Skip to main content

National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis

Project Description

The availability of fresh water to meet the demands of a growing human population and simultaneously ensure ecosystem integrity has emerged as one of the world’s primary resource issues (Postel and Richter, 2003; Alcamo et al. 2008). Water management for people and ecosystems remains an open scientific question (Acreman and Dunbar 2004, Arthington et al.2006) that is being answered with experimental approaches to releasing water from dams and other control structures for ecological benefits in rivers, floodplains, and estuaries. Flow experiments present an unrivaled opportunity to evaluate large-scale experimental approaches in ecosystem management because of shared scientific approaches. We propose bringing scientists together in a working group to integrate the site-specific results of large-scale flow experiments and synthesize general lessons to guide future large-scale experiments and ecosystem management in other places. We will: 1) test the limits of extrapolation across scales and integration across sites in drawing general conclusions about ecological responses to flow experiments; 2) identify criteria for attributing immediate, direct responses and long-term changes in the status of populations, communities, and ecosystems to experimental manipulation; and 3) develop innovative approaches that facilitate the ransfer of knowledge from large-scale experiments to broader applications.
Working Group Participants

Principal Investigator(s)

Christopher P. Konrad, Julian D. Olden

Project Dates

Start: January 1, 2009

End: December 31, 2010

completed

Participants

Erin Bray
University of California, Santa Barbara
Joan Browder
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
Mary Freeman
University of Georgia
Keith B. Gido
Kansas State University
Nina P. Hemphill
Trinity River Restoration Program
Paul S. Higgins
BC Hydro
Francine Hughes
Anglia Ruskin University
Mark J. Kennard
Griffith University
Christopher P. Konrad
US Geological Survey (USGS)
Josh Korman
Ecometric Research
David Lytle
Oregon State University
Laura E. McMullen
Oregon State University
Theodore Melis
US Geological Survey (USGS)
Meryl Mims
University of Washington
Julian D. Olden
University of Washington
Mark Pyron
Ball State University
Christopher T. Robinson
Eawag Aquatic Research
John C. Schmidt
Utah State University
John G. Williams
NOAA, Northwest Fisheries Science Center

Products

  1. Presentations / 2010

    Global review of large-scale flow experiments

  2. Presentations / 2010

    Global review of large-scale flow experiments

  3. Journal Article / 2011

    Large-scale flow experiments for managing river systems

  4. Journal Article / 2014

    Are large-scale flow experiments informing the science and management of freshwater ecosystems?

Are you part of a working group or visiting NCEAS for another opportunity? Check out our page of resources for you.

Learn More