Missouri River Valley Research Articles

Diverging climate response of corn yield and carbon use efficiency across the U.S.

In this paper, we developed an open-source package to analyze the overall trend and responses of both carbon use efficiency (CUE) and corn yield to climate factors for the contiguous United States. Our algorithm enables automatic retrieval of remote sensing data through the Google Earth Engine (GEE) and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) agricultural production data at the county level through application programming interface (API). Firstly, we integrated satellite products of net primary productivity and gross primary productivity based on the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) sensor, and climatic variables from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. Secondly, we calculated CUE and commonly used climate metrics. Thirdly, we investigated the spatial heterogeneity of these variables. We applied a random forest algorithm to identify the key climate drivers of CUE and crop yield, and estimated the responses of CUE and yield to climate variability using the spatial moving window regression across the U.S. Our results show that growing degree days (GDD) has the highest predictive power for both CUE and yield, while extreme degree days (EDD) is the least important explanatory variable. Moreover, we observed that in most areas of the U.S., yield increases or stays the same with higher GDD and precipitation. However, CUE decreases with higher GDD in the north and shows more mixed and fragmented interactions in the south. Notably, there are some exceptions where yield is negatively correlated with precipitation in the Missouri and Mississippi River Valleys. As global warming continues, we anticipate a decrease in CUE throughout the vast northern part of the country, despite the possibility of yield remaining stable or increasing.

Effigy mounds and rock art of midcontinental North America: Shared iconography, shared stories

The effigy mounds of the Upper Midwest and the Ohio Valley long have been regarded as distinct and independent cultural developments. A review of effigy mound iconography in both regions reveals similarities suggesting that they are elements of a shared cultural tradition. Comparisons with rock art imagery from the Upper Midwest and Missouri, the inferred centers of this artistic and ceremonial florescence, reveal co-occurrences of specific motifs and provide additional evidence of cultural connections among the Late Woodland to early Late Precontact societies inhabiting the lower Missouri, Mississippi, and Ohio river valleys. Oral traditions of Native American groups with documented connections to these regions allow this rich corpus of imagery to be understood as key episodes in their genesis stories.

Seeing red: an analysis of archeological hematite in east central Missouri

Ceramic and chert artifacts constitute the main evidence for understanding trade and cultural dynamics in prehistoric eastern Missouri. But despite its relative ubiquity, hematite, most often characterized as ochre, has rarely been considered for such research. To partially fill the void, neutron activation analysis (NAA) was utilized to analyze collections of hematite artifacts excavated from the Truman Road Site (n = 31) and other nearby sites (n = 7) in the lower Missouri River valley. Our results indicate no significant temporal or spatial patterning of its usage or acquisition. Similarly, low correlation exists between the chemistry and artifact type. Furthermore, the assemblage is compositionally distinct from previously analyzed source samples from elsewhere in Missouri. Therefore, the origin of the artifacts remains undetermined. Although they could not be linked to a single acquisition locale, the results suggest at least two separate, although possibly related, sources. Overall, this study serves to increase our understanding of the characterization and diversity of hematite and its usage in prehistoric Missouri.

A CASE OF LARGE MEDIASTINAL MASS SECONDARY TO HISTOPLASMOSIS

SESSION TITLE: Chest Infections 2 SESSION TYPE: Med Student/Res Case Rep Postr PRESENTED ON: 10/09/2018 01:15 PM - 02:15 PM INTRODUCTION: The differential diagnosis for anterior mediastinal masses classically includes lymphomas and neoplasms of thymus, thyroid, and germ cell origins. Mycotic etiologies such as Histoplasma capsulatum are rare in immunocompetent populations. The following is a pediatric case of a large anterior mediastinal mass secondary to histoplasmosis in an immunocompetent patient. CASE PRESENTATION: A 7-year-old boy with a past medical history of asthma was transferred to the pediatric hematology/oncology service from an outside hospital for evaluation of a paratracheal mass incidentally noted on chest radiograph after presenting with vague abdominal pain, weight loss, and a fever of 38°C.Chest CT revealed calcified pulmonary nodules in the right upper lobe and a 3.1 x 2.7 x 3.7 cm mass with areas of calcification at the confluence of the brachiocephalic veins. Initial workup was targeted towards lymphoma and germ cell neoplasm, but mycotic etiologies were also screened for with serum Cryptococcus antigen and Histoplasma antibody titers that were weakly positive at 1:20 and 1:32 respectively. An M band was present for Histoplasma. The patient had no recent travel to endemic areas, exposure to soil with bird or bat guano, or history of recurrent infections.The mass’s location was not amenable to minimally invasive biopsy. Consequently, pediatric surgery performed a thoracotomy with excisional biopsy of the mass and a right upper lobe wedge resection of the lung nodules. The mass was noted to have caseous drainage upon removal, and intraoperative frozen sections were not concerning for malignancy. Final pathology of the mass and pulmonary nodules revealed lymph node and lung tissue respectively with necrotizing granulomatous inflammation and fungal yeast forms. The fungal stains were compatible with H. capsulatum. Repeat serum Cryptococcus antigen and fungal cultures were negative. He was started on long-term oral itraconazole for 12 weeks. Other than intermittent low fevers, the remainder of hospital course was uneventful. DISCUSSION: H. capsulatum is endemic to the Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio river valleys and is also commonly found in other temperate climates around the world. The dimorphic fungus preferably grows in soil containing bird or bat guano. Disruption of the soil can lead to inhalation of the mold form’s conidia. An overwhelming majority of pulmonary infections are entirely asymptomatic in immunocompetent patients although <1% of those affected can develop fever, malaise, headache, fatigue, and dry cough which are typically self-limiting. Rarely, as with this case, granulomatous mediastinitis can occur where mediastinal lymph nodes undergo massive enlargement and caseous necrosis. CONCLUSIONS: This process is insidious and the mass can be confused for more common etiologies such as lymphoma in pediatric patients, so it is important to consider mycotic etiologies even in non-endemic areas. Reference #1: Kauffman CA. Histoplasmosis: a clinical and laboratory update. Clin Microbiol Rev. 2007 Jan;20(1):115-32. Reference #2: Shersher DD, Hong E, Breard J, Warren WH, Liptay MJ. Anterior mediastinal mass secondary to histoplasmosis. Ann Thorac Surg. 2012 Jan;93(1):e9-10. DISCLOSURES: No relevant relationships by Narayana Gowda, source=Web Response no disclosure on file for Supriya Gupta; No relevant relationships by jayanth keshavamurthy, source=Web Response No relevant relationships by Daniel Kleven, source=Admin input No relevant relationships by Ivan Morales, source=Web Response no disclosure on file for Gilberto Sostre

Geomorphic History of the Beaver Creek Drainage Basin as Determined from Topographic Map Evidence: Eastern Montana and Western North Dakota, USA

The Beaver Creek drainage basin is located along the North Dakota-Montana border slightly to the south of a recognized continental ice sheet margin and immediately to the east of the deep northeast-oriented Yellowstone River valley with Beaver Creek flowing in a north and northeast direction to join the north-oriented Little Missouri River. The Beaver Creek drainage basin originates on an escarpment-surrounded upland and its erosional history was determined by analyzing detailed topographic maps aided by previously made field observations that showed coarse-grained and distinctive alluvium had been transported in an east direction across the Beaver Creek drainage basin and across what is now the deep Little Missouri River valley to sediments making up southwest North Dakota high points containing both the distinctive alluvium and Oligocene age fossils. Drainage divides surrounding the Beaver Creek drainage basin show numerous divide crossings (or notches) linking northwest-oriented Yellowstone River tributary valleys with east-oriented Beaver Creek tributary valleys and west- or northwest-oriented Beaver Creek tributary valleys with southeast- or east-oriented Little Missouri River tributary valleys and suggest the Beaver Creek valley eroded headward across a large-scale flood formed anastomosing channel complex. Buttes located just to the east of the Beaver Creek-Little Missouri River drainage divide suggest the east-oriented water removed as much as 150 meters, or more, of Beaver Creek drainage basin bedrock, and even greater amounts of bedrock from regions to the south of the Beaver Creek drainage basin. Topographic map evidence and routes traveled by the distinctive alluvium suggest a continental ice sheet blocked a large and high-level northeast-oriented river and diverted at least some of the water along the ice sheet margin with the east-oriented floodwaters being captured in a progressive sequence by headward erosion of the Little Missouri River, Beaver Creek, and Yellowstone River valleys (in that order).

Interpreting Topographic Map Evidence Related to Northeast Nebraska Barbed Tributaries and Drainage Routes, USA

Northeast Nebraska barbed tributaries include north-oriented streams flowing to the south-oriented Missouri River and south-oriented streams flowing to the north-oriented Missouri River tributaries. Detailed topographic maps were used to determine how these northeast Nebraska drainage routes originated. A giant south-oriented supra-glacial melt water river is interpreted to have sliced an ice-walled and bedrock-floored canyon into a decaying ice sheet’s surface where eastern South Dakota’s east-facing Missouri Escarpment and west-facing Prairie Coteau escarpment are now located and to have flowed from that canyon’s mouth across northeast Nebraska while South Dakota’s north-facing Pine Ridge Escarpment is interpreted to be the south wall of a large east-oriented valley that was eroded headward across immense southeast-oriented ice-marginal melt water floods which had originally flowed across northeast Nebraska. Prior to Missouri River valley headward erosion these two different immense melt water floods created and then flowed across a low relief and low gradient northeast Nebraska topographic surface. Present day northeast Nebraska topography developed when the deep south-oriented Missouri River valley and its south-oriented tributary valleys eroded headward into this low relief and low gradient topographic surface. As the deep Missouri River valley eroded headward it beheaded shallow south-oriented flood flow channels supplying water to new and actively eroding south-oriented Missouri River tributary valleys and water on north ends of the beheaded channels reversed flow direction to move toward the much deeper Missouri River valley. Water still moving in south directions adjacent to these reversed flow channels was then captured leading to development of south-oriented tributaries to the north-oriented streams.

Using Map Interpretation Techniques for Relative Dating to Determine a Western North Dakota and South Dakota Drainage Basin Formation Sequence, Missouri River Drainage Basin, USA

Map interpretation techniques are used to determine the sequence in which western North and South Dakota erosion events occurred. The map interpretation techniques apply the principle of cross cutting relationships by studying asymmetric drainage divides, barbed tributaries, elbows of capture, drainage divide crossings, abandoned headcuts, and similar features on detailed topographic maps to determine the sequence in which drainage basins and valleys within those drainage basins formed. Detailed topographic maps covering western North and South Dakota show numerous closely spaced divide crossings along drainage divides separating the White, Bad, Cheyenne, Moreau, Grand, Cannonball, Heart, Knife, and Little Missouri Rivers. These divide crossings often form links between opposing northwest- and southeast-oriented tributary stream valleys and provide evidence of multiple closely spaced southeast-oriented flow channels that existed prior to formation of the deeper present day east-, northeast-, and north-oriented river valleys. Numerous barbed tributaries in the form of northwest-oriented tributaries to east- and northeast-oriented rivers (and major tributaries to the mentioned rivers) and southeast-oriented tributaries to the northeast- and north-oriented rivers (and tributaries to the mentioned rivers) suggest the deeper river (and tributary) valleys eroded headward across the southeast-oriented flow channels. Asymmetric drainage divides, barbed tributaries, abandoned headcuts, and elbows of capture demonstrate the southeast-oriented flow, which was most likely in the form of floods of ice-marginal melt water moving between the Black Hills uplift and a continental ice sheet’s southwest margin, was captured in sequence by headward erosion of the White, Bad, Cheyenne, Moreau, Grand, Cannonball, Heart, Knife, and Little Missouri River valleys. This erosion event sequence and its probable cause, determined from the map evidence, has major implications related to what is commonly considered to have been a much larger pre-glacial Bell River system, which included segments of each of the studied river valleys, and for all geologic and glacial history interpretations based on a Bell River system pre-glacial age interpretation.

Origin of Little Missouri River - South Fork Grand River and nearby Drainage Divides in Harding County, South Dakota and Adjacent Eastern Montana, USA

Barbed tributaries flowing in southeast directions, an asymmetric drainage divide with both the South Fork Grand River and the North Fork Moreau River, and the Jump-off escarpment-surrounded basin (interpreted here to be a large abandoned headcut) are examples of topographic map evidence suggesting the north oriented Little Missouri River valley eroded headward across a large southeast oriented anastomosing complex of ice-marginal melt water flood flow channels that once crossed Harding County, South Dakota. Additional evidence includes southeast oriented tributaries to the northeast oriented South Fork Grand River and multiple divide crossings (e.g. through valleys and wind gaps) on the Boxelder Creek-Little Missouri River divide (in eastern Montana and west of the Little Missouri River) and suggests deep regional erosion occurred as the north oriented Little Missouri River valley eroded headward into and across the region. Harding County is located south and west of the southwest limit of coarse-grained glacial erratic material and ice-marginal melt water flow routes logically should have crossed it. Deep melt water erosion of Harding County and adjacent eastern Montana regions to the west is not consistent with many previous drainage history and glacial history interpretations, but is consistent with deep erosion by continental ice sheets.

Southern Crucible: The Making of an American Region by William A. Link

Reviewed by: Southern Crucible: The Making of an American Region by William A. Link Aaron Astor Southern Crucible: The Making of an American Region. By William A. Link. (New York and other cities: Oxford University Press, 2015. Pp. xx, 585, plus index. $49.95, ISBN 978-0-19-976360-3.) For college instructors seeking a comprehensive narrative text capturing the entirety of southern history, William A. Link’s Southern Crucible: The Making of an American Region serves as the finest survey produced to date. The breadth of coverage, analytical depth, historiographical relevance, and lucid but concise prose make for a superb volume accessible to undergraduates of all levels as well as to general readers. Southern Crucible successfully integrates the social, political, cultural, and economic history of the South and deftly places the region within its national context. Released as either two separate volumes divided chronologically at the end of Reconstruction, or as in the case under review, a combined and complete text, Southern Crucible takes readers from before European contact to the present. Beginning with a discussion of the demographic origins and environmental context of human settlement in the South, Link incorporates both Native American civilizations as well as Spanish and French coastal settlements in places that became part of the American South. From there the story proceeds with the development of a slave plantation system and British (and British-descended) settlers forcibly expanding that system into the Old Southwest. Taking in much of the latest scholarship on the Civil War, [End Page 241] emancipation, and Reconstruction, Link provides as good a depiction of the war experience as any to be found in a survey text. The real strength of the book lies in the second half, as Link’s expertise in the transformation of the New South shines through. The emergence of the Jim Crow system, continued impoverishment of the region, textile-based industrialization, and mass migration characterize the story from the 1880s to the 1920s. Chapters on the mid-twentieth century incorporate technological and social changes associated with World War II as the South simultaneously experienced the black freedom movement and the growth of Sun Belt suburbs. Link concludes by remarking how the modern South has remade America as a whole by assuming a greater degree of cultural, economic, and political power than at any other time since the Civil War. If there is a single, overarching argument driving the narrative it is the centrality of race and the “clash of identities” that gave shape to the plantation system and to the post–Civil War social order (p. xii). Link is careful to identify the instability of racial ideology, however, especially when emancipation, the Populist movement, the Great Depression, and the collapse of legal segregation briefly imperiled the class structure. But the long scope of coverage, ranging from the rise, sustenance, and decline of the plantation system to the adjustments to post–World War II modernity, underscores the persistence of race as a marker of social and political power in the South, even more than in the rest of the country. The transformation of southern evangelicalism receives less attention than expected. To be sure, Link discusses the early proliferation of evangelical revivalism in the early-nineteenth-century South, the rise of fundamentalism after World War I, and the ascendancy of the Christian Right in the 1980s. But these developments appear more as episodic interjections in the larger course of southern history than they do as markers of southern identity over time. Geographic coverage of the South is a bit uneven. Spanish and French cultural influences along the Gulf Coast garner extensive and welcome treatment, while southern Appalachia and the Ohio and Missouri River Valleys barely intrude on the narrative. Considering how often Appalachia and the border South exemplified the flashpoints of slavery’s extension, labor struggle, the limits of urbanization, and environmental destruction, the narrative would have been enriched by more thorough coverage of those regions. The book occasionally suffers from distracting editing errors that could easily confuse undergraduates relying on Southern Crucible as a course text. The sacking of Lawrence, Kansas, for example, is described as occurring two months after the Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) decision...

Origin of Mountain Passes across Continental Divide Segments Surrounding the Southwest Montana Big Hole and Beaverhead River Drainage Basins, USA

The evolution of southwest Montana’s Big Hole and Beaverhead River drainage basins is determined from topographic map evidence related to mountain passes crossing what are today high altitude drainage divides including North America’s east-west Continental Divide. Map evidence, such as orientations of valleys leading away from mountain passes (and saddles) and barbed tributaries found along the downstream drainage routes, is used to reconstruct flow directions of streams and rivers that once crossed the present-day high mountain divides. Large south-oriented anastomosing complexes of diverging and converging channels are interpreted to have eroded what are today closely spaced passes and saddles now notched into high mountain ridges. Water in those south-oriented channels is interpreted to have flowed across emerging mountains and subsiding basins. Headward erosion of deeper southeast-oriented valleys, assisted by crustal warping, concentrated south-oriented water in fewer and deeper valleys as the water flowed from southwest Montana into what are today Idaho and the Snake River drainage basin. Headward erosion of the Big Hole River valley between the emerging Anaconda and Pioneer Mountains, also assisted by crustal warping, reversed all Big Hole Basin drainage so as to create the north-, east-, and south-oriented Big Hole River drainage route. A final and even more major reversal of flow in the present-day north-oriented Montana Missouri River valley, with the assistance of additional crustal warping, next ended all remaining flow to Idaho and the Snake River drainage basin and reversed and captured all drainage in the present-day north-oriented Big Hole, Beaverhead, and Red Rock River drainage basins. The observed map evidence indicates that prior to the final flow reversal events, large volumes of south-oriented water flowed across southwest Montana’s Big Hole and Beaverhead River drainage basins.

Intramedullary Spinal Cord Compression Caused by Histoplasma capsulatum: A Case Report and Meta-Analysis

Nine cases of intramedullar histoplasmosis have been published in the literature. In six cases, spinal cord compression was associated with brain localization or with contex of disseminated histoplasmosis. The authors are reporting here the third isolated spinal cord compression in immunocompetent 42-year-old African-rabbits breeder, a woman. This case was successfully managed with surgical removal of the lesion associated to itraconazole during 8 months. Intramedullar lesion because of the Histoplasma capsulatum was necrosis granulomatous localized at spinal conus. In conclusion, according to literature data the most frequent spinal cord compression caused by histoplasmosis capsulatum. General risk factors include residence in endemic areas as well as immunosuppression. Endemic areas include Africa, Australia, parts of Eastern Asia, and America (Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio River valleys). Initial localization was cutaneous. Two histopathological forms reported are abscess and necrotizing granuloma. Management is mainly based on antifungus like itraconazole. Surgery is only necessary for the etiology diagnosis.

What's driving adoption of in‐season nitrogen application?

What's driving adoption of in‐season nitrogen application?

Jackson’s Sword: The Army Officer Corps on the American Frontier, 1810–1821 by Samuel J. Watson (review)

Reviewed by: Jackson’s Sword: The Army Officer Corps on the American Frontier, 1810–1821 by Samuel J. Watson Robert Wooster Jackson’s Sword: The Army Officer Corps on the American Frontier, 1810–1821. By Samuel J. Watson. (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2012. Pp. 480. Illustrations, maps, appendices, notes, bibliography, index.) Note regarding changes to the book reviews section: The publishing world is undergoing a revolution in product delivery that no longer restricts the choice in book form to cloth or paperback. Electronic and print editions in various formats each require a separate ISBN, prices vary on a frequent basis, and there are increasing opportunities for self-publication that defy traditional bibliographical organization. Consequently, with this issue the editorial board of the Southwestern Historical Quarterly has decided to streamline the headers that introduce book reviews by removing ISBN, format, and pricing information. The rest of the publication data will be provided based on the print copies from which reviews are done, and in those cases where a book appears in electronic format, the publisher’s listing will be employed. We hope the change does not produce too much inconvenience. Over the past decade, Samuel J. Watson has in a series of articles and book chapters established himself as a leading authority on the antebellum United States Army. With the publication of Jackson’s Sword, the first of two volumes on army officers and American life between the War of 1812 and the U.S.-Mexico War, Watson moves to the head of the class. Based upon prodigious research in both primary and secondary sources (the 285 pages of text and appendices are complemented by 13 pages of appendices, 93 pages of notes, and 39 pages of bibliography), he demonstrates that the army and its officers played a major role not only in projecting U. S. influence into the Gulf Borderlands and the Great Plains, but in asserting the power of an active national state throughout the southern and western frontiers. Watson’s complex narrative begins in the South, where army officers aggressively pushed territorial expansion. Major General Andrew Jackson, commander of the Southern Division from 1815–21, set the tone with his self-confidence and willingness to blatantly disregard constitutional provisions for representative government. Buoyed by the popular desire for expansion and convinced that national security could only be guaranteed by expelling Indian and European rivals and eliminating any refuges for escaped slaves, Jackson and his subordinates exploited the frequent absence of effective civilian leadership in the War Department, difficulties of long-distance communication, and ill-defined international boundaries to press claims to Louisiana, Texas, and even Cuba. Florida topped the list, and consistent with President James Monroe’s well-known support for expansion, Jackson’s 1818 invasion of Spanish Florida seems to Watson an almost natural culmination of the era. With Florida secured, attitudes within and without the army changed. As Watson explains, Jackson’s high-handed actions had caused enormous political turmoil, and his resignation removed the most formidable champion of southern expansion from the army’s ranks. Other veterans of the War of 1812 did the same, often to live in the very southern borderlands their actions had secured for the United States. In addition, the strategic threats posed by Mexican Texas or by the Indians of the upper Missouri River valley seemed minimal so the nonstate actors the army had once tolerated (and often supported) now seemed to threaten an orderly society. To Watson, however, the major change stemmed from the growing sense of accountability, subordination, and responsibility of army officers fostered by their shared experiences at the United States Military Academy, whose graduates after 1821 enjoyed a near-monopoly among new appointments. National, rather than sectional, interests now drove the typical officer; although Congress refused to devote many financial resources to the standing army, its officers nonetheless represented an extremely useful—and to Watson largely effective—agent of the central state which had no other means by which it might enforce national sovereignty or implement national policy. “Indeed,” Watson concludes, “a dependent standing army beholden to the nation-state perfectly suited civilian executive branch officials, whatever their party or ideological perspective” (268). This is...

Shifting seasonality and increasing frequency of precipitation in wet and dry seasons across the U.S.

AbstractWater management, agriculture, and ecological systems are sensitive to the frequency and timing of precipitation. Here we document historical trends in these characteristics for station‐specific wet and dry seasons over the U.S. from 1930 to 2009. Simulations based on Markovian precipitation occurrence models are used as a null against which to test observed trends without resorting to area averaging. Most regions display increases in precipitation frequency during both wet and dry seasons accompanied by a decrease in length of dry spells. Prominent increases (decreases) occur over the Central and Great Plains during the dry season. An exception is the Atlantic Plains, which experienced a decrease in frequency and an increase in dry spell length, especially during the wet season. Regionally consistent trends in the timing of wet and dry seasons are also evident, particularly over the Ohio (Missouri) River valleys where the dry season now arrives up to 2–3 weeks earlier (later).

Evaluating a SAR TT-OSL protocol for dating fine-grained quartz within Late Pleistocene loess deposits in the Missouri and Mississippi river valleys, United States

The Mississippi and Missouri river valleys in the midcontinental United States contain extensive loess-paleosol sequences that are used to constrain the timing of expansion and retreat of the Laurentide Ice Sheet. Previous studies have been unsuccessful in producing finite ages for sediments older than ∼150 ka due to saturation of luminescence emissions. The thermally transferred optically stimulated luminescence (TT-OSL) dating technique is tested on the fine-grained (4–11 μm) quartz fraction of these loess deposits because the TT-OSL signal has been shown to grow with high (kGy) radiation doses. The TT-OSL signal continued to increase with radiation dose above 900 Gy. The optical and thermal stabilities of this TT-OSL signal are evaluated. Equivalent dose values are highly sensitive to preheat temperatures. Recycling ratios, zero-dose response values, and dose recovery tests all yield acceptable values for samples with burial doses >∼200 Gy. The apparent TT-OSL ages for the Roxana Silt (∼52–63 ka), Teneriffe Silt (∼66 ka), and Loveland Silt (∼133–192 ka) agree at 1σ level with previously published TL and IRSL ages derived from the same samples. For the oldest unit, the Crowley's Ridge Silt, TT-OSL ages (∼167–200 ka) are younger than IRSL or TL ages by ∼20%. This is interpreted as underestimation related to TT-OSL signal contamination, which can be avoided by isolating the fast component of the TT-OSL. Preliminary fast component TT-OSL ages for the Crowley's Ridge Silt (∼197–241 ka) favor deposition during marine oxygen-isotope stage (MIS) 7 or 8, contrary to a previous inference of a MIS 12 deposition.

Movements of white‐tailed deer in riparian habitat: Implications for infectious diseases

AbstractMovements of male white‐tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) are of great concern with respect to spread of chronic wasting disease (CWD) across landscapes because most yearlings males disperse and adult males have higher prevalence of CWD than do females and younger deer. We radiocollared and monitored 85 male white‐tailed deer in the middle Missouri River Valley of eastern Nebraska and western Iowa, USA from 2004 to 2008. Average size (±SE) of fixed‐kernel annual home ranges (95%) and core areas (50%) for resident deer were 449 (±32) ha and 99 (±7) ha, respectively. Resident deer exhibited a high‐degree of fidelity to their home ranges. Mean overlap between consecutive annual home ranges and core areas was 81% and 74%, respectively. Average dispersal distance was 17.7 ± 4.5 km (range = 3–121 km) for 22 radio‐marked and 6 ear‐tagged yearlings. Mean spring dispersal distance (25 km) was 150% greater than fall (10 km). Dispersal direction from Desoto National Wildlife Refuge (DNWR) was bimodal on a northwest to southeast axis that followed the Missouri River corridor. Of 22 yearlings that dispersed, 18 (82%) established adult home ranges within the river valley. Dispersal movements of yearling males represent the greatest risk for rapid spread of diseases from infected source populations. Disease management efforts in riparian habitats should target male fawns and yearling males for removal in areas within or immediately adjacent to river corridors. © 2011 The Wildlife Society.

Age, genesis, and paleoclimatic interpretation of the Sangamon/Loveland complex in the Lower Mississippi Valley, U.S.A.

For more than a century, the Sangamon paleosol (the Sangamon) has been an integral part of geologic and pedologic investigations in the central United States, including the Upper Mississippi and Lower Missouri River Valleys. Compositional, pedologic, micromorphologic, stratigraphic, and age data indicate that the prominent reddish paleosol developed in silt-rich deposits of the Lower Mississippi Valley, from southernmost Illinois to northwestern Mississippi, represents multiple periods of soil formation, and is wholly or in part time equivalent to the Sangamon of the central United States. Thermoluminescence data, for localities where the Sangamon developed in loess, indicate that the primary period of loess deposition was from 190 to 130 ka (oxygen isotope stage, OIS6), that loess deposition continued intermittently from 130 to 74 ka (OIS5), and that deposition was wholly or in part coeval with Loveland loess deposition in the central United States. Beryllium-10, chemical, and pedologic data indicate that in the Lower Mississippi Valley: (1) the Sangamon represents a minimum time period of 60–80 k.y.; (2) there were at least two periods of soil formation, ca. 130–90 ka and 74–58 ka (OIS4); and (3) rates of weathering and pedogenesis equaled or exceeded the net loess-accumulation rate until at least 46 ka (OIS3) and resulted in development of a paleosol in the overlying basal Roxana Silt. Along a N-S transect from southern Illinois to western Mississippi, Sangamon macroscopic characteristics as well as the micromorphology, chemistry, and mineralogy, suggest a regional paleoclimate during periods of soil formation that: (1) was warm to hot, with a wider range in temperature, precipitation, and evapotranspiration than present; (2) had seasonal to decadal or longer periods of drought; and (3) had down-valley (southward) trends of increasing temperature and precipitation and decreasing seasonality and variation in annual to decadal precipitation.

Sentinel Presentation of Disseminated Blastomyces dermatitidis Infection as Hip Pain in a Young Adult

In young, active patients, the common causes of hip pain are multiple and can include muscle strain, contusion, acetabular labral tear, osteochondral injury, sports hernia, snapping hip, proximal femoral stress fracture, and spinal abnormalities1-3. In most patients, an initial trial of nonoperative management is instituted. If pain persists or is of an unusual presentation, a more extensive diagnostic workup may be used. A thorough clinical evaluation can expedite the diagnosis of uncommon conditions of the musculoskeletal system, and the diagnostic evaluation may include magnetic resonance imaging of the pelvis and hip to evaluate the integrity of the periarticular structures. The case of the patient in the present report illustrates an unusual presentation of disseminated Blastomyces dermatitidis infection causing hip pain that was diagnosed with magnetic resonance imaging and was successfully treated through a multidisciplinary approach. The parents of the patient were informed that data concerning the case would be submitted for publication, and they consented. A seventeen-year-old boy presented to our clinic with a chief complaint of an insidious onset of hip pain of approximately two weeks’ duration that was minimally responsive to nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. He had previously worked at a job in construction requiring heavy labor and lived in the Missouri River valley region. The hip pain was limiting his ability to work at his normal level. The pain was primarily localized to the lateral aspect of the hip at the greater trochanteric region and the lateral iliac wing without radiation. He denied any fevers, chills, or other constitutional symptoms …

Determining Provenance of Shell-Tempered Pottery from the Central Plains Using Petrography and Oxidation Analysis

Late prehistoric sites on the Central Plains contain both grit/grog- (mineral-) tempered pottery and shell-tempered pottery. This appearance of shell-tempered pottery around cal A.D. 1000 has traditionally been explained as a colonization from the Mississippi River valley with further dispersal via trade. As a result, very little is known about the role of this material in the region. We report the results of a provenance analysis of shell-tempered pottery from seven sites extending from the Missouri River valley to north-central Kansas. We use petrography and oxidation analysis to compare the shell-tempered pottery across these localities and the shell-tempered to the mineral-tempered pottery from each locality, and we compare mineral inclusions and clay characteristics in all pottery with published geological and pedological information for each locality. The results demonstrate that shell-tempered pottery was locally produced throughout at least a portion of the Central Plains. Differences in firing technology are apparent across the study area and may play a role in the distribution of shell-tempered pottery. Two other results are the identification of composite temper in a notable proportion of the sherds studied, and indications of from where on the landscape Central Plains potters were procuring their raw materials.

Indian Displacement from the Loess Hills

Indian nations have been thoroughly removed from the Loess Hills of the Missouri River valley. That removal, however, does not conform to the typical story of Indian displacement from the forested East or the Great Plains; it was specific to a time and a place and reflected the changing status of Indian sovereignty in the United States. While it was accomplished with little White-on-Indian violence, it was still coercive and can be seen as an act of ethnic cleansing or developmental genocide.