Estuarine Habitat and Demographic Factors Affect Juvenile Chinook (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Oncorhynchus tshawytscha</Emphasis>) Growth Variability in a Large Freshwater Tidal Estuary

Estuarine rearing has been shown to enhance within watershed biocomplexity and support growth and survival for juvenile salmon (Oncorhynchus sp.). However, less is known about how growth varies across different types of wetland habitats and what explains this variability in growth. We focused on the estuarine habitat use of Columbia River Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha), which are listed under the Endangered Species Act. We employed a generalized linear model (GLM) to test three hypotheses: (1) juvenile Chinook growth was best explained by temporal factors, (2) habitat, or (3) demographic characteristics, such as stock of origin. This study examined estuarine growth rate, incorporating otolith microstructure, individual assignment to stock of origin, GIS habitat mapping, and diet composition along ~130 km of the upper Columbia River estuary. Juvenile Chinook grew on average 0.23 mm/day in the freshwater tidal estuary. When compared to other studies in the basin our growth estimates from the freshwater tidal estuary were similar to estimates in the brackish estuary, but ~4 times slower than those in the plume and upstream reservoirs. However, previous survival studies elucidated a possible tradeoff between growth and survival in the Columbia River basin. Our GLM analysis found that variation in growth was best explained by habitat and an interaction between fork length and month of capture. Juvenile Chinook salmon captured in backwater channel habitats and later in the summer (mid-summer and late summer/fall subyearlings) grew faster than salmon from other habitats and time periods. These findings present a unique example of the complexity of understanding the influences of the many processes that generate variation in growth rate for juvenile anadromous fish inhabiting estuaries.     

Diagenetic K-feldspar pseudomorphs in the Triassic Buntsandstein sandstones of the Iberian Range, Spain

Early diagenetic K-feldspar in the Triassic Buntsandstein of the Iberian Range (Spain) occurs as pseudomorphs after detrital K-feldspar (Or<93) and plagioclase (Ab<96). These pseudomorphs are chemically pure (Or>99), untwinned, commonly heavily clouded by vacuoles and tiny inclusions, dark-luminescing and are composed of numerous fine euhedral crystals of K-feldspar. The latter property suggests that the pseudomorphs form via dissolution of detrital K-feldspar and plagioclase and precipitation of authigenic K-feldspar. X-ray diffraction analysis shows that the authigenic K-feldspar is intermediate microcline.     

IMPROVEMENTS TO THE CLASSIFICATION PERFORMANCE OF RDA

Regularized discriminant analysis has proven to be a most effective classifier for problems wheretraditional classifiers fail because of a lack of sufficient training samples,as is often the case in high-dimensional settings.However,it has been shown that the model selection procedure of regularizeddiscriminant analysis,determining the degree of regularization,has some deficiencies associated with it.We propose a modified model selection procedure based on a new appreciation function.By means ofan extensive simulation it was shown that the new model selection procedure performs better than theoriginal one.We also propose that one of the control parameters of regularized discriminant analysis beallowed to take on negative values.This extension leads to an improved performance in certain situations.The results are confirmed using two chemical data sets.     

TWO STRUCTURAL MODELS FOR THE WESTERN FLANK OF THE BRABANT MASSIF*

This paper is concerned with an interpretation of the Bouguer anomaly on the Western flank of the Brabant Massif (Belgium). The position, shape, and density contrast of elementary bodies in the upper part of the earth's crust are determined in a purely numerical manner. A batholith-like body and a basin-type structure both adequately account for the observed surface field, at least from a one-sided geophysical and mathematical point of view. Since seismological control is lacking the two models are representative of the ambiguity and indeterminacy of the definitions of the geologic cause of the anomalous features, if the data are restricted to gravity information alone.     

Sedimentology of a marine intermontane Pleistocene Gilbert-type fan-delta complex in the Crati Basin, Calabria, southern Italy

The Crati Basin is a Pliocene-Holocene extensional basin filled by the progradation of different types of marine fan-delta systems. Coarse-grained Gilbert-type fan-deltas developed during the Pleistocene. They represent the sedimentary response to a strong differential uplift involving the basin margins and the basin itself. The differential uplift was responsible for the fragmentation of the basin into several sub-basins, into which these fan-deltas prograded. The protection and lateral confinement by structural highs, steep coastlines and the absence of strong tidal action in the adjacent Ionian Sea, allowed the regular progradation of these fan-deltas in the restricted gulfs and narrow embayments of the Crati Basin. For the classical Gilbert-type (fan) deltas in lacustrine settings, homopycnal inflow favours a rapid mixing of water masses and deposition of sediment close to the river mouth. In the case of the example described here, the density contrast between the sea water and the inflowing river water caused the separation of the muddy fraction from the coarse sandy and conglomeratic part of the sediment. This allowed the development of steep mud-poor coarse-grained delta foresets. Slope instability features (slump scars, conglomeratic flow slides) are fairly scarce in the proximal parts of the San Lorenzo del Vallo system. Towards the north, where protection from the Ionian Sea was less, they increase in importance.     

Determination of Gold in Twenty Geochemical Reference Samples by Flameless Atomic Absorption Spectrometry

After acid digestion, gold is extracted with MIBK and determinated by flameless atomic absorption spectrometry. The results for six USGS reference samples and fourteen French geochemical standards are presented and discussed. The agreement with working values for these standards is in the range of pm 5%.     

The genesis of lateral accretion deposits in recent intertidal mudflat channels, Solway Firth, Scotland

ABSTRACT The pattern of lateral accretion on an intertidal point bar is a response to the suspended sediment concentrations to which it is exposed. In summer, high sediment concentrations occur only during shallow (ebb) channel flows; deposition therefore takes place mainly on the point bar toe. In winter, high concentrations obtain at all depths and deposition therefore occurs on the upper point bar slopes. Accretion of the point bar toe is limited by scouring resulting from the high rainfall runoff of winter. High suspended sediment concentrations have little effect, however, if flow velocities are too high to allow deposition. Deposition is dependent on the non-uniformity of curved channel flow and is often confined to the downstream (ebb-sense) portion of the point bar. The lateral accretion deposits form a series of wedge-shaped units. Each unit represents one year's deposition, bounded by erosion scarps produced during successive winters. The base of the point bar deposit shows a gradual aggradation, keeping pace with the build-up of the adjacent interchannel flats.     

EFFECTS OF RIVER NETWORK WORKS AND SOIL CONSERVATION MEASURES ON RESERVOIR SILTATION

Knowledge of the morphological dynamics of a water course is essential for management of reservoir siltation. With an example of sedimentation in a reservoir in Basilicata, Italy, this paper demonstrates the effect on reservoir siltation of the hydraulic works, which are aimed to reduce sediment transport along the fluvial network and to prevent part of the sediment discharge from reaching the lake. The effect depends on the river type and on the the geological features of river basin slopes. The paper also shows how mass erosion can significantly contribute to development of reservoir siltation. Finally, preliminary results are provided about the time needed for river training works to be effective.     

Pyroxenite and granulite xenoliths from beneath the Scottish Northern Highlands Terrane: evidence for lower-crust/upper-mantle relationships

Xenolith suites from Permian host rocks in Orkney and the extreme NE of the Scottish mainland (Duncansby Ness) are described and compared to those from elsewhere in the Northern Highlands Terrane. Those from the Tingwall dyke, Orkney, comprise roughly equal proportions of ultramafic rocks (wehrlites, clinopyroxenites, websterites, hornblendites) and mafic to felsic rocks (gabbroic, noritic and dioritic granulites, with subordinate tonalites and trondhjemites). Those from Duncansby (45 km to the south) are dominantly olivine-poor ultramafic rocks (clinopyroxenites, pargasite pyroxenites, biotite-pyroxenites), together with granulites grading from gabbroic through to tonalites and trondhjemites. Most of the granulites are meta-igneous, comprising plagioclase and one- or two-pyroxene species with equilibration temperatures of 810-710 °C, and are regarded as samples of the lower crust. Absence of garnet and olivine, together with the association of relatively sodic plagioclase and aluminous pyroxenes, is consistent with derivation from depths corresponding to 5-10 kbar. Positive Eu anomalies in the granulites imply that most originated as plagioclase-rich cumulates from basaltic magmas. Scarce peraluminous quartzo-feldspathic xenoliths, such as a garnet-sillimanite-bearing sample from Duncansby, are regarded as metasedimentary in origin. Pyroxenes (and biotites) in the ultramafic xenoliths tend to have higher mg numbers than those of the granulites, reflecting higher temperatures of formation. Whereas the pyroxene-rich ultramafic rocks may be partly interleaved with the granulites in the lower crust, it is concluded that they also constitute a zone of substantial thickness at or around Moho level, separating the granulites from underlying peridotites, and that they originated as cumulates cognate to the granulites. They have, however, been variably metasomatised with formation of amphibole. This zone may constitute a density trap at which melt fractions, rich in K, Fe, Ti and OH and ascending from the asthenosphere, interact with the ultramafic cumulates, modifying them texturally and modally to produce a complex veined assemblage of clinopyroxene- and pargasite-rich rocks. The metasomatism involved an increase in LREE, HFSE and LILE contents. Some modal and cryptic metasomatism may also have affected the granulites, accounting for the presence of amphibole and relatively high LREE/HREE values (La/Lu 38-206). Since closely comparable xenolith assemblages also occur in Mull at the southwestern extremity of the Northern Highland Terrane, such metasomatised olivine- and orthopyroxene-deficient ultramafic rocks may characterise the shallowest part of the mantle beneath the entire terrane. The strongly bimodal character of the xenolith populations (either ultramafic or mafic grading to felsic) is taken to reflect the sharpness of the petrological Moho in this region.