Description:    Wetland ecosystems are of global significance having productive, regulatory and informative function. These wetlands are crucial for the long-term protection of water sources, as well as the survival of its unique biodiversity. Most of the wetlands of Turkey are now facing serious threat from the anthropogenic sources and now near to the verge of extinction. This study has been carried out to monitor vegetation dynamics and ecological status of wetlands of Koyna basin at spatial and temporal scale. This study has involved MODerate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) images of the year 2000, 2004 and 2008 on daily basis with spatial resolution of 1 km. The MODIS 16 days composite NDVI time series products of 250-m spatial resolution from year 2000 to 2008 has been utilized to monitor the ecological status of the wetlands. The European Nature Information System habitat classification map, meteorological data (precipitation, temperature) coupled with field data has been utilized to validate NDVI values of nine habitats in the wetlands. The time series analyses of NDVI data values have been correlated with the groundwater level depth from 1996 to 2004. The overall analysis has shown a declining trend of NDVI over the year 2000 to 2008, indicated a degraded wetland condition in span of 9 years. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-12 DOI 10.1007/s10113-011-0241-x Authors Jay Krishna Thakur, Department Hydrogeology and Environmental Geology, Institute of Geosciences, Martin Luther University, Von-Seckendorff-Platz 3, 06120 Halle (Saale), Germany P. K. Srivastava, Department of Civil Engineering, Water and Environment Management Research Center, University of Bristol, Bristol, BS8 1TR United Kingdom S. K. Singh, Centre of Atmospheric and Ocean Science, KBCAOS, IIDS, University of Allahabad, Allahabad, 211002 India Zoltán Vekerdy, Faculty of Geo-information Science and Earth Observation, Twente University, Hengelosestraat 99, 7514 AE Enschede, The Netherlands Journal Regional Environmental Change Online ISSN 1436-378X Print ISSN 1436-3798

Description:    Understanding the factors which affect the distribution of alien plants in arid islands is complicated by the complex and stochastic nature of the invasion process per se , the harsh environmental conditions, and the low number of researchers and sampling effort. We present the results of the most comprehensive inventory to date of alien vascular plant species occurring in Socotra Island, a global biodiversity hotspot just beginning to be developed. A floristic survey was conducted between 2006 and 2008 in 36 grid cells of 10 × 10 km. We integrated this data from this survey with those from scientific literature. We recorded 88 alien plant species. Tree and herbaceous species were the most common growth forms. Species from Asia and edible species were prevalent. We identified 80 species considered weeds worldwide with 〉50 % adapted to arid conditions. We used a two-part model to analyze the spatial distribution of naturalized and alien plant species in relation to environmental and anthropogenic factors. Altitude and human-related factors play a significant role in the distribution of both naturalized and invasive species. Notably, the latter can potentially spread mainly in the alluvial basal areas. This study underpins the knowledge about alien species and their spatial distribution in Socotra Island. It provides a baseline for plant invasion management and contributes data for the analyses of invasion processes on islands worldwide. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-12 DOI 10.1007/s11258-012-0098-1 Authors Ali S. Senan, Department of Environmental Science, Bangalore University, Bangalore, India Federico Tomasetto, Bio-Protection Research Centre, Lincoln University, Lincoln, New Zealand Alessio Farcomeni, Department of Public Health and Infectious Diseases, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy Rayasamuda K. Somashekar, Department of Environmental Science, Bangalore University, Bangalore, India Fabio Attorre, Department of Environmental Biology, Sapienza University of Rome, P.le A. Moro 5, 00185 Rome, Italy Journal Plant Ecology Online ISSN 1573-5052 Print ISSN 1385-0237

Description:    A 108-year (1901–2008) downscaling of the twentieth-century reanalysis (20CR) using the Regional Spectral Model (RSM) has been conducted for the southeastern United States (SEUS) at a horizontal grid resolution of 10 km. This 108-year product, named as the Florida Climate Institute-Florida State University Land–Atmosphere Reanalysis for the southeastern United States at 10-km resolution version 1.0 [FLAReS1.0], has primarily been developed for anticipated application studies in hydrology, crop management, ecology, and other interdisciplinary fields in the SEUS. The analysis of this downscaled product reveals that it ameliorates the issue of artificial discontinuity in the precipitation time series of the 20CR from the variations inherent to RSM. This centennial scale product allows us to begin examining decadal scale variations of the regional features of the SEUS. The fidelity of the low-frequency variations of the winter rainfall associated with the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation (AMO) and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation is reasonably well captured in FLAReS1.0. In fact, the modulation of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) teleconnection with the SEUS rainfall by AMO in the downscaled product is also validated with observations. The ENSO-associated variations of accumulated rainfall from landfalling hurricanes in the SEUS are also well simulated in the downscaled climate simulation. It is to be noted that the success of this dynamical downscaling is also because the global reanalysis of 20CR showed comparable fidelity in these low-frequency variations of the SEUS climate. This method of dynamic downscaling global reanalysis with inclusion of spectral nudging at large wavelengths (in this case ≥500 km) toward the driving global reanalysis (20CR) is sometimes referred as a form of regional reanalysis. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Article Pages 1-9 DOI 10.1007/s10113-012-0372-8 Authors V. Misra, Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science, Florida State University, P.O. Box 3064520, Tallahassee, FL 32306-4520, USA S. M. DiNapoli, Center for Ocean-Atmospheric Prediction Studies, Florida State University, 2035 E. Paul Dirac Dr., 200 RM Johnson Bldg, Tallahassee, FL 32306-2840, USA S. Bastola, Center for Ocean-Atmospheric Prediction Studies, Florida State University, 2035 E. Paul Dirac Dr., 200 RM Johnson Bldg, Tallahassee, FL 32306-2840, USA Journal Regional Environmental Change Online ISSN 1436-378X Print ISSN 1436-3798