Commercial fishing is a culturally and economically significant industry on the Oregon coast. The importance of this industry to human communities is often neglected in fisheries research, with economic and ecological data being favored by managers and decision makers. Recent observations in many coastal communities have indicated aging of fishermen...
In the United States during the last 30 years there has been a shift from extractive natural resource-based economies of the Old West to a New West defined by environmental protection. Over the past century, a growing national support for environmental protection has influenced a lengthening list of national and...
Voluntary environmental programs (VEPs) have been created to encourage companies to engage in behaviors that mitigate environmental impacts (e.g., recycling, emissions reduction). Many ski areas participate in the Sustainable Slopes Program, an initiative that promotes VEPs in the ski area industry. Past research has addressed the performance of VEPs in...
Harmful algal blooms (HABs) are a problem for coastal communities, the fishing industry, and coastal organisms. Pseudo-nitzschia spp. is a regularly occurring diatom in Oregon’s coastal waters. At times, Pseudo-nitzschia spp. can facultatively produce domoic acid, a neurotoxin that can bioaccumulate in the food chain. While regular shore-based sampling provides...
Gunung Leuser is a national park in Sumatra Island, Indonesia. This park is one of the most important biodiversity hotspots in the country. For instance, it is home to endangered and endemic species of Indonesia, such as the Sumatran orangutan, the Sumatran tiger, the Sumatran elephant, and the Sumatran rhino....
This dissertation seeks to understand Yi farmers’ livelihoods in the midst of an agricultural transition in Yunnan, Southwest China. This dissertation examines a community’s traditional knowledge related to wild edible plants (WEPs), analyzes socio-ecological vulnerability and resilience in the face of agricultural transition from subsistence farming to cash cropping, and...
Rising human global population, appetite for seafood, and the effects of climate change have pushed commercial marine fisheries around the globe onto trajectories that are chillingly unsustainable. Input from fishermen on what it means to have a “sustainable fishery” is often absent or ignored. Some commercial fisheries are lauded for...
Hardrock mining is associated with severe environmental and economic costs. Of particular concern is acid mine drainage which has contaminated several thousand kilometers of streams across the United States representing a formidable danger to watershed health. Given the high risks of this activity, ensuring high regulatory standards may be an...
In the Pacific Northwest, USA, the cumulative impact of human development has caused decades of salmon habitat degradation and the listing of multiple populations under the US Endangered Species Act. As a result, the need for implementation of recovery goals has encouraged the development of an economy focused on salmon...
There is a growing movement in the U.S., and throughout the world, involving top down government bureaucracies or government agencies within the natural resources field, to develop new and innovative processes and structures for integrating societal viewpoints into agency decision-making. This study examines Urban Matters, a community of practice within...
The purpose of this research was to determine the role of formative experiences in the home and family pertaining to environment on children's overall environmental beliefs. Students attending environmentally related and non-environmentally related summer camps at a children's science museum served as test subjects in this study. A written instrument...
Millions of U.S. households experienced hunger in 2005 and millions more experienced food insecurity. Previous research indicates that low-wage work and little social support contribute to food insecurity. Research also suggests that individuals cope by finding alternate food sources and drawing on social support. Further, researchers have found that rural...
Cultural competence is a topic that concerns social scientists and medical anthropologists who pay attention to demographic changes and health disparities. This study demonstrates practical approaches to developing cultural competence in medical education by using factors from the social environment to develop protocols for action. With current concerns in domestic...
The easy picking characteristic, expressed as low pod detachment force (PDF),
offers a way to decrease pod damage in bush green beans mechanically harvested for
processing and fresh market, and makes hand picking easier and faster. This study was
undertaken to examine inheritance in a cross of two green bean...
Co-management is considered an alternative approach to fisheries management,
however, not all co-managed fisheries have been successful. Most studies discussing the
success and failure of co-management have emphasized economic and social attributes of
success and failure, such as fishery rights and institutional arrangements. The effect on
co-management of biological characteristics,...
The protection of sensitive resources is an integral part of forest practices regulations in many states, affecting non-industrial private forest (NIPF) landowners. In Oregon, forest operations on private lands which will conflict with sensitive areas designated "specified resource sites" must meet spatial and temporal requirements to protect those sites. These...
Interest groups have participated in the American political system since the signing of the U.S. Constitution. Environmental interest groups, a subsection of the American interest group society, have been especially active in national policies since the proliferation of environmental laws and environmental advocacy in the 1960s and 1970s. When environmental...
Numerous development projects are implemented in developing countries to attain economic and ecological development. However, in most cases, the encouraging results observed during the implementation phase terminated with the project period, raising concerns on these projects' sustainability after the project period has ended. This study focuses on this sustainability issue...
Hydrological and biogeochemical processes occurring throughout a watershed are typically reflected in stream water chemistry, including in coastal watersheds. While Oregon Coast Range streams have been studied in the past, there is a dearth of knowledge in terms of seasonal temporal trends and spatial variability that this study seeks to...
This study examines the long-term role of interference on stand development of Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii [Mirb.] Franco) and red alder (Alnus rubra Bong.) planted mixtures in the Central Cascades of Oregon, USA. The two species are common associates in naturally regenerated and planted conifer stands in the Pacific Northwest. Due...
The process of land acquisition for the conservation of plants or wildlife habitat
can raise controversial issues, issues often perceived differently by the individuals and groups
involved. After the land acquisition process is completed, there is rarely an opportunity to
analyze the differing perceptions of the issues and their relative...
Oregon, much like the nation, has historically had a paradoxical relationship to migration. Oregon is famous for the Lewis and Clark expedition and the Oregon Trail. It is, and always has been, greatly affected and inspired by interstate migration yet each successive generation has been less than welcoming to further...
Anthropogenic climate change is an escalating environmental and humanitarian emergency, but American public opinion varies on the issue, particularly in terms of whether climate change is natural or human caused. Belief that climate change is human caused has been shown to be critical in terms of support for policy action....
Oregon’s high hunger and food insecurity rates have been a concern throughout the last decade. These high rates earned Oregon the dubious distinction as the most food insecure with hunger state in the late 1990’s. While Oregon’s ranking has improved in recent years, our understanding of why Oregon ranked so...
Natural resource data are typically non-linear and complex, yet modeling methods often utilize statistical analysis techniques, such as regression, that are insufficient for use on such data. This research proposes an innovative modeling method based on pattern recognition techniques borrowed from the field of machine learning. These techniques make no...
Few studies examine whether public attitudes toward forest management practices differ between public and private forests, with virtually no recent studies examining these differences in the Pacific Northwest, despite the coexistence of millions of acres of both public and private forest lands. Knowing whether public attitudes differ between public and...
This thesis investigates Contextual Teaching and Learning (CTL) as a method of instruction for natural resources education. The research follows the adoption of CTL in the K-12 classrooms of six teachers focusing on natural resources education at two rural schools in Western Oregon. CTL is being investigated because it connects...
An alternative to traditional roofing, extensive green roofs are contained ecosystems consisting of a drainage layer, a thin media profile which is planted with hardy plant species. Extensive green roof plants must maintain multiple functions while growing in a highly aggregate media at a depth of equal to or less...
Disturbance and microclimate interact to play a central role influencing the composition and structure of plant communities. In this thesis, I examined plant community composition and structure twenty years after high severity wildfires with and without post-fire management (salvage logging, fuel treatment, tree planting, and shrub release) under contrasting microclimatic...
In 2021, Oregon’s legislature passed House Bill 2021 with relative ease. House Bill 2021 is a mandate for the state’s two largest utilities to reduce carbon emissions from electricity generation on a decreasing scale, reaching 100% below baseline levels by 2040. This ambitious piece of legislation, meant to reduce the...
The U.S. Forest Service has been forced to adapt to numerous changes over the last three decades. These include a dramatic reduction in workforce, a declining budget, and controversial lawsuits. Moreover, recent agency wide studies suggest that within the Forest Service a new resource management paradigm has emerged that differs...
The purpose of the research project leading to this paper was to determine if a
community management approach to fishery management would be feasible in Oregon.
The basis for answering this question was a survey of residents in Oregon's eleven
incorporated fishing port communities.
This paper explores the contributions of social capital, social connections, and stakeholder engagement to the goals of ecosystem-based management in a local scale marine planning process. The body of work presented here, through a journal article and report, uses the lens of social capital to evaluate stakeholder engagement in making...
The management of the Northern Rocky Mountains (NRM) gray wolf population is a longstanding controversy that has fueled generations of political and cultural turmoil in the American West. At the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century, wolves were eradicated from the West for the threat...
The purpose of this study is to identify the aspects of successful collaboration within an inter-organizational context. This essay is a case study of a tightly niched network of fire chiefs in central Oregon situated within multiple contiguous boundaries of federal and state agencies, county and municipal governments, industrial forests,...
The topics in this dissertation center on the snow processes that dominate mountain environments in the Western U.S. and Alaska, particularly in locations lacking long-term observational datasets or locales that are difficult to access in-person. Some are currently glacierized or have been glaciated in the recent past. Each of the...
Using Richard Matland’s ambiguity/conflict model of policy implementation, this research examines the connections that agencies and organizations in one rural county, Klamath, and one urban county, Multnomah, in Oregon utilize to implement a particular state policy. The policy being examined is ORS 418.746-800, which mandates the use of Multidisciplinary Teams...
In September 2016, the US Army Corps of Engineers, Bureau of Reclamation, and Bonneville Power Administration initiated an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) to re-evaluate the long-term strategies for managing the Columbia River System Operations (CRSO). Most notably, these strategies included an option to remove four dams along the Lower Snake...
This pilot study of South Sister Creek (8 km length) examined stream-scale (i.e., longitudinal trends) and sub-reach scale (less than 100 m) water temperature. Hourly summer temperature time-series data were gathered at four to seven locations along South Sister Creek in 2006, 2012, and 2013 and were used to explore...
As Europeans settled the Willamette Valley in the 1800s, they began to simplify Oregon's largest river contained wholly within state boarders—the Willamette. The river lost miles of channels from dikes, dams, and development. Some channels vanished under concrete. Others became meander scars, or shallow, dry depression in the land where...
This essay examines the low-income weatherization program in rural Oregon, shedding light on difficulties in increasing weatherization services to low-income rural households. This essay also identifies policy limitations. There are strict rules in place for utilizing Department of Energy weatherization funding and some of these rules
are likely to make...
State parks in Oregon provide important sites for visitor recreation and natural resource education. With the increasing number of visitors to Oregon coastal parks, tide pools and beach areas, there is growing need for site-specific marine education to enhance stewardship, interpretation and safety knowledge. The Oregon Sea Grant Program and...
I examined the relative roles of biotic and abiotic factors in structuring redband trout
Oncorhynchus mykiss distributions in the South Fork John Day. I first examined the
relationship between the biological traits of the fish assemblage and riparian-geomorphic features in context of prevailing theories of stream ecology stemming from the...
Global annual average temperatures are rising, creating extreme heat events or heatwaves that are increasing in frequency, length, and severity. The world will endure more of these events as climate change worsens and heat-related mortality and morbidity will increase due to warming conditions. At the center of heatwaves are urban...
Concern over the incidental catch of non-targeted species in commercial and
recreational fisheries has greatly increased. Public attention, negative publicity,
controversies between differing fisheries and gear groups and the reauthorization of the
Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act have led to an increased
awareness of the issue. The Pacific halibut...
Many nations that invest in aquaculture and fisheries for improved nutrition and food security are located in areas prone to natural disasters, such as typhoons. While all residents are vulnerable to the effects of disasters, research suggests that women are disproportionately affected at all stages of disaster management: preparedness, response,...
This study documents the occurrence of stereotypical representations of
gender, race, and other characteristics in individuals that appear in advertisements in
the prestigious academic journal Science. It repeats and expands upon a study
conducted by Mary Barbercheck (2001) that analyzed advertisements in Science
between 1995 and 1997. In this study,...
Relative to other systems in the PNW, the rain-dominated, coastal watersheds of western Oregon have shallow aquifers. Given the seasonality of streamflow and storage limitations in coastal, rain-dominated watersheds, changes in the temporal patterns of precipitation have the potential to magnify the risk of extreme streamflow conditions during both high-...
Since the 1990s the U.S. and especially the Western U.S. have experienced more intense and costly fires. To help address this problem government agencies are increasingly looking at homeowners in fire-prone landscapes to mitigate fire risk. Part of this effort involves communicating risk and understanding how residents perceive risk. This...
Since the 1990s the U.S. and especially the Western U.S. have experienced more intense and costly fires. To help address this problem government agencies are increasingly looking at homeowners in fire-prone landscapes to mitigate fire risk. Part of this effort involves communicating risk and understanding how residents perceive risk. This...