H21I-01
The Agua Salud Project, Central Panama
The Agua Salud Project utilizes the Panama Canal's central role in world commerce to focus global attention on the ecosystem services provided by tropical forests. It will be the largest field experiment of its kind in the tropics aimed at quantifying the environmental services (water, carbon, and biodiversity) provided by tropical forests. The Agua Salud Watershed is our principal field site. This watershed and the headwaters of several adjacent rivers include both protected mature forests and a wide variety of land uses that are typical of rural Panama. Experiments at the scale of entire catchments will permit complete water and carbon inventories and exchanges for different landscape uses. The following questions will be addressed: (1) How do landscape treatments and management approaches affect ecosystem services such as carbon storage, water quality and quantity, dry- season water supply, and biodiversity? (2) Can management techniques be designed to optimize forest production along with ecosystem services during reforestation? (3) Do different tree planting treatments and landscape management approaches influence groundwater storage, which is thought to be critical to maintaining dry-season flow, thus insuring the full operation of the Canal during periods of reduced rainfall and severe climatic events such as El Niño. In addition we anticipate expanding this project to address biodiversity, social, and economic values of these forests.
H21I-02
Impacts of Alien Tree Invasion on Evapotranspiration in Tropical Montane Cloud Forest in Hawai'i
Hawaiian tropical montane cloud forests (TMCFs) are ecologically and hydrologically valuable zones. TMCFs in Hawai'i serve as refugia for the remaining intact native terrestrial plant and animal ecosystems, and are major sources of hydrologic input to surface water and groundwater systems. Invasion of alien tree species, with obvious effects on the ecological integrity of TMCFs, also threatens to impact the hydrological services these forests provide. Much speculation has been made about the hydrological effects of replacing native forest tree species with alien trees in Hawai'i, but until now no measurements have been made to test these assertions. We established two study sites, each equipped with eddy covariance and other micrometeorological instrumentation, one within native Metrosideros polymorpha forest and the other at a site heavily invaded by Psidium cattleianum, in the cloud forest zone of Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park. We are conducting measurements of stand-level evapotranspiration, transpiration (using sapflow techniques), energy balance, throughfall, stemflow, and soil moisture at each site. Preliminary analysis of these measurements shows that the fraction of available energy used for evapotranspiration (ET Fraction) at the native site is much higher for wet canopy conditions. The ET Fraction at the native site has an annual cycle corresponding to the annual cycle in leaf area. Deviations from the annual cycle are more closely related to variations in canopy wetness than to variations in soil moisture. Overall, ET as a function of available energy is 27% higher at the invaded site than the native site. The difference in ET between the two sites is especially pronounced during dry canopy periods, during which the ET Fraction is 53% higher at the invaded site than the native site. Sapflow measurements using heat balance collars show that leaf-area-specific transpiration is much greater in invasive P. cattleianum trees than in remnant native M. polymorpha trees at the invaded site. These results indicate that the P. cattleianum invasion is altering the hydrological cycle of the TMCF where it is found, with potential significant negative consequences for island water supply.
H21I-03 INVITED
Fate and Transport of Road Salt During Snowmelt Through a Calcareous Fen: Kampoosa Bog, Stockbridge, Massachusetts
Kampoosa Bog is the largest and most ecologically diverse calcareous lake-basin fen in Massachusetts. Situated within a 4.7 km2 drainage basin, the open fen (approx. 20 acres) consists of a floating mat of sedges (incl. Carex aquatilis and Cladium mariscoides) that overlie peat and lake clay deposits. Mineral weathering of marble bedrock within the drainage basin supplies highly alkaline ground and surface waters to the fen basin. The natural chemistry has been greatly altered by road salt runoff from the Massaschusetts Turnpike, and in question is whether disturbance from the Turnpike and a gas pipline has facilitated aggressive growth by the invasive species Phragmites australis. Considered to be one of the most significant rare species habitats in the state, Massachusetts has designated Kampoosa Bog an Area of Critical Environmental Concern, and a committee representing several local, regional, and state agencies, organizations, and citizens manages the wetland. The purpose of this study is to characterize the hydrologic and chemical response of the wetland during snowmelt events to understand the fate and movement of road salt (NaCl). Concentrations of Na and Cl in the fen groundwater are greatest close to the Turnpike. Concentrations decrease with distance downstream but are still greatly elevated relative to sites upstream of the Turnpike. During snowmelt events, the fen's outlet shows a sharp rise in Na and Cl concentrations at the onset of melting that is soon diluted by the added meltwater. The Na and Cl flux, however, is greatest at peak discharge, suggesting that high-flow events are significant periods of export of dissolved salts from the fen. Pure dissolution of rock salt produces an equal molar ratio between Na and Cl, and sodium and chloride imbalances in stream and ground waters suggest that ~20% of the Na is stored on cation exchange sites within the peat. The largest imbalances between Na and Cl occur deeper within the peat, where the peat is more compact and groundwater has a longer residence time. CEC measurements show that Ca>Mg>Na>K on exchange sites and suggest that Na in groundwater preferentially displaces Mg. Management questions to be addressed include what percentage of applied salt is flushed through the fen during snowmelt each year? How much salt is retained in the fen? For how long would salt concentrations remain elevated if salt application were to cease?
H21I-04
Ecohydrological Modeling of Food Webs in Stream Ecosystems
Dynamic biological processes in streams and rivers are essential aspects of ecohydrology. Numerical modeling of river food webs provides a useful vehicle for gaining insights into the scaling, self-organization and critical responses of these biological processes. Existing modeling literature is mostly limited to food webs with two or three trophic levels applied to marine or lake ecosystems. However, river ecosystems are distinctively different. They have a characteristic shorter residence time. Natural drivers (e.g., watershed and channel hydrology and geomorphology) as well as direct anthropogenic activities in rivers (e.g., building dams and reservoirs) play a vital role in shaping river food webs. Of particular interests are the benthic and non-benthic zones that have different physical, chemical and biological compositions. The authors developed food web models to capture the long- term dynamics of the total as well as that of the benthic and non-benthic zones in an interactive manner by emphasizing hydrologic drivers along with other environmental and geomorphologic constraints. These models are applied to several floodplain streams and rivers in Minnesota.
H21I-05
Climatic and hydrologic influences on wading bird foraging patterns in Everglades National Park
A goal of the Everglades National Park (ENP) restoration project is to ensure that the ecological health of the ENP improves as a direct result of management activities. Achieving hydrologic targets through the proper timing and amount of releases from control structures is a first step in the management process. Significant climate and weather variations in the region influence the ability to make releases and also determine the ecological outcomes. An assessment of the relative impact of climate variations and water releases to ENP in determining ecological outcomes is consequently a key to the evaluation of the success or failure of any restoration plan. Seasonal water depths in ENP depend on managed surface water releases from control structures and on direct rainfall. Here we link wading bird foraging patterns – a fundamental aspect of Everglades' ecology – to hydrologic management and climate variability in the National Park. Our objective is multifold. First, we relate the water levels at P33 and Shark Slough to the synoptic hydrologic conditions. Second, we develop a statistical model relating water levels at a station in central Shark Slough (P33) to wading birds foraging patterns throughout ENP. We attempt to apply a Hierarchical Bayesian scheme to a time series of wading bird to provide an uncertainty distribution of the population over specified time periods given hydrologic condition. Third, we develop a set of hydrologic index derived by recorded water level at P33 for a use of the statistical model of wading birds as an input. Our study will focus on great egret and white ibis that are major species among wading birds in the ENP. The great egret and white ibis prediction predicted by the model using the proposed predictors exhibits strong correlation with the observed streamflow, with an correlation 0.8.
H21I-06
Evaluating the Impact of Barriers on the Fragmentation of Waterbodies Traversed by Migratory Fish
Fish migrate to spawn, feed, seek refuge from predators, and escape harmful environmental conditions. The success of upstream migration is limited by the presence of barriers that can impede the passage of fish. If migration is delayed or halted by barriers, the life cycle of that species may be disrupted resulting in decreased population health. Potential barriers to upstream migration include natural structures such as waterfalls, cascades and debris dams and artificial barriers such as culverts and dams. Some barriers are impassable at all levels of flow to all species while other barriers may experience periods with favorable conditions for migratory fish. We used geographic information systems (GIS) to assess each barrier's role in blocking migratory fish passage. Using readily available data, we estimated barrier height, the depth of the plunge pool, and the velocity of the water (both estimated at the time of spawning for each species modeled) and the burst swimming speed and jumping ability of non-stocked migratory fish species of interest. A barrier was considered passable if its height was lower than the maximum jumping height of the fish, its plunge pool deeper than the average length of the fish, and the velocity of the water slower than the burst swimming speed of the fish. Model predictions were tested against observed presence/absence data. The map produced from the execution of this model is a useful tool for evaluating the extent of habitat lost to migratory fish as a result of habitat fragmentation by barriers. This information can be used to inform managers concerned about migratory fish population viability and to guide future restoration and conservation efforts.
H21I-07
Inference of Stream Network Fragmentation Patterns from Ground Water - Surface Water Interactions on the High Plains Aquifer
Stream networks in the Great Plains integrate fluxes from precipitation as surface runoff in discrete events and groundwater as base flow. Changes in land cover and agronomic practices and development of ground water resources to support irrigated agriculture have resulted in profound changes in the occurrence and magnitude of stream flows, especially near the Ogallala aquifer, where precipitation is low. These changes have demonstrably altered the aquatic habitat of western Kansas, with documented changes in fish populations, riparian communities and groundwater quality due to stream transmission losses. Forecasting future changes in aquatic and riparian ecology and groundwater quality requires a large scale spatially explicit model of groundwater- surface water interaction. In this study, we combine historical data on land use, stream flow, production well development and groundwater level observations with groundwater elevation modeling to support a geospatial framework for assessing changes in refugia for aquatic species in four rivers in western Kansas between 1965 and 2005. Decreased frequency and duration of streamflow occurred in all rivers, but the extent of change depended on the geomorphology of the river basin and the extent of groundwater development. In the absence of streamflow, refugia for aquatic species were defined as the stream reaches below the phreatic surface of the regional aquifer. Changes in extent, location and degree of fragmentation of gaining reaches was found to be a strong predictor of surface water occurrence during drought and a robust hydrological template for the analysis of changes in recharge to alluvial and regional aquifers and riparian and aquatic habitat.