Colorado Highlights

• Whirling Disease: This affliction of young trout has severely reduced naturally reproducing trout populations in Colorado. It is caused by a microscopic parasite associated with worms of the genus Tubifex, which, if carrying the parasite, can transmit the disease to young fish that feed on them. Researchers from the USGS Fort Collins Science Center are working with the Colorado Division of Wildlife and Colorado State University to develop sediment transport models of Tubifex habitat for identifying flow regimes and channel modifications that could reduce such habitat. Field work and modeling on selected reaches of two streams in northern Colorado were used to design channel modifications to isolate Tubifex habitat and ultimately lower the incidence of whirling disease in these areas. Researchers are currently evaluating the effectiveness of these site modifications.

• Gunnison Sage-Grouse: Previous genetic studies have shown that the Gunnison Sage-Grouse population has much less genetic diversity than the Greater Sage-Grouse populations from which it derives. This is of importance to managers, who must decide what actions will best help conserve this unique bird, found only in Colorado. Scientists from the USGS Fort Collins Science Center and the Rocky Mountain Center for Conservation Genetics and Systematics are conducting research to characterize the genetic makeup of all seven Gunnison Sage-Grouse populations, using both mitochondrial and nuclear DNA markers. This information will provide managers with data on gene flow and connectivity among populations, and will document levels of genetic diversity for each population. It will also provide the baseline genetic information necessary should managers consider translocation as a management option.

  

• Nitrogen Deposition: Too much of a good thing can be hazardous to an ecosystem's health, at least as far as nitrogen is concerned. For 24 years, scientists at the USGS Fort Collins Science Center have been studying the air, water, vegetation, and soil of mountain habitats within and around Rocky Mountain National Park to determine the consequences of nitrogen from atmospheric deposition. Results show nitrogen is accumulating in high-elevation ecosystems. These elevated levels bring about shifts in plant and animal communities, decreases in soil fertility, and increases in algae growth. Sources of atmospheric nitrogen include automobile, power plant, and agricultural emissions. Together with Colorado State University partners, FORT scientists continue to evaluate the degree of impact and explore the pathways by which nitrogen moves through high-elevation ecosystems.

• Urban Bats: The dynamics of rabies transmission in bat populations that roost and live within cities is being investigated using Fort Collins as the case study. Biologists at the Fort Collins Science Center are completing this 5-year project in collaboration with Colorado State University, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, and the National Science Foundation. Rabies commonly circulates in urban bat populations, but these animals appear to have the capacity to develop immunity to the disease. The final results, which will include a new model for rabies transmission in bats, are expected to be of considerable interest to public health agencies and bat conservationists alike.
• Forecasting Invasions: Scientists from NASA, Colorado State University, and the Fort Collins Science Center have combined expertise to develop the Invasive Species Forecasting System (ISFS), a new Web-based tool for combatting invasive plant species across the U.S. The ISFS links data on occurrence, field information on species abundance and spread, and NASA satellite data to analyze past and present distributions of non-native plants and predict their future distribution and abundance, based on ecological factors. Land and resource managers can use the ISFS to generate color-coded maps that will help them limit the spread of existing invaders and prevent new invasions. The model has successfully been tested on tamarisk (saltcedar), an invasive plant species found in riparian areas throughout the West, including Colorado.
• The Conservation Reserve Program is the largest environmental program administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, with enrollment exceeding 34 million acres across all 50 states. In Colorado alone, nearly 2.3 million acres on 6,174 farms are in the CRP. Based on average rental payments, the CRP brings in over $71 million per year to Colorado’s farm economy. Improvement in program performance is an enduring goal of CRP administrators. For the past 9 years and continuing today, scientists from the USGS Fort Collins Science Center have been working in partnership with the USDA Farm Service Agency to help improve the program by evaluating program performance both socially (how is it working for CRP contractees) and ecologically (how is wildlife habitat improved?). In June 2004, FORT and the FSA sponsored a national meeting for more than 200 participants and presenters to address and present research on these issues as well as future CRP directions. The proceedings, The Conservation Reserve Program: Planting for the Future, was published in 2006.

  

• Mancos Shale: Mancos shale-derived soils on the Gunnison Gorge National Conservation Area (GGNCA) pose resource conservation and management challenges for the Bureau of Land Management. A USGS interdisciplinary research team is developing a comprehensive picture of the Mancos shale by examining everything from its formation and soil development to the vegetation and biological soil crusts that live on it. Understanding how the Mancos shale ecosystem interacts with off-highway vehicle disturbance is critical for sustainable management of both the Gunnison Gorge NCA and the larger upper Colorado River watershed, which receives selenium and salts from the erosion of Mancos shale soils. The Northern Rocky Mountain Science Center provides the biological research component to the USGS research team that also includes geologists, hydrologists, chemists, and geographers. Native and non-native species distributions and biological soil crusts are being studied in relation to disturbance and topographic position. This information will be used directly in models to estimate surface flow and runoff, particularly as it relates to areas disturbed by off-highway vehicles. In addition, intensive soil chemistry data and the vegetation data are being used in an attempt to identify areas suitable for the endangered, endemic clay-loving buckwheat (Eriogonum pelinophilum Reveal), which is currently the subject of a petition to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to extend its critical habitat.