United States Environmental Protection Agency	Office of Research and Development

National Exposure Research Laboratory
Research Abstract

Government Performance Results Act (GPRA) Goal 4.5.2
Annual Performance Measure 248

Significant Research Findings:

Population Models for Stream Fish Response to Habitat and
Hydrologic Alteration: the CVI Watershed Tool

Scientific	Under the Clean Water Act, the EPA is involved with protecting, restoring, and

Problem and	maintaining the biological integrity of the nation's streams. Often, local and

Policy Issues	regional watershed groups are also committed to such activities. One such group

in the Mid-Atlantic Highlands (MAH) region of the eastern United States is the
Canaan Valley Institute (CVI), whose goal is to develop and implement solutions
to restore damaged areas and protect aquatic systems in the MAH. To achieve this
goal, they require sound science that combines theory, detailed knowledge,
monitoring and modeling. EPA NERL ERD is helping CVI in this endeavor by
providing science and tools to address environmental problems associated with
aquatic systems in the MAH. This direct assistance of the client allows them to
better manage land and development in their region, through the planning and
prioritizing conservation and restoration activities in the watershed.

To assist CVI with its goal to develop and implement solutions to restore damaged
areas and protect aquatic systems in the MAH, the EPA NERL ERD has
developed an interactive watershed toolkit. In this toolkit, habitat quality and
aquatic ecosystem response models have been linked to a regional hydrologic
model that simulates habitat characteristics (e.g., water depth, current velocity and
water temperature) that determine the survival, reproduction, and recruitment of
fish and aquatic invertebrates. This toolkit contains four tools: 1) a Hydrologic
Tool for predicting hydrologic inputs to streams; 2) a Clustering Tool for the
prediction of fundamental fish assemblages in the Mid-Atlantic Highlands, 3) a
Habitat Suitability tool, to relate habitat measures to the suitability of streams for
specific fish species, and 4) the BASS (Bioaccumulation and Aquatic Systems
Simulator) model tool, a generalized aquatic ecosystem simulator to examine fish
community dynamics over time. The toolkit also provides a tutorial for the user to
examine scenarios for fish stocking and harvest, and stream restoration. Peer
review of this tool consists of an initial academic review of the approach, and a
review by CVI for the relevance of the toolkit to their goal.

The CVI Watershed Tool developed by EPA NERL ERD is a stream-based
decision support tool that is object-oriented in design and easily maintained. To
facilitate the use and application of the models within the CVI Watershed Tool,
graphical user interfaces (GUI), supporting databases, and libraries of management
scenarios were developed. Stakeholders interact with the GUI to frame the
environmental problem by: selecting valued endpoints of concern and analytical

Research
Approach

Results and
Impact


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methods, accessing data and models to establish the causal relationships between
management actions and changes in endpoint status/trend, and performing multiple
model executions and visualizations of projected outcomes to span the range of
various management scenarios that might be taken so that associated costs and
benefits can be evaluated. For example, with this Tool, stakeholders can examine
the effects of a Best Management Practice (BMP) on the aquatic community: the
stakeholder can select from three present BMP scenarios, examine how the BMP
changes instream habitat characteristics and in turn how these habitat
characteristics affect individual fish species, and finally, can elect to run a
simulation of the stream ecosystem in order to see how the dynamics of fish
species and other components of the ecosystem change through time as a result of
the BMP application.

Research	The ERD research team worked together with the CVI clients to develop this

Collaboration and project. Other collaborators include EPA Region 3, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Research	Service, and Partners in Wildlife.

Products

Examples of recent publications from this study include:

Cyterski, M., R. Parmar, C. Barber, B. Rashleigh, J. Johnston, and K. Wolfe. "Prediction of
Fundamental Assemblages in Mid-Atlantic Fish Communities " Presented at the EPA Science
Forum, Washington, DC. June, 2004.

Future Research A Phase-II level version of the CVI Watershed Tool is currently under

development. The Phase-II version will allow users to enter any stream of interest
within the region, and apply the Hydrology, Clustering, Habitat Suitability, and
Community Dynamics Models to that stream. A "wizard" function is being
developed to guide users more easily through the use and application of the
models. Additional relevant research is underway to further develop the CVI
Watershed Tool, including: an improvement of the BMP applications and
efficiencies, which will build on work being conducted at EPA NRMRL; the
analysis of additional data available from the region to test the predictive abilities
of existing models in the tool; and more complex formulations for BASS stocking
and harvesting functions, in order to represent more realistically the various efforts
that are undertaken by states in the MAH region.

Contacts for	Questions and inquiries can be directed to:

Additional	Brenda Rashleigh, Ph.D.

Information	u.S. EPA, Office of Research and Development

National Exposure Research Laboratory
960 College Station Road
Athens, GA 30605
Phone: 706/355-8148
E-mail: rashleigh.brenda@epa.gov

Funding for this project was through the U.S. EPA's Office of Research and
Development, National Exposure Research Laboratory, and the work was
conducted by the Ecosystems Research Division.


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