Brine shrimp Artemia franciscana provide food for many migrating and staging birds that spend summer and fall on Great Salt Lake,Utah,USA.Artemia produce live young and cysts(hard-walled eggs);these cysts are commerci...Brine shrimp Artemia franciscana provide food for many migrating and staging birds that spend summer and fall on Great Salt Lake,Utah,USA.Artemia produce live young and cysts(hard-walled eggs);these cysts are commercially harvested on Great Salt Lake and support a large industry in Utah.It is unclear the impact that millions of hungry birds have on the Artemia population in the lake.To help assess that,this study evaluated cyst viability(percentage of cysts that contain an embryo)and hatchability(percent of cysts that hatch)from cysts that had passed through the digestive tract of eared grebes Podiceps nigricollis and cysts obtained directly from Great Salt Lake at the same site where each grebe was collected.Hatchability was significantly higher for cysts collected from the water column(19%)than from the stomach(0.3%)or intestines(3%)of eared grebes.Viability also was significantly different for cysts collected from the water column(29%),stomach(0.7%),and intestines(5%).These results indicate that eared grebes nutritionally benefit from eating cysts and that they may be an important food source for grebes in late fall after the adult population of Artemia dies off due to the water becoming too cold.Also,enough cysts survive their passage through the digestive system that grebes can vector hatchable cysts to other waterbodies.展开更多
High precision elevation measurements using DGPS were carried out along three representative tran- sects for the "Great Ear" area, a dry salt lake within the Lop Nor basin. Results indicate that the Lop Nor ...High precision elevation measurements using DGPS were carried out along three representative tran- sects for the "Great Ear" area, a dry salt lake within the Lop Nor basin. Results indicate that the Lop Nor basin is only 5.2 m deep and its lowest point occurs at the center of the "Great Ear". In addition, the basin is asymmetric - steeper in the southwest (0.19‰) and gentler in the northeast (0.09‰). Points along the same "Great Ear" ring were found to have an identical elevation value, but different when from different ones (lower towards the center). The spacing of the "Great Ear" rings was found to be closely related with the surface steepness. The closer the "Great Ear" rings are spaced, the steeper the ground surface, and vice versa. These findings support the argument that the "Great Ear" rings are the former shoreline trails left behind by Lop Nor water during the last few episodes of recession towards its total dry up. A comprehensive analysis of the high precision elevation data, historical accounts, aerial and satellite photographs and imagery, and official topographic maps of the study area suggests that the "Great Ear" area in the Lop Nor basin was incorrectly mapped as being covered by a great body of water on the 1963 topographic maps. A re-interpretation of the 1958 aerial photographs and newer remote sensing imagery indicated that the "Great Ear" ring structure was already in place in 1958 and it continued to appear on the subsequent remote sensing data without any major changes. It is estimated that lake water in the "Great Ear" area of the Lop Nor basin disappeared between the late 1930s and early 1940s.展开更多
基金Supported by the Great Salt Lake Ecosystem Program of Utah Division of Wildlife Resources,Utah Agricultural Experiment Station(article No.9534)and Ecology Center of Utah State Universityapproved by Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of Utah State University(10087)+2 种基金permitted by the state of Utah(1BAND10069,2COLL10039)the U.S.Bird Banding Lab(21175)and the U.S.Fish and Wildlife Service(MB693916-0).
文摘Brine shrimp Artemia franciscana provide food for many migrating and staging birds that spend summer and fall on Great Salt Lake,Utah,USA.Artemia produce live young and cysts(hard-walled eggs);these cysts are commercially harvested on Great Salt Lake and support a large industry in Utah.It is unclear the impact that millions of hungry birds have on the Artemia population in the lake.To help assess that,this study evaluated cyst viability(percentage of cysts that contain an embryo)and hatchability(percent of cysts that hatch)from cysts that had passed through the digestive tract of eared grebes Podiceps nigricollis and cysts obtained directly from Great Salt Lake at the same site where each grebe was collected.Hatchability was significantly higher for cysts collected from the water column(19%)than from the stomach(0.3%)or intestines(3%)of eared grebes.Viability also was significantly different for cysts collected from the water column(29%),stomach(0.7%),and intestines(5%).These results indicate that eared grebes nutritionally benefit from eating cysts and that they may be an important food source for grebes in late fall after the adult population of Artemia dies off due to the water becoming too cold.Also,enough cysts survive their passage through the digestive system that grebes can vector hatchable cysts to other waterbodies.
基金the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 40671080)the Program for Changjiang Scholars and Innovative Research Team in University (Grant No. IRT0412)the Key Subject of Soil Science Program in Xinjiang
文摘High precision elevation measurements using DGPS were carried out along three representative tran- sects for the "Great Ear" area, a dry salt lake within the Lop Nor basin. Results indicate that the Lop Nor basin is only 5.2 m deep and its lowest point occurs at the center of the "Great Ear". In addition, the basin is asymmetric - steeper in the southwest (0.19‰) and gentler in the northeast (0.09‰). Points along the same "Great Ear" ring were found to have an identical elevation value, but different when from different ones (lower towards the center). The spacing of the "Great Ear" rings was found to be closely related with the surface steepness. The closer the "Great Ear" rings are spaced, the steeper the ground surface, and vice versa. These findings support the argument that the "Great Ear" rings are the former shoreline trails left behind by Lop Nor water during the last few episodes of recession towards its total dry up. A comprehensive analysis of the high precision elevation data, historical accounts, aerial and satellite photographs and imagery, and official topographic maps of the study area suggests that the "Great Ear" area in the Lop Nor basin was incorrectly mapped as being covered by a great body of water on the 1963 topographic maps. A re-interpretation of the 1958 aerial photographs and newer remote sensing imagery indicated that the "Great Ear" ring structure was already in place in 1958 and it continued to appear on the subsequent remote sensing data without any major changes. It is estimated that lake water in the "Great Ear" area of the Lop Nor basin disappeared between the late 1930s and early 1940s.
