Legislation and the capacity for rapid‐response management of nonindigenous species of fish in contiguous waters of Canada and the USA

• 1. The provision of Canadian and US hard, enforceable, law to authorize rapid response management of nonindigenous aquatic species originating from aquaculture, live fish sales, bait fish, and the pet trade was analysed at the provincial/state levels of government for the Atlantic, Laurentian Great Lakes, and Pacific regions of North America.
• 2. No federal legal capacity for rapid response management exists in either country. US state legislation is generally better developed than Canadian provincial laws to manage the exotic fish trade. However, much discrepancy exists among provincial and state law regarding provisions to restrict or prohibit potentially harmful species. Aquaculture and baitfish use is generally better regulated than live fish markets and the pet fish trade in both countries. Only the state of Maine has laws authorizing rapid‐response management to control escaped exotic fish.
• 3. Most species of nonindigenous fish arise from the aquarium, pet, and baitfish trades, and development of improved legislation containing provisions for rapid response management of escapees is warranted in all states and provinces.
• 4. It is recommended that Canada amends the Fisheries Act to create the appropriate enabling legislation to monitor, assess risk, and deploy rapid response management of nonindigenous aquatic species, including fish that enter federal fresh and sea waters. Two recently‐introduced US Bills, S. 725 and H.R. 1350, with their explicit measures for early detection and fast action response, could, if passed into law, create provisions to control introduced nuisance species throughout North American waters. They would also create precedents for states and provinces that have most jurisdiction over aquaculture and trade in exotic fish to amend and align their laws in a complementary manner.

Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Simulated rainfall evaluation of revegetation/mulch erosion control in the Lake Tahoe basin: 2. Bare soil assessment

Slopes that have been disturbed through roadway, ski slope or other construction often produce more sediment than less disturbed sites. Reduction or elimination of sediment loading from such disturbed slopes to adjacent streams is critical in the Lake Tahoe basin. Here, use of a portable rainfall simulator (RS), described in the first paper of this series, is used to evaluate slope effects on erosion from bare volcanic and granitic soils (road cut and ski run sites) common in the basin in order to establish a basis upon which revegetation treatment comparisons can be made. Rainfall simulations (60 mm h⁻¹, approximating a 100‐year, 15‐minute storm) at each site included multiple replications of bare soil plots as well as some adjacent ‘native’, or relatively undisturbed soils below trees where available. Field measurements of time to runoff, infiltration, runoff, sediment discharge rates, and average sediment concentration were obtained. Laboratory measurements of particle‐size distributions using sieve and laser counting methods indicated that the granitic soils had larger grain sizes than the volcanic soils and that road cut soils of either type also had larger grain sizes than their ski run counterparts. Particle‐size‐distribution‐based estimates of saturated hydraulic conductivity were 5–10 times greater than RS‐determined steady infiltration rates. RS‐measured infiltration rates were similar, ranging from 33–50 mm h⁻¹ for disturbed volcanic soils and 33–60 mm h⁻¹ for disturbed granitic soils. RS‐measured runoff rates and sediment yields from the bare soils were significantly correlated with plot slope with the exception of volcanic road cuts due to the narrow range of road cut slopes encountered. Sediment yields from bare granitic soils at slopes of 28 to 78 per cent ranged from ∼1 to 12 g m⁻² mm⁻¹, respectively, while from bare volcanic soils at slopes of 22 to 61 per cent they ranged from ∼3 to 31 g m⁻² mm⁻¹, respectively. Surface roughness did not correlate with runoff or erosion parameters, perhaps also as a result of a relatively narrow range of roughness values. The volcanic ski run soils and both types of road cut soils exhibited nearly an order of magnitude greater sediment yield than that from the corresponding native, relatively undisturbed, sites. Similarly, the granitic ski run soils produced nearly four‐times greater sediment concentration than the undisturbed areas. A possible goal of restoration/erosion control efforts could be recreation of ‘native’‐like soil conditions. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Implications of climate change scenarios for soil erosion potential in the USA

Atmospheric general circulation models (GCMs) project that increasing atmospheric concentrations of CO2 and other greenhouse gases May, result in global changes in temperature and precipitation over the next 40-100 years. Equilibrium climate scenarios from four GCMs run under doubled CO2 conditions were examined for their effect on the climatic potential for sheet and rill erosion in the conterminous USA. Changes in the mean annual rainfall factor (R) in the Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE) were calculated for each cropland, pastureland and rangeland sample point in the 1987 National Resources Inventory. Projected annual precipitation changes were assumed to be from differences in either storm frequency or storm intensity. With all other USLE factors held constant these changes in R translated to changes in the sheet and rill erosion national average of +2 to +16 per cent in croplands, -2 to +10 per cent in pasturelands and -5 to +22 per cent in rangelands under the eight scenarios. Land with erosion rates above the soil loss tolerance (T) level and land classified as highly erodible (eredibility index >8) also increased slightly. the results varied from model to model, region to region and depended on the assumption of frequency versus intensity changes. These results show the range of sensitivity of soil erosion potential by water under projected climate change scenarios. However, actual changes in soil erosion could be mitigated by alterations in cropping patterns and other management practices, or possibly by increased crop growth and residue production under higher atmospheric CO2 concentrations.     

美国康涅狄格州雪茄烟叶生产技术概况

因得天独厚的地理优势，美国康涅狄格州的康涅狄格河谷成为了世界上少有的优质雪茄烟叶产地，经过几百年的技术积累与沉淀，康涅狄格州雪茄烟叶因其独特的内在品质和完美的外在品质，成为国际雪茄烟叶市场上的主要原料之一，在各大雪茄品牌中都有使用。文章从雪茄烟叶生产历史、主要产区特点、主栽品种、生产技术以及分级和销售几个方面介绍了美国康涅狄格州雪茄生产的发展概况，以期为中式雪茄原料的发展提供一些参考。