Consumptive water use from riparian evapotranspiration is a large component of many semiarid basins’ groundwater budgets — comparable in magnitude to mountain front recharge and surface water discharge. In most long-term groundwater studies the amount of water used by phreatophytes is estimated by empirical formulae and extrapolation of measurements taken elsewhere. These approaches are problem...

Mesquites (Prosopis spp.) are thorny leguminous shrubs or trees native to Southwest Asia, Africa, and predominantly North and South America. Introduced as beneficial plants to India, Pakistan, South Africa, Egypt, Kuwait, Australia, U.S.A. (Hawaii), and Brazil, some Prosopis species have become invasive in some of these countries. Mechanical and chemical control methods implemented in the U.S.A...

Continuously varying traits such as body size or gene expression level evolve during the history of species or gene lineages. To test hypotheses about the evolution of such traits, the maximum likelihood (ML) method is often used. Here we introduce CoMET (Continuous-character Model Evaluation and Testing), which is module for Mesquite that automates likelihood computations for nine different mo...

Abstract The Chihuahuan desert ecosystem has experienced a decrease in black grama (Bouteloua eriopoda), perennial grass species with high ecological value, alongside subsequent increase mesquite (Prosopis glandulosa). This trend is thought to be due several management- and environment-related factors. We compared diet selection of heritage Raramuri Criollo (RC) vs. Angus-X-Hereford (AH) cattle...

Near surface (i.e., camera) and satellite remote sensing metrics have become widely used indicators of plant growing seasons. While robust linkages have been established between field metrics and ecosystem exchange in many land cover types, assessment of how well remotely-derived season start and end dates depict field conditions in arid ecosystems remain unknown. We evaluated the correspondenc...

Understanding landscape conversion is vital for assessing the impacts of ecological and anthropogenic disturbances at regional and global scales. Since rangelands cover nearly half of the global land surface, and because a large part of rangelands is located in semi-arid ecosystems, they serve as critical land cover types for determining regional biodiversity, global biogeochemical cycles, and ...

Fou r coprolite s were exceveted with Burial S at Ventena Cave . a part ially mummified five-year-old child. Two coprolites were p1Ulular and dark. in cokx and two were fibrous and light in color . The coprolisn are remains of the child 's intestinal contents and were submitted for dietary andparasitological anal ysis. No parasites were found. The fibrous coprolites proved to be remains of high...