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At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources
USGS2025

Ten lessons for controlling invasive species: Wisdom from the long-standing sea lamprey control program on the Laurentian Great Lakes

Sea lamprey ( Petromyzon marinus ) control in the Laurentian Great Lakes of North America is among the largest and most successful control programs of an invasive species anywhere on the planet. The effort began more than 75 years ago; it unites multiple nations, states, and provinces with the common goal of controlling this invasive species and protecting a valuable fishery. The science-based control program is administered by the Great Lakes Fishery Commission (GLFC), a body arising from a treaty signed by the United States and Canada. In the present article, we share 10 lessons learned from decades of successful sea lamprey control with the hopes of informing ongoing and future control programs targeting biological invasions. The 10 lessons we identified are to act boldly in times of crisis, to maintain the social license, to invest in capacity building, to break down the silos, to support fundamental science, to diversify your portfolio of control measures, to strive for continuous improvement, to confront the trade-off between information and action, to keep your foot on the gas, and to keep your eyes on the prize. The GLFC has long fostered a framework that uses some military strategy and verbiage that extends across the lessons (e.g., know your enemy). Other lessons are more nascent as the GLFC reenvisions its relationship with Indigenous peoples and governments in a path to reconciliation where two-eyed seeing is being embraced. Through adaptive management, horizon scanning methods, and embracing implementation science, the lessons learned about sea lamprey control will continue to evolve, which is itself a lesson. We submit that the lessons shared in the present article will help guide invasive species control programs spanning taxa, ecosystems, and regions.

Laurentian Great Lakes↗
USGS2026

A synthesis of plant mass mortality events in coastal ecosystems

Around the world, mass mortality events are disrupting the ecological and economic stability of shorelines. To better understand mechanisms of mass mortality in coastal ecosystems, we provide a global synthesis of over 250 reports of plant mass mortality events in six coastal ecosystems: coastal freshwater forests, tidal freshwater marshes, salt marshes, mangrove forests, seagrass meadows, and kelp forests, highlighting commonalities. Mass mortality events were associated with both climate and land-use change drivers in all six coastal ecosystems. Furthermore, increases in disturbance intensity and frequency, including climate extremes, and compound disturbances were key aspects of mass mortality events. Land-use change disturbances that altered hydrology, nutrient availability, and trophic structure often interacted with climate stressors, leading to mass mortality events. Therefore, beyond global climate mitigation, remediating local land-use disturbances represents a tractable opportunity for intervention. Insights from this synthesis may help managers to anticipate mass mortality events and prevent future habitat loss.

BioScience↗
USGS2026

A practical framework for identifying genetic subpopulations and ESUs: Insights for IUCN assessments and broader management

Species conservation assessments evaluate extinction risk, and recovery potential, advancing species persistence through guiding resource prioritization and planning. Assessment frameworks, including the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List and Green Status of Species, typically focus on species as a whole. Importantly, they do not routinely account for genetically distinct units or do not have standardized methods of unit delineation. This limits the representation of genetically distinct components, including adaptive genetic diversity that underpins long-term resilience and recovery. Incorporating standardized within-species units like subpopulations and Evolutionarily Significant Units (ESUs) into species assessments could help address this oversight. However, identifying and delineating such units remain challenging, particularly when molecular data are limited. Here, we propose a flexible framework that integrates molecular and non-molecular evidence to identify both subpopulations and ESUs across taxa, providing a practical tool to incorporate within-species diversity into conservation assessments.

BioScience↗
USGS2026

Perspectives and insights gained from applying landscape ecological approaches to the Upper Mississippi riverscape

Advances in remote sensing, spatial data collection, hydraulic and geospatial models, and the maturation of landscape ecology during the early 2000s spurred the concept of rivers as landscapes or ‘riverscapes’. Since that time, the Upper Mississippi River Restoration (UMRR) Program - one of the world’s longest running large-river ecosystem restoration and monitoring programs - has applied landscape ecological principles to the Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS). I examine spatial patterns of aquatic nutrient concentrations, submersed aquatic vegetation, and fish and mussel communities, finding that within-river patterns are often patchy in nature, likely resulting from how nutrient processes and community traits interact with spatial variability in hydraulic exchange patterns. Local-scale patchy spatial patterns in the UMRS are embedded in system-scale longitudinal gradients and a hierarchical view of the river has provided a foundation for strategic river restoration planning. Key Words: Aquatic Habitat, hydraulic connectivity, patch, restoration, riverscape

BioScience↗
USGS2026

At the leading edge: Advancing and bridging the science and management of range-shifting species

Climate-mediated shifts in species distributions are reshaping ecosystems worldwide, creating major challenges for conservation and resource management. These range shifts have far-reaching ecological and socio-economic consequences, requiring managers to address complex ecological dynamics while navigating diverse regulatory and value systems. Despite growing attention, key gaps remain in supporting management, from improved understanding of the mechanisms of range shifts, to evaluating the effectiveness of climate adaptation strategies, and tailoring science to the institutional and social contexts of decision-making. Central challenges include scaling processes across space, time, and organizational levels, and reconciling mismatches between biogeographical and management scales. Progress will depend on more comprehensive datasets to assess outcomes across taxa and regions, stronger cross-jurisdictional cooperation, and decision frameworks that integrate uncertainty alongside multiple value systems. Addressing these gaps is essential to make research more actionable and to enable successful management of species redistribution.

BioScience↗
USGS2026

Conservation enhances resilience of the United States Duck Factory as environmental shifts may diminish landscape-scale waterfowl breeding capacity

Wetlands in the U.S. Prairie Pothole Region (USPPR) provide habitat for an estimated 5 million breeding ducks and remain a focal point for North American waterfowl conservation. After decades of investment, almost 20% of the USPPR is protected by some form of wetland or grassland conservation. We synthesized four decades of modeling studies aimed at understanding how environmental change may impact duck populations. We built upon past modeling efforts by applying an integrated scenario-based approach to inform wetland-waterfowl conservation planning. By century’s end, all scenarios projected declines (27%–53%) in breeding duck abundance in the USPPR. Despite these declines, areas in the USPPR with higher rates of protection and wetland density will likely continue to support the most breeding ducks, indicating resilient conservation planning. Our findings underscore the benefits of interdisciplinary efforts that can inform complex conservation decision-making in the face of environmental uncertainty.

Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, North Dakota, South Dako↗
USGS2026

Climate change is reshaping seagrass futures: Novel environments and opportunities along coastlines and across oceans

Seagrasses are a highly productive ecosystem that supports biodiversity and fisheries, protects coastlines, and buries globally significant carbon stocks. Because seagrasses are increasingly stressed by warmer, darker, and more variable waters, established management strategies may not guarantee future success. Here, we depict a global outlook for seagrass futures by synthesizing how climate and non-climate human pressures may restructure meadow composition, food webs, fisheries, and blue carbon services. Current seagrass range shifts, adaptations, and acclimations to novel environmental conditions preview future states: climate-tolerant species often become dominant post-disturbance, seeds can disperse hundreds of kilometers, and local management can facilitate habitat persistence and large-scale restoration. To boost climate resilience, we propose a three-part framework involving (1) expanding seagrass mariculture and planting, (2) detecting and predicting shifting stressor gradients and species distributions, and (3) managing for seagrasses tolerant of novel environments. Together, these strategies offer proactive pathways for cultivating climate-adapted seagrass meadows worldwide.

BioScience↗
USGS2013

Changing ecosystem dynamics in the Laurentian Great Lakes: Bottom-up and top-down regulation

Understanding the relative importance of top-down and bottom-up regulation of ecosystem structure is a fundamental ecological question, with implications for fisheries and water-quality management. For the Laurentian Great Lakes, where, since the early 1970s, nutrient inputs have been reduced, whereas top-predator biomass has increased, we describe trends across multiple trophic levels and explore their underlying drivers. Our analyses revealed increasing water clarity and declines in phytoplankton, native invertebrates, and prey fish since 1998 in at least three of the five lakes. Evidence for bottom-up regulation was strongest in Lake Huron, although each lake provided support in at least one pair of trophic levels. Evidence for top-down regulation was rare. Although nonindigenous dreissenid mussels probably have large impacts on nutrient cycling and phytoplankton, their effects on higher trophic levels remain uncertain. We highlight gaps for which monitoring and knowledge should improve the understanding of food-web dynamics and facilitate the implementation of ecosystem-based management.

Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, new York, ↗
USGS2014

Reconstructing disturbances and their biogeochemical consequences over multiple timescales

Ongoing changes in disturbance regimes are predicted to cause acute changes in ecosystem structure and function in the coming decades, but many aspects of these predictions are uncertain. A key challenge is to improve the predictability of postdisturbance biogeochemical trajectories at the ecosystem level. Ecosystem ecologists and paleoecologists have generated complementary data sets about disturbance (type, severity, frequency) and ecosystem response (net primary productivity, nutrient cycling) spanning decadal to millennial timescales. Here, we take the first steps toward a full integration of these data sets by reviewing how disturbances are reconstructed using dendrochronological and sedimentary archives and by summarizing the conceptual frameworks for carbon, nitrogen, and hydrologic responses to disturbances. Key research priorities include further development of paleoecological techniques that reconstruct both disturbances and terrestrial ecosystem dynamics. In addition, mechanistic detail from disturbance experiments, long-term observations, and chronosequences can help increase the understanding of ecosystem resilience.

BioScience↗
USGS2014

Capturing migration phenology of terrestrial wildlife using camera traps

Remote photography, using camera traps, can be an effective and noninvasive tool for capturing the migration phenology of terrestrial wildlife. We deployed 14 digital cameras along a 104-kilometer longitudinal transect to record the spring migrations of caribou ( Rangifer tarandus ) and ptarmigan ( Lagopus spp.) in the Alaskan Arctic. The cameras recorded images at 15-minute intervals, producing approximately 40,000 images, including 6685 caribou observations and 5329 ptarmigan observations. The northward caribou migration was evident because the median caribou observation (i.e., herd median) occurred later with increasing latitude; average caribou migration speed also increased with latitude (r 2 = .91). Except at the northernmost latitude, a northward ptarmigan migration was similarly evident (r 2 = .93). Future applications of this method could be used to examine the conditions proximate to animal movement, such as habitat or snow cover, that may influence migration phenology.

Alaska↗
USGS2014

Ecological change on California's Channel Islands from the Pleistocene to the Anthropocene

Historical ecology is becoming an important focus in conservation biology and offers a promising tool to help guide ecosystem management. Here, we integrate data from multiple disciplines to illuminate the past, present, and future of biodiversity on California's Channel Islands, an archipelago that has undergone a wide range of land-use and ecological changes. Our analysis spans approximately 20,000 years, from before human occupation and through Native American hunter–gatherers, commercial ranchers and fishers, the US military, and other land managers. We demonstrate how long-term, interdisciplinary research provides insight into conservation decisions, such as setting ecosystem restoration goals, preserving rare and endemic taxa, and reducing the impacts of climate change on natural and cultural resources. We illustrate the importance of historical perspectives for understanding modern patterns and ecological change and present an approach that can be applied generally in conservation management planning.

California↗
USGS2014

Coral communities as indicators of ecosystem-level impacts of the Deepwater Horizon spill

The Macondo oil spill released massive quantities of oil and gas from a depth of 1500 meters. Although a buoyant plume carried released hydrocarbons to the sea surface, as much as half stayed in the water column and much of that in the deep sea. After the hydrocarbons reached the surface, weathering processes, burning, and the use of a dispersant caused hydrocarbon-rich marine snow to sink into the deep sea. As a result, this spill had a greater potential to affect deep-sea communities than had any previous spill. Here, we review the literature on impacts on deep-sea communities from the Macondo blowout and provide additional data on sediment hydrocarbon loads and the impacts on sediment infauna in areas with coral communities around the Macondo well. We review the literature on the genetic connectivity of deep-sea species in the Gulf of Mexico and discuss the potential for wider effects on deep Gulf coral communities.

BioScience↗
USGS2015

Adapting California’s ecosystems to a changing climate

Significant efforts are underway to translate improved understanding of how climate change is altering ecosystems into practical actions for sustaining ecosystem functions and benefits. We explore this transition in California, where adaptation and mitigation are advancing relatively rapidly, through four case studies that span large spatial domains and encompass diverse ecological systems, institutions, ownerships, and policies. The case studies demonstrate the context specificity of societal efforts to adapt ecosystems to climate change and involve applications of diverse scientific tools (e.g., scenario analyses, downscaled climate projections, ecological and connectivity models) tailored to specific planning and management situations (alternative energy siting, wetland management, rangeland management, open space planning). They illustrate how existing institutional and policy frameworks provide numerous opportunities to advance adaptation related to ecosystems and suggest that progress is likely to be greatest when scientific knowledge is integrated into collective planning and when supportive policies and financing enable action.

BioScience↗
USGS2015

The natural sediment regime in rivers: broadening the foundation for ecosystem management

Water and sediment inputs are fundamental drivers of river ecosystems, but river management tends to emphasize flow regime at the expense of sediment regime. In an effort to frame a more inclusive paradigm for river management, we discuss sediment inputs, transport, and storage within river systems; interactions among water, sediment, and valley context; and the need to broaden the natural flow regime concept. Explicitly incorporating sediment is challenging, because sediment is supplied, transported, and stored by nonlinear and episodic processes operating at different temporal and spatial scales than water and because sediment regimes have been highly altered by humans. Nevertheless, managing for a desired balance between sediment supply and transport capacity is not only tractable, given current geomorphic process knowledge, but also essential because of the importance of sediment regimes to aquatic and riparian ecosystems, the physical template of which depends on sediment-driven river structure and function.

BioScience↗
USGS2015

On theory in ecology: Another perspective

We agree with Marquet and colleagues ( 2014 ) that the balance between theory and data is an important one. However, their description of what constitutes good theory in ecology ignores the most important characteristic of successful theory—that it accurately and precisely describes the way the world works.

BioScience↗
USGS2015

Icefield-to-ocean linkages across the northern Pacific coastal temperate rainforest ecosystem

Rates of glacier mass loss in the northern Pacific coastal temperate rainforest (PCTR) are among the highest on Earth, and changes in glacier volume and extent will affect the flow regime and chemistry of coastal rivers, as well as the nearshore marine ecosystem of the Gulf of Alaska. Here we synthesize physical, chemical and biological linkages that characterize the northern PCTR ecosystem, with particular emphasis on the potential impacts of glacier change in the coastal mountain ranges on the surface–water hydrology, biogeochemistry, coastal oceanography and aquatic ecology. We also evaluate the relative importance and interplay between interannual variability and long-term trends in key physical drivers and ecological responses. To advance our knowledge of the northern PCTR, we advocate for cross-disciplinary research bridging the icefield-to-ocean ecosystem that can be paired with long-term scientific records and designed to inform decisionmakers.

Pacific coastal temperate rainforest↗
USGS2015

Forecasting wildlife response to rapid warming in the Alaskan Arctic

Arctic wildlife species face a dynamic and increasingly novel environment because of climate warming and the associated increase in human activity. Both marine and terrestrial environments are undergoing rapid environmental shifts, including loss of sea ice, permafrost degradation, and altered biogeochemical fluxes. Forecasting wildlife responses to climate change can facilitate proactive decisions that balance stewardship with resource development. In this article, we discuss the primary and secondary responses to physical climate-related drivers in the Arctic , associated wildlife responses, and additional sources of complexity in forecasting wildlife population outcomes. Although the effects of warming on wildlife populations are becoming increasingly well documented in the scientific literature, clear mechanistic links are often difficult to establish. An integrated science approach and robust modeling tools are necessary to make predictions and determine resiliency to change. We provide a conceptual framework and introduce examples relevant for developing wildlife forecasts useful to management decisions. © 2015 Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Institute of Biological Sciences 2014. This work is written by US Government employees and is in the public domain in the US.

Alaska↗