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There is growing evidence that headwater stream ecosystems are especially vulnerable to changing climate and land use, but managers are challenged by the need to address these threats at a landscape scale, often through coordination with multiple management agencies and landowners. This project sought to provide an example of cooperative landscape decision-making by addressing the conservation of headwater stream ecosystems in the face of climate change at the watershed scale. Predictive models were built for critical resources to examine the effects of the potential alternative actions on the objectives, taking account of climate effects and examining whether there are key uncertainties that impede decision making....
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The amount of water flowing through a stream is an important driver of aquatic habitat, but scientists don’t often measure streamflow in the small stream networks that feed larger rivers. Monitoring smaller streams is especially important as climate change is causing them to (a) flood more often and more intensely, and (b) lose habitat as drought events and water temperatures increase. A better understanding of the changing patterns of flow and temperatures in small streams can help decision makers evaluate which streams will provide suitable habitat for plants and animals under a changing climate. Specific goals of this project are to 1) understand how water flow and temperature interact in small streams and 2)...
The Interactive Catchment Explorer (ICE) is a dynamic visualization interface for exploring catchment characteristics and environmental model predictions. ICE was created for resource managers and researchers to explore complex, multivariate environmental datasets and model results, to identify spatial patterns related to ecological conditions, and to prioritize locations for restoration or further study. ICE incorporates stream temperature and brook trout occurrence models for headwaters of the Northeast, including projections of the potential effects of climate change. ICE is part of the Spatial Hydro-Ecological Decision System (SHEDS).
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NOTE: The data are available online four times based on four different attributes (the current, plus 2 degrees C, plus 4 degrees C, and plus 6 degrees C probability of occurrence), the dataset is the same and the download includes the layer files for all the attributes, you do NOT need to download the data more than once.This dataset is one of a suite of products from the Nature’s Network project (naturesnetwork.org). Nature’s Network is a collaborative effort to identify shared priorities for conservation in the Northeast, considering the value of fish and wildlife species and the natural areas they inhabit. Brook Trout probability of occurrence is intended to provide predictions of occupancy (probability of presence)...
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This dataset is a component of a complete package of products from the Connect the Connecticut project. Connect the Connecticut is a collaborative effort to identify shared priorities for conserving the Connecticut River Watershed for future generations, considering the value of fish and wildlife species and the natural ecosystems they inhabit. Click here to download the full data package, including all documentation. This dataset represents the probability of occurrence of brook trout in headwater creeks based on current habitat and climate conditions. Brook trout are a representative species for cool/cold headwater creeks. This layer was derived from a model developed by Ben Letcher and associates at the USGS...
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NOTE: The data are available online four times based on four different attributes (the current, plus 2 degrees C, plus 4 degrees C, and plus 6 degrees C probability of occurrence), the dataset is the same and the download includes the layer files for all the attributes, you do NOT need to download the data more than once.This dataset is one of a suite of products from the Nature’s Network project (naturesnetwork.org). Nature’s Network is a collaborative effort to identify shared priorities for conservation in the Northeast, considering the value of fish and wildlife species and the natural areas they inhabit. Brook Trout probability of occurrence is intended to provide predictions of occupancy (probability of presence)...
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Climate change poses a variety of threats to biodiversity. Most efforts to assess the likely impacts of climate change on biodiversity try to rank species based on their vulnerability under changed environmental conditions. These efforts have generally not considered the ability of organisms to adjust their phenotype to the changing environment. Organisms can do this by one of two ways. First, they can adjust their phenotype via non-evolutionary pathways. Second, they can undergo adaptive evolutionary change. We used two interconnected approaches to evaluate thermal adaptation capacity in a cold-water fish species. 1) Using tagging data, we estimated thermal performance curves for wild fish. The curves indicate...
AbstractWe analyzed the associations of catchment-scale and riparian-scale environmental factors with occurrence of Brook Trout Salvelinus fontinalis in Connecticut headwater stream segments with catchment areas of <15 km2 . A hierarchical Bayesian approach was applied to a statewide stream survey data set, in which Brook Trout detection probability was incorporated and statistical significance of environmental covariates was based on 95% credible intervals of estimated coefficients that did not overlap a value of zero. Forested land at the catchment scale was the most important covariate affecting Brook Trout occurrence; i.e., heavily forested catchments with corresponding low levels of developed and impervious...
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NOTE: The data are available online four times based on four different attributes (the current, plus 2 degrees C, plus 4 degrees C, and plus 6 degrees C probability of occurrence), the dataset is the same and the download includes the layer files for all the attributes, you do NOT need to download the data more than once.This dataset is one of a suite of products from the Nature’s Network project (naturesnetwork.org). Nature’s Network is a collaborative effort to identify shared priorities for conservation in the Northeast, considering the value of fish and wildlife species and the natural areas they inhabit. Brook Trout probability of occurrence is intended to provide predictions of occupancy (probability of presence)...
The objective of this project was to develop tools to assist managers in protecting and restoring streams for brook trout and other aquatic resources in the face of threats such as climate change and development. Summary of Phase 2 of the project (2014-2016):The goal of the second phase of this project was to improve natural resources management by providing effective, flexible, portable, and transparent modeling results and decision support tools to managers. The objectives included: 1) Expand existing tools to additional portions of LCC region a) Extend the stream temperature and stream flow models to the full geographic area of the North Atlantic LCC, plus the headwaters of the Atlantic-draining watersheds (e.g.,...
Categories: Data, Project; Tags: 2010, ANIMALS/VERTEBRATES, ANIMALS/VERTEBRATES, ANIMALS/VERTEBRATES, ANIMALS/VERTEBRATES, All tags...
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This dataset is one of a suite of products from the Nature’s Network project (naturesnetwork.org). Nature’s Network is a collaborative effort to identify shared priorities for conservation in the Northeast, considering the value of fish and wildlife species and the natural areas they inhabit. Brook Trout probability of occurrence is intended to provide predictions of occupancy (probability of presence) for catchments smaller than 200 km2 in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic region from Virginia to Maine. The dataset provides predictions under current environmental conditions and for future increases in stream temperature. Brook Trout probability of occurrence (under current climate) is one input used in developing...
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Salmonids (a family of fish that includes salmon, trout, and char) are a keystone species for both aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, and can be an early warning indicator of ecosystem health. Salmonids also have strong societal values and contribute enormously to regional economies and Native American cultures. Today, many native salmonid populations are small, highly fragmented, and isolated from genetic exchange, thereby increasing their vulnerability to disturbances due to their limited ability to adapt through migration. Rising global air temperatures are altering the characteristics of aquatic ecosystems worldwide, including freshwater in the United States. Understanding the vulnerability of aquatic species...
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Aquatic invasive species threaten our lakes, streams, and wetlands. These species not only change the biology within the waterbody, but they can change the way we use those waterbodies and the resources they produce. Those changes may have large economic impacts, such as direct management costs and indirect costs to fisheries, tourism and commerce. These species can be small like zebra mussels or large like Asian carp, but one thing they have in common is being difficult to manage and to prevent further spread. To help inform control measures for aquatic invasive species, local, state, and federal natural resource management agencies have been working to develop risk assessments to understand the potential spread...
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This dataset is a component of a complete package of products from the Connect the Connecticut project. Connect the Connecticut is a collaborative effort to identify shared priorities for conserving the Connecticut River Watershed for future generations, considering the value of fish and wildlife species and the natural ecosystems they inhabit. Click here to download the full data package, including all documentation.This dataset represents a scaled version of the headwater stream temperature tolerance index based on a model developed by Dr. Ben Letcher and associates at the USGS Conte Anadromous Fish Lab, which is a measure of the relative sensitivity of stream temperatures to rising air temperatures. Specifically,...
ABSTRACTWater 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 drivers. In a small stream network, the model performed well (RMSE D 0:59 °C), identified a clear warming trend (0.63 °C...
    map background search result map search result map Projecting the Future of Headwater Streams to Inform Management Decisions The Past as a Prelude to the Future: Assessing Climate Effects on Native Trout in the U.S. Can Wildlife Species Evolve in Response to a Changing Climate? Informing Species Vulnerability Assessments USGS Stream Temperature Tolerance, CT River Watershed Brook Trout Current Probability of Occurrence, CT River Watershed Brook Trout Probability of Occurrence, Northeast U.S. Brook Trout Probability of Occurrence, Plus 4 degrees C, Northeast U.S. Brook Trout Probability of Occurrence, Plus 6 degrees C, Northeast U.S. Brook Trout Probability of Occurrence, Plus 2 degrees C, Northeast U.S. Scoping the Feasibility of Incorporating Climate Change into Risk Assessments of Aquatic Invasive Species in the Upper Midwest Integrating Streamflow and Temperature to Identify Streams with Coldwater Refugia in the Northeast Brook Trout Current Probability of Occurrence, CT River Watershed USGS Stream Temperature Tolerance, CT River Watershed Scoping the Feasibility of Incorporating Climate Change into Risk Assessments of Aquatic Invasive Species in the Upper Midwest Integrating Streamflow and Temperature to Identify Streams with Coldwater Refugia in the Northeast Brook Trout Probability of Occurrence, Northeast U.S. Brook Trout Probability of Occurrence, Plus 4 degrees C, Northeast U.S. Brook Trout Probability of Occurrence, Plus 6 degrees C, Northeast U.S. Brook Trout Probability of Occurrence, Plus 2 degrees C, Northeast U.S. Projecting the Future of Headwater Streams to Inform Management Decisions Can Wildlife Species Evolve in Response to a Changing Climate? Informing Species Vulnerability Assessments The Past as a Prelude to the Future: Assessing Climate Effects on Native Trout in the U.S.