From Dayton to Pittsburgh

Dayton’s rivers hold a lot of importance to the city and the people around them. After spending last semester learning about the conservation of these rivers I thought I’d look and see what Pennsylvania does to promote the awareness and the conservation of its rivers. What I came across was pretty cool. Pennsylvania has been awarding rivers “River of the Year” since 1983. This is the second year that the selection process has been done through a public vote. Basically these nominations and the River of the Year honor are designed to raise public awareness of the selected rivers and to promote the conservation needs and achievements. Last year’s “River of the Year” was awarded to the Delaware River, which is the longest undammed river east of the Mississippi

Assessments of Stream Flow and Flooding Along the Pere Marquette River, West Michigan

Understanding how stream flow in rivers across Michigan is responding to climate change is important because rivers are used for hydroelectricity, recreation, fisheries, and many people own property along them. Michigan’s annual rainfall has increased by three inches since 1940 and is expected to increase by 0.036 inches/year through the 21st century due to climate change. In this study, I test the hypothesis that increased rainfall will lead to more frequent flooding along Michigan’s rivers. I do so by analyzing river discharge data and flow-duration curves from a stream gaging station on the Pere Marquette River, the largest undammed river in Michigan. Results from this study show that the discharge on the Pere Marquette River was ≥1,643 cfs for 27 days and increased 6-fold to 164 days in the 1990s and 2000s. It is likely that other natural rivers in Michigan might also show increases in the historical 1.5 year discharge associated with them and that discharge with the 1% exceedance probability might also increase

Thin-layer Sediment Addition of Dredge Material for Enhancing Marsh Resilience

Building marsh elevations with sediment delivered from nearby dredging projects is a potentially valuable tool for creating, restoring, and maintaining coastal marshes, and may help slow or reverse losses of wetlands due to coastal development and sea-level rise (Woodhouse et al., 1972). . .

Spatial and Seasonal Patterns of Above- and Belowground Vegetation Biomass and Potential Drivers in the Pascagoula River Delta, MS

Coastal wetlands provide a valuable wealth of services to the greater coastal ecosystem and human communities. However, threats such as sea level rise and conservation projects, such as freshwater diversions, have the potential to alter coastal wetlands in different ways. In this thesis, I describe the effects of inundation and nitrogen on vegetation productivity using a field-sampling approach and an in situ controlled mesocosm experiment, called a marsh organ. The West Channel of the Pascagoula River contained significantly higher belowground biomass than the East Channel, which is more anthropogenically modified. Vertical distribution of belowground biomass did not strongly vary between seasons or channels. Elevation was significantly correlated to aboveground biomass, and NOx was correlated to belowground biomass. Both relationships were nonlinear and complex. In the marsh organ, Sagittaria lancifolia end-of-season biomass responded in a quadratic fashion, similar to coastal sedge and grass species in previous studies. My findings are valuable to understanding the status and resilience of the lower Pascagoula River, as well as the ability of S. lancifolia (a dominant fresh-brackish water marsh species) to respond to changing hydrological regimes, potentially including freshwater diversion

Loosening of environmental licensing threatens Brazilian biodiversity and sustainability

Environmental licensing is one of Brazil’s main environmental-policy instruments and is intended to regulate anthropogenic activities and to avoid their impacts on the environment. This licensing is now at risk to being annihilated. Bill 3729/2004 was recently approved by Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies, and if approved by the Senate (as is likely) it would create the so-called ‘general law of environmental licensing’ and a series of changes weakening environmental impact assessments, public participation and supervision by environmental agencies. The changes include creation of a self-declared license in which licenses would be issued automatically without any analysis by technical staff in the environmental agencies. Various types of small and medium-sized projects would be completely exempted from licensing. If approved, the bill would cause irreversible environmental losses to megadiverse Brazilian ecosystems and allow installation of projects with high environmental impact without any impact analysis or measures to minimize or recover from impacts or to provide environmental compensation for them

American Eel Behavior and Survival in an Impounded River System

After beginning life in the Sargasso Sea, American eel enter river systems as juveniles and swim upstream in pursuit of freshwater habitat. Many encounter dams during this migration which act as barriers to upstream movement and limit eel establishment in headwater systems. Some dams have been retrofitted with fishways to improve watershed connectivity, but the individual selection imposed by these structures remains uncharacterized. We considered whether individual differences in behavior (i.e., personality) may be used to predict the propensity of juveniles to use a passage structure, suggesting that eel personality may predict access to habitat upstream of dams. Migrating, juvenile eels (n=63) were captured from a tidal tributary, and we measured the expression of bold and exploratory behaviors in classic animal personality assays (open field and emergence). Then we assessed the propensity for individuals to volitionally climb through a passage structure and assessed passage outcomes. Finally, we compared consistent behavioral tendencies and climbing propensity. We show evidence for personality in young eels by demonstrating among-individual variation in bold and exploratory behaviors that were consistent across repeated trials in open field and emergence assays. Mean swimming speed in the open field was a predictor of climbing propensity; faster fish were less likely to climb through a passage structure. For successful climbers, climbing time was negatively associated with fish length, offering evidence for potential size-based selection on climbing ability during upstream passage at dams. Our results suggest strong potential for selective pressure on both climbing motivation and ability during fish passage Preventing a subset of individuals from accessing upstream habitat may have unintended consequences for both aquatic ecosystems and American eel populations. Eels that successfully recruit to habitat upstream of dams may spend decades in freshwater systems before making a single, terminal migration to spawn in the Sargasso Sea. Therefore, individuals that ascended dams as juvenile, must navigate these same dams while moving downstream as mature adults, where passage is commonly associated with mortality and delay. We conducted a four-year acoustic telemetry study that characterized passage risks through two hydropower dams (West Enfield and Milford) in the Penobscot River, Maine, USA. We released tagged fish (n=355) at two sites, estimated survival and delay under variable river conditions, and compared performance among dammed and free-flowing river sections. Survival rates (standardized per river km) were lower at West Enfield (Φrkm = 0.984 ± 0.006 SE) and Milford (Φrkm = 0.966 ± 0.007 SE), compared to undammed River sections (Φrkm = 0.998 ± 0.0003 SE). This accounted for 8.7%, 14.2%, and 8.7% cumulative mortality through sections classified as West Enfield (4.4km), Milford (5.5km), or River (58.1km) respectively. Fish that already passed an upstream dam incurred higher downstream mortality compared to individuals without passage experience. Additionally, fish endured long delays at dams, and \u3e10% of fish were delayed \u3e24h. Low flows exacerbated the risk of mortality and delay. These results offer evidence for direct, latent, and sub-lethal consequences of dam passage for migrating eels

Control System Integration for Automating an Electric Golf Cart

Understanding how stream flow in rivers across Michigan is responding to climate change is important because rivers are used for hydroelectricity, recreation, fisheries, and many people own property along them. Michigan’s annual rainfall has increased by three inches since 1940 and is expected to increase by 0.036 inches/year through the 21st century due to climate change. In this study, I test the hypothesis that increased rainfall will lead to more frequent flooding along Michigan’s rivers. I do so by analyzing river discharge data and flow-duration curves from a stream gaging station on the Pere Marquette River, the largest undammed river in Michigan. Results from this study show that the discharge on the Pere Marquette River was ≥1,643 cfs for 27 days and increased 6-fold to 164 days in the 1990s and 2000s. It is likely that other natural rivers in Michigan might also show increases in the historical 1.5 year discharge associated with them and that discharge with the 1% exceedance probability might also increase