Small Ponds Help Minnow→

PHYS.ORG, by Greg Stanley, Star Tribune

Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

The Topeka shiner, a rare and endangered fish, is only found in the few remaining prairies of Minnesota and a handful of other states in the Midwest. A decade ago it looked well on the way to extinction. But a group of scientists in a branch of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service along with nonprofit conservationists at the Nature Conservancy may have unlocked the secret to bringing it back, as well as a host of other prairie life. And it all depends on small unnamed ponds called oxbows.

Oxbow ponds get their name from a horseshoe shape resembling the old yokes used on teams of oxen. They form from the bend of streams and rivers that cut through grasslands. Over time some of those bends naturally separated from the larger stream, leaving behind small pools. Once a year, or every few years, the stream reconnects to these orphaned pools when the water is high enough, briefly allowing fish to move from one to the other.

The isolation and shallow water of an oxbow pond provides a nice little sanctuary and breeding ground for a slew of small fish, like Topeka shiners, protected from fast currents and predators, said Nick Utrup, the Fish and Wildlife Service's lead biologist for the Topeka shiner recovery.

AAAS: Getting Rid of Humans Benefits Wildlife Even if a Radiation Tragedy is Involved→

“In 1986, after a fire and explosion at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant released radioactive particles into the air, thousands of people left the area, never to return. Now, researchers reporting in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on October 5 have found that the Chernobyl site looks less like a disaster zone and more like a nature preserve, teeming with elk, roe deer, red deer, wild boar, and wolves.

The findings are a reminder of the resilience of wildlife. They may also hold important lessons for understanding the potential long-term impact of the more recent Fukushima disaster in Japan.

”It’s very likely that wildlife numbers at Chernobyl are much higher than they were before the accident,” says Jim Smith of the University of Portsmouth in the UK. “This doesn’t mean radiation is good for wildlife, just that the effects of human habitation, including hunting, farming, and forestry, are a lot worse.””

Abstract: Following the 1986 Chernobyl accident, 116,000 people were permanently evacuated from the 4,200 km2 Chernobyl exclusion zone [1] . There is continuing scientific and public debate surrounding the fate of wildlife that remained in the abandoned area. Several previous studies of the Chernobyl exclusion zone (e.g. [2,3] ) indicated major radiation effects and pronounced reductions in wildlife populations at dose rates well below those thought [4,5] to cause significant impacts. In contrast, our long-term empirical data showed no evidence of a negative influence of radiation on mammal abundance. Relative abundances of elk, roe deer, red deer and wild boar within the Chernobyl exclusion zone are similar to those in four (uncontaminated) nature reserves in the region and wolf abundance is more than 7 times higher. Additionally, our earlier helicopter survey data show rising trends in elk, roe deer and wild boar abundances from one to ten years post-accident. These results demonstrate for the first time that, regardless of potential radiation effects on individual animals, the Chernobyl exclusion zone supports an abundant mammal community after nearly three decades of chronic radiation exposures.

Can We Restore Everything?→

Bob Lalasz, for the Science Blog of the Nature Conservancy:

“Beth Tellman: Seeking to return to “the historical trajectory of ecosystems before human activity” (if we actually knew what that was) would require the dislocation or livelihood transformation of hundreds of millions of people in places like Bangladesh, Haiti or Latin America. If we care about people as much as other species, this line in Murcia et al — “all ecosystems should be considered candidates for restoration, regardless of the requisite resources” — should instead be about restoring socio-ecological systems for their ecosystem services. Novel ecosystems like urban wetlands and rain gardens will be critical to restoring such services as watershed infiltration capacity (Tellman et al). ”