwaters. Fine streambed substrate was associated with a high abundance of Diptera and surface air breathers, and was most dominant in agricultural headwaters. Fish community assemblage was driven largely by stream flow and temperature regimes and could be impacted by episodic pollution events that have occurred within the lower, urbanized watershed. Impacts of agricultural and urban land cover to lotic ecosystems are prevalent worldwide; therefore, this study has broad applications.

Dan Myers (Primary Presenter/Author), Grand Valley State University, myersda@mail.gvsu.edu;


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10:00 - 10:15: / 330 B RIPARIAN SHADE CONTROLS ON STREAM TEMPERATURE NOW AND IN THE FUTURE ACROSS TRIBUTARIES OF THE COLUMBIA RIVER, USA

5/24/2018  |   10:00 - 10:15   |  330 B

RIPARIAN SHADE CONTROLS ON STREAM TEMPERATURE NOW AND IN THE FUTURE ACROSS TRIBUTARIES OF THE COLUMBIA RIVER, USA Future climates may warm stream temperatures altering aquatic communities and threatening socioeconomically-important species. These impacts vary across large spatial extents and require special evaluation tools. Statistical stream network models (SSNs) account for spatial autocorrelation in rivers and are suited to evaluate stream parameters affected by climate change. SSNs predicted mean August stream temperature for tributaries of the mainstem Columbia River (downstream of Snake River) under three climate scenarios (present, 2040, 2080). These climate scenarios were crossed with three channel shading levels including (1) topographic – no riparian vegetation, (2) present vegetation shade, and (3) potential vegetation shade – maximum height of riparian vegetation to evaluate the use of riparian restoration to offset forecast climate changes. The mean August temperature of all 191 tributary outflows was below the minimum cold water refugia (CWR) threshold of 20°C for three scenarios (present climate/present shade, present climate/potential shade, 2040 climate/potential shade); other scenarios were 1-2°C above. Relative to the present climate/shade scenario, the percent of tributaries below the CWR threshold in 2040 drops 35%, while 2040 climate with potential shading drops 6%. This suggests riparian shading regionally could maintain Columbia River CWR in 2040.

Matthew Fuller (Primary Presenter/Author), ORISE postdoc with US EPA/Atlantic Ecology Division, matthew.robert.fuller@gmail.com;


Naomi Detenbeck (Co-Presenter/Co-Author), U.S. EPA/ORD/NHEERL Atlantic Ecology Division, Detenbeck.Naomi@epa.gov;


Peter Leinenbach (Co-Presenter/Co-Author), US EPA, leinenbach.peter@epa.gov;


Rochelle Labiosa (Co-Presenter/Co-Author), US Environmental Protection Agency, labiosa.rochelle@epa.gov;


Daniel Isaak (Co-Presenter/Co-Author), Research and Development, United States Forest Service, Boise, Idaho 83702, disaak@fs.fed.us;


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10:15 - 10:30: / 330 B USING A TRAITS APPROACH TO HELP DISENTANGLE THE DIRECT AND INDIRECT EFFECTS OF ANTHROPOGENIC FACTORS ON INVERTEBRATE RESPONSE TO STREAM FLOW ALTERATION

5/24/2018  |   10:15 - 10:30   |  330 B

USING A TRAITS APPROACH TO HELP DISENTANGLE THE DIRECT AND INDIRECT EFFECTS OF ANTHROPOGENIC FACTORS ON INVERTEBRATE RESPONSE TO STREAM FLOW ALTERATION Prior work in the Delaware River Basin (DRB) indicated that modeling basin-scale responses of invertebrates to hydrologic alteration using assemblage metrics (e.g., EPT richness) was challenging because the effects of hydrologic alteration were intertwined with natural and anthropogenic factors (e.g., land use and ecoregion). Understanding the role of hydrologic alteration in structuring assemblages requires disentangling these responses when developing flow-ecology response models and(or) using different indicators of invertebrate responses. Functional species traits may represent a suitable alternative to assemblage metrics as they provide more mechanistic insights into an organism’s response to environmental conditions. Monitoring data from 1,488 DRB sites from 9 different agencies were used to develop invertebrate trait metrics and regression tree analysis was used to identify significant streamflow variables and model their relations with invertebrate traits (e.g., life-history, habitat preference, and reproductive strategy). Measures of flow frequency and magnitude appeared to be the most important predictors of trait response to flow alteration. These results are being incorporated into Bayesian and Path models to facilitate a more rigorous understanding of flow-biology relations and landscape effects on flow characteristics.

Jonathan Kennen (Primary Presenter/Author), U.S. Geological Survey, New Jersey Water Science Center, 3450 Princeton Pike, Suite 110, Lawrenceville, NJ 08648, jgkennen@usgs.gov;


Thomas Cuffney (Co-Presenter/Co-Author), U.S. Geological Survey, South Atlantic Water Science Center, 3916 Sunset Ridge Rd., Raleigh, NC 27607, tcuffney@usgs.gov;


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