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Fall 2017

King, Carolyn M

Resprouting is an important adaptation to aboveground disturbance, whereby plants develop new shoots after loss or death of a portion of their aboveground biomass. Aspen (Populus tremuloides Michx.) is a foundational tree species in the boreal forests of North America and is a prolific...

Fall 2017

Najar, Ahmed

Stem canker diseases in poplars caused by the fungal pathogen Sphaerulina musiva Peck. remain some of the least understood forest diseases despite causing considerable damage, particularly in hybrid poplar plantations. S. musiva is endemic to eastern Canada in provinces including the Maritimes,...

Fall 2017

Rudolfsen, Tyana A

Freshwater biodiversity is presently one of the world’s largest conservation concerns. Both direct and indirect human activities contributing to waterway modifications, climate change, and habitat alteration are causing major declines in freshwater fish species richness and abundance. While these...

Fall 2017

Chen, Youhua

Species extinctions are inevitable, irreversible and a time-delayed process that is accelerating due to the warming climate and the loss of habitats worldwide. The most threatened vertebrate group in terrestrial ecosystems is amphibians. In this thesis, I assess potential range shifts and...

Spring 2017

Zhao, Yihan

Phosphogypsum (PG) is an acidic by-product created during phosphate fertilizer production (Rutherford et al 1994). In open or operational PG stacks, airborne fluorides are emitted from phosphogypsum process water pond surface evaporation or particulate fluoride that can be transported as fluoride...

Spring 2018

Olivier, Samantha

Oil sands extraction and refining can cause many negative environmental impacts and because these activities usually take place in the forest region, the Government of Alberta requires that, after mine sites are closed, the companies perform reclamation. The properties of reclaimed oil sands...

Spring 2017

Stockdale, Christopher A

Throughout the Rocky Mountain regions of North America fire regimes have been altered towards longer fire return intervals in the 20th century as compared to the 18th and 19th centuries; this has been accompanied by losses of grassland and open canopy woodlands due to encroachment by closed...

Spring 2017

Kiani, Mina

Managing the land properly should lead us to conserve the soil which is a critical substance for sustaining our life and the global society. Quantifying the effects of land management and land-use conversion on soil physical and biological properties can aid to identify best management practices...

Spring 2017

Hoffman, Elizabeth H

Industrial activities such as surface mining are responsible for disturbing large areas of forest land. Reclamation methods must facilitate the development of soil, of a diverse natural understory plant community, and of a tree canopy. In my thesis research, I examined the response of vegetation...

Spring 2017

Kukka, Piia M.

Wolverines (Gulo gulo) are harvested for fur in Yukon, Canada, but little is known about the sustainability of their harvest. In the absence of population data, harvest management relies on harvest data to assess the efficacy of regulations and harvest sustainability. I examined the...