Seasonal changes in community composition and trophic structure of fish populations of five salt marshes along the Essex coastline, United Kingdom     

Benjamin C. Green  David J. Smith  Sarah E. Earley  Leanne J. Hepburn  Graham J.C. Underwood 《Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science》2009,85(2):247-256

European intertidal salt marshes are important nursery sites for juvenile fish and crustaceans. Due to the increasing threat of habitat loss, the seasonal changes of salt marsh fish communities need to be understood in order to appreciate the ecological and economic importance of the saltmarsh habitat. This study was the first in Great Britain to investigate the seasonal changes of salt marsh fish communities and the variation in community structure between closely located marsh habitats. Between February 2007 and March 2008, five marshes on three estuaries of the Essex coastline were sampled using flume nets to block off intertidal creeks at high tide. Fourteen fish species were caught. The community overall was dominated by three species that made up 91.6% of the total catch: the common goby Pomatoschistus microps (46.2% of the total catch), juvenile herring Clupea harengus (24.3%), and juvenile and larval sea bass Dicentrarchus labrax (21.2%). Cluster analysis demonstrated clear seasonal patterns, with some community structures unique to specific marshes or estuaries. The marsh fish community shifts from a highly diverse community during spring, to a community dominated by D. labrax and P. microps in autumn, and low diversity during winter months. Gravimetric stomach content analysis of fish community identified three main trophic guilds; macroinvertivores, planktivores and omnivores. The macroinvertivore feeding guild contained D. labrax and P. microps, the two most frequently occurring species. This investigation demonstrates the importance of British salt marshes as nursery habitats for commercial fish species.  相似文献   

Difficulties in separating hurricane induced effects from natural benthic succession: Hurricane Isabel,a case study from Eastern Virginia,USA     

C. Hughes  C.A. Richardson  M. Luckenbach  R. Seed 《Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science》2009

Hurricane Isabel reached the Eastern seaboard of North America on 18 September 2003 causing estimated damage >3 billion US dollars and the death of ∼50 people. Isabel is considered to be one of the most significant tropical cyclones to affect Virginia, since the Chesapeake Potomac Hurricane of 1933 and Hurricane Hazel in 1954. A study of the temporal changes in the benthic fauna pre- and post-hurricane was conducted on an intertidal sandflat within the dynamic barrier island system near Wachapreague, Eastern Virginia. Replicate sediment cores were collected 3 weeks before Isabel made landfall and further samples were collected on 5 occasions over the following 20 months. An immediate effect of Isabel was a doubling in the number of species, a significant increase in invertebrate species diversity (H′) and a rise in opportunistic species and deposit feeders, but a non-significant increase in the total number of organisms. Changes in infauna occurred such that by the end of the study there were significantly increased numbers of species, faunal abundances and community diversity measures, as compared with pre-hurricane samples, suggesting a potentially positive medium-term effect of this hurricane perturbation. The most notable direct effects of the hurricane were on the relative abundances of feeding guilds with a reduction in interface feeders from 87% pre-hurricane to 64% post-hurricane, and an increase in surface deposit feeders from 7% pre-hurricane to 20% post-hurricane. The study highlights potential problems in interpreting post-perturbation data when insufficient pre-perturbation data exist.  相似文献   

‘Bear are only the Lightning Rod’: Ongoing Acrimony in Alberta’s Grizzly Bear Recovery     

Courtney Hughes  Scott E. Nielsen 《社会与自然资源》2019,32(1):34-52

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The Falkland Islands’ palaeoecological response to millennial‐scale climate perturbations during the Pleistocene–Holocene transition: Implications for future vegetation stability in the southern ocean islands     

Robert G. Scaife  Antony J. Long  Alistair J. Monteath  Paul D. M. Hughes  Michael J. Bentley  Philip Stone 《第四纪科学杂志》2019,34(8):609-620

Oceanic island flora is vulnerable to future climate warming, which is likely to promote changes in vegetation composition, and invasion of non‐native species. Sub‐Antarctic islands are predicted to experience rapid warming during the next century; therefore, establishing trajectories of change in vegetation communities is essential for developing conservation strategies to preserve biological diversity. We present a Late‐glacial‐early Holocene (16 500–6450 cal a bp ) palaeoecological record from Hooker's Point, Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas), South Atlantic. This period spans the Pleistocene‐Holocene transition, providing insight into biological responses to abrupt climate change. Pollen and plant macrofossil records appear insensitive to climatic cooling during the Late‐glacial, but undergo rapid turnover in response to regional warming. The absence of trees throughout the Late‐glacial‐early Holocene enables the recognition of far‐travelled pollen from southern South America. The first occurrence of Nothofagus (southern beech) may reflect changes in the strength and/or position of the Southern Westerly Wind Belt during the Late‐glacial period. Peat inception and accumulation at Hooker's Point is likely to be promoted by the recalcitrant litter of wind‐adapted flora. This recalcitrant litter helps to explain widespread peatland development in a comparatively dry environment, and suggests that wind‐adapted peatlands can remain carbon sinks even under low precipitation regimes. © 2019 The Authors. Journal of Quaternary Science Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.  相似文献   

Late Quaternary solifluction sheets in the British uplands     

Stephan Harrison  Leanne Hughes  Neil Glasser  Oliver Kuras 《第四纪科学杂志》2021,36(7):1162-1173

Solifluction sheets are large-scale and extensive valley-floor and valley-side landforms developed widely in the British Isles from mass-wasting of glacial and periglacial sediments during late-glacial times. We describe their geographical distribution and review the processes that have led to their development. We use data from the Cheviot Hills, the one site in the British Isles where sedimentology and optically stimulated luminescence dating have been combined, to assess their age and nature of deposition. We also present data from central Wales where a new mapping and resistivity survey has reconstructed the nature of valley-side solifluction sheets. We explore the relative lack of recent research on these landforms and argue that solifluction sheets represent a clear example of how upland geomorphological systems have responded to late-glacial climate change. We end by identifying a number of areas where research on these enigmatic features could be focussed, including better understanding of their distribution, sedimentology and age.  相似文献   

The Perseid meteor shower     

David W. Hughes 《Earth, Moon, and Planets》1995,68(1-3):31-70

The Perseids usually appear, with no remarkable variation in numbers, every August, maximising about the 12th. They have a parent, Comet Swift-Tuttle (1862 III), and, with the exception of planet Earth, the causative meteoroids keep away from perturbing planets. Of all the known streams the origin and evolution of the Perseids should be the easiest to understand. The meteoroids are fast and are prone to fragmentation.  相似文献   

An observational program for a unified optical-radio reference frame     

C. de Vegt  J. A. Hughes  D. Jauncey  G. White  K. J. Johnston  J. Russell  G. Nicholson 《Astrophysics and Space Science》1991,177(1-2):199-202

An observational pilot program is described which provides a first step towards the construction of an inertial extragalactic reference frame from optical and radio measurements. Candidate objects will be selected from extragalactic compact radio sources which display optical counterparts. Galactic radio stars will be secondary reference objects. The reference frame will be defined by the radio positions of the extragalactic objects. Based on a coordinated effort in both hemispheres, a global homogeneous net of about 400 quasars and 100 radio stars is expected to result from a five year campaign.  相似文献   

Riparian management and stream bank erosion in New Zealand     

AO Hughes 《新西兰海洋与淡水研究杂志》2016,50(2):277-290

Improvements in riparian management, such as shrub/tree planting and livestock exclusion, are often assumed to result in reduced stream bank erosion and associated catchment sediment yield. Studies that quantify the effectiveness of riparian interventions aimed at reducing bank erosion and river sediment yields are, however, rare. This paper discusses how bank erosion processes can vary throughout catchments (with particular reference to their scale dependence) and hence how the effectiveness of different riparian interventions can be variable. The findings of known published accounts of the effectiveness of riparian management interventions for reducing stream bank erosion in New Zealand are also summarised. Only nine relevant studies were identified and most used qualitative or semi-quantitative analysis methods. Most studies compared stream banks in pasture catchments (with unlimited livestock access) with stream banks where livestock were excluded and riparian shrubs/trees were present. Many studies reported that managed stream banks were in better condition than unmanaged banks. The exclusion of livestock from riparian areas was generally reported as the principal factor in the measured improvements or differences. Only two studies specifically attributed reduced stream bank erosion to the presence of riparian vegetation. The dearth of research identified here highlights the need for further quantitative studies to determine the effectiveness of riparian management measures for reducing bank erosion.  相似文献   

Spatial Variability of the Flow and Turbulence Within a Model Canopy     

Ian N. Harman  Margi Böhm  John J. Finnigan  Dale Hughes 《Boundary-Layer Meteorology》2016,160(3):375-396

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The effect of the atmosphere and ionosphere on long period magnetospheric micropulsations   总被引：1，自引：0，他引：1  

W.J. Hughes 《Planetary and Space Science》1974,22(8):1157-1172

A study is made of the screening effect of the atmosphere and ionosphere which lets only part of a magnetospheric micropulsation signal reach the ground. We obtain analytical expressions relating the magnetic field in the magnetosphere to that on the ground, which are confirmed by computing a full solution. Only the part of the signal with no vertical current will be seen on the ground; this agrees with previous work. Using this result, we find that the reflection condition of a transverse hydromagnetic wave incident on the top of the ionosphere indicates a ‘fixed-end’ boundary condition for the field line. To a first approximation, micropulsation polarisations observed on the ground must be rotated through a right angle to obtain those in the magnetosphere. The strength of the electric field predicted in the ionosphere agrees with radio aurorae observations.  相似文献