Seasonal and event-scale variations in solute chemistry for four Sierra Nevada catchments

Hydrobiogeochemical processes controlling stream water chemistry were examined in four small (<5 km²) catchments having contrasting bedrock lithologies in the western Sierra Nevada foothills of California. The Mediterranean climate with its cool/wet and hot/dry cycle produces strong seasonal patterns in hydrological, biological and geochemical processes. Stream water solutes fall into three general groups according to seasonal fluctuation in concentration: strong, rainy season minimum–dry season maximum (Cl⁻, SO₄²⁻, base cations); weak, rainy season minimum–dry season maximum (Si); and rainy season maximum–dry season minimum (NO₃⁻ and K⁺). Solute dynamics in soil solutions and stream water suggest that mixing of drainage waters from bedrock and soil sources regulate stream water solute concentrations. Patterns are further altered by the leaching of solutes accumulated in the soil over the summer period of desiccation and the temporal discoupling of nutrient cycles that occurs due to differences in the timing between vegetation growth (late spring) and leaching (early winter). Solute concentrations are remarkably similar between watersheds with varying bedrock types, with the exception of nitrate, sulfate and bicarbonate. Three watersheds have nitrogen-bearing metasedimentary bedrock that contributes to elevated nitrate concentrations in stream waters. Watersheds whose bedrock includes mineralized veins of sulfide and carbonate minerals similarly have greater sulfate and bicarbonate concentrations in stream water. Hydrobiogeochemical processes are highly dynamic at the seasonal and storm-event temporal scales and spatially complex at the watershed scale making management of stream water chemical composition, such as nitrate concentrations, very challenging.     

The structure of an inversion above a convective boundary layer as observed using high-power pulsed doppler radar

The high-power Defford radar has been upgraded to provide Doppler information regarding the motion of echoes from weak refractive index inhomogeneities within the optically clear atmosphere. A case study is presented in which data from the radar are used to derive the detailed velocity structure in and above the planetary boundary layer. These data are analysed to show how convective circulations in the boundary layer can perturb the height of a shallow inversion overlying it, thereby producing local enhancements of wind shear and a decrease in dynamic stability within the inversion. The measurements were obtained as part of a Boundary-Layer Project in which simultaneous measurements were made using fast-response instruments suspended from a tethered balloon within the region scanned by the radar. The balloon-borne probes showed that the most intense turbulence and fluctuations of temperature and refractivity were encountered when radar-detected hummocks in the height of the inversion were advected through the probes. The fine-scale turbulence measurements within the perturbed inversion are consistent with the existence of Kelvin-Helmholtz billows.     

Variations in eelgrass (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Zostera marina</Emphasis> L.) morphology and internal nutrient composition as influenced by increased temperature and water column nitrate

In an experimental mesocosm system, we evaluated changes in morphology and tissue nutrient content (carbon [C], nitrogen [N], phosphorus [P]) of eelgrass (Zostera marina L.) as influenced by increased temperature and nitrate. During the late summer-fall growing season (14 weeks, August through mid-November), control plants were compared to plants grown at elevated temperatures (3°C to 4°C above ambient, based on 20-yr weekly means) and elevated water column nitrate enrichment (8 μM NO₃ ⁻, pulsed daily). Both increased temperature and increased nitrate led to declines in shoot density (by 40% and 48% for nitrate and temperature treatments, respectively), as well as decreased leaf and root production. High temperature promoted increased total C content of leaf tissues, whereas high nitrate increased the percentage of N in belowground tissues and depressed the C∶N ratio in aboveground tissues. The data indicated that increases in nitrate or temperature can significantly reduce the size ofZ. marine shoots and can also alter the internal C and N content. This reduction was not associated with significant increases in light-attenuating algae as we controlled epiphytic growth, so we suggest that a direct physiological mechanism or other mechanism was involved.     

Crocodile crimes: people versus wildlife and the politics of postcolonial conservation on Lake Kariba, Zimbabwe

This article is about the politics of conservation in postcolonial Southern Africa. It focuses on the process and consequences of redefining the Nile crocodile as an endangered species and explores the linked local and international, commercial and conservationist interests that allowed the animal to re-establish itself in state-protected waterways in colonial and postcolonial contexts. It investigates the effects of the animal’s successful re-accommodation by examining conflicts between crocodiles and the fishing communities sharing space on Lake Kariba, Zimbabwe. Fishermen’s hostile representations of the animal emphasize competition for fish, harassment, fear, loss of assets and loss of life. Their fear of crocodiles is heightened by the animal’s entanglement in local social life, through its association with witchcraft. The article emphasizes the importance of considering both hegemonic and marginalized ideas about animals in the light of the material interactions, relations of power and historical contexts that shape them. Understanding the attitudes and circumstances of the local communities who bear the physical and economic costs of living with dangerous animals is important--it threatens the future of conservation programmes and reveals the potential for significant abuses to accompany the conservation of wildlife in postcolonial contexts.     

Petrology of iron-rich magmatic segregations associated with strongly peraluminous trondhjemite in the Cornucopia stock, northeastern Oregon

The Middle Cretaceous Cornucopia stock in the Blue Mountains of northeastern Oregon is a small composite intrusion consisting of hornblende biotite tonalite, biotite trondhjemite, and three cordierite two mica trondhjemite units. Unusual magnetite + biotite-rich tonalitic rocks are associated with the Crater Lake cordierite trondhjemite, the youngest of the intrusions. Oxide-rich tonalites are characterized by high Fe (~47-68 wt% total Fe as FeO), low SiO₂ (<36 wt%), and enrichments in HFSE and REE (La_(N)=361-903). Oxide-rich tonalites appear in a variety of forms, including composite dikes and sheets, in which they are associated with leucocratic tonalite. Leucotonalite is lower in SiO₂ (60-72 wt%) than Crater Lake trondhjemite, and generally has DREE contents and Eu anomalies intermediate between the oxide-rich tonalite and Crater Lake compositions. Oxide-rich tonalites crosscut, and are crosscut by, shear zones in the host trondhjemite, indicating their emplacement late in the pluton's crystallization history. Granitic dikes crosscut the composite dikes in all localities. Geochemical considerations and sedimentary-like structures, such as load casts and bedding of magnetite-rich assemblages in the composite dikes and sheets, are suggestive of crystal settling from an Fe-rich parental magma. The Fe-rich liquid parental to the oxide-rich tonalite-leucotonalite pairs formed by extensive, in-situ, plagioclase + quartz-dominated crystallization of strongly peraluminous trondhjemite. Early magnetite saturation in the trondhjemite was suppressed, either because the parental trondhjemitic magma had a lower initial total Fe content or because it had a lower ferric-ferrous ratio, possibly reflecting a lower oxygen fugacity. Accumulation of magnetite from Fe-rich residual magma is a viable mechanism for the concentration of iron, and the subsequent formation of Fe-rich rocks, in calcic siliceous intrusions. Apparently, Fe-enrichment can occur locally in calcic magmas, and is not restricted to rocks of mafic tholeiitic or anorthositic affinity.     

The magnetic non-equilibrium of buoyant flux tubes in the solar corona

The equilibrium shape of a slender flux tube in the stratified solar atmosphere is studied. The path is determined by a balance between the downwards magnetic tension, which depends on the curvature of the loop, and the upwards buoyancy force. Previous results for untwisted slender tubes are extended to include twisted tubes embedded in an external magnetic field.The path of an untwisted tube in an atmosphere with an ambient magnetic field is calculated. For a given footpoint separation, the height of the tube is lowered by increasing the strength of the external magnetic field. If the footpoints are slowly moved apart, the tube rises, until a threshold separation is reached beyond which there is no possible equilibrium height. This threshold width does not depend on the strength of the external field.The effects of twisting up a curved loop are studied, using an extension of results obtained for slender curved tubes with a straight axis. It is shown that for a twisted tube of given width, there can be two possible values of the equilibrium height. If, however, the tube is twisted more than a certain amount or if the footpoints are too widely separated there is no equilibrium. The critical footpoint separation for non-equilibrium is smaller for a twisted tube that an untwisted one.Twisting a tube or moving its feet apart is thus likely to result in non-equilibrium, causing the tube to rise indefinitely under the influence of the unbalanced buoyant force. It is suggested that this phenomenon could be important in the preflare stage of a large two-ribbon solar flare, by causing the initial slow rise of an active region filament. As well as being involved in the onset of an erupting prominence, this non-equilibrium may also be relevant to the formation of coronal loop transients.     

Dynamo action in simulations of penetrative solar convection with an imposed tachocline

We summarize new and continuing three-dimensional spherical shell simulations of dynamo action by convection allowed to penetrate downward into a tachocline of rotational shear. The inclusion of an imposed tachocline allows us to examine several processes believed to be essential in the operation of the global solar dynamo, including differential rotation, magnetic pumping, and the stretching and organization of fields within the tachocline. In the stably stratified core, our simulations reveal that strong axisymmetric magnetic fields (of ∼ 3000 G strength) can be built, and that those fields generally exhibit a striking antisymmetric parity, with fields in the northern hemisphere largely of opposite polarity to those in the southern hemisphere. In the convection zone above, fluctuating fields dominate over weaker mean fields. New calculations indicate that the tendency toward toroidal fields of antisymmetric parity is relatively insensitive to initial magnetic field configurations; they also reveal that on decade-long timescales, the magnetic fields can briefly enter (and subsequently emerge from) states of symmetric parity.We have not yet observed any overall reversals of the field polarity, nor systematic latitudinal propagation. (© 2007 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Ammonium in thermal waters of Yellowstone National Park: Processes affecting speciation and isotope fractionation

Dissolved inorganic nitrogen, largely in reduced form (), has been documented in thermal waters throughout Yellowstone National Park, with concentrations ranging from a few micromolar along the Firehole River to millimolar concentrations at Washburn Hot Springs. Indirect evidence from rock nitrogen analyses and previous work on organic compounds associated with Washburn Hot Springs and the Mirror Plateau indicate multiple sources for thermal water NH₄(T), including Mesozoic marine sedimentary rocks, Eocene lacustrine deposits, and glacial deposits. A positive correlation between NH₄(T) concentration and δ¹⁸O of thermal water indicates that boiling is an important mechanism for increasing concentrations of NH₄(T) and other solutes in some areas. The isotopic composition of dissolved NH₄(T) is highly variable (δ¹⁵N = −6‰ to +30‰) and is positively correlated with pH values. In comparison to likely δ¹⁵N values of nitrogen source materials (+1‰ to +7‰), high δ¹⁵N values in hot springs with pH >5 are attributed to isotope fractionation associated with loss by volatilization. NH₄(T) in springs with low pH typically is relatively unfractionated, except for some acid springs with negative δ¹⁵N values that are attributed to condensation. NH₄(T) concentration and isotopic variations were evident spatially (between springs) and temporally (in individual springs). These variations are likely to be reflected in biomass and sediments associated with the hot springs and outflows. Elevated NH₄(T) concentrations can persist for 10s to 1000s of meters in surface waters draining hot spring areas before being completely assimilated or oxidized.