Adaptive Management as an Effective Strategy: Interdisciplinary Perceptions for Natural Resources Management.

Adaptive management is a well-established approach to managing natural resources, but there is little evidence demonstrating effectiveness of adaptive management over traditional management techniques. Peer-reviewed literature attempts to draw conclusions about adaptive management effectiveness using social perceptions, but those studies are largely restricted to employees of US federal organizations. To gain a more comprehensive insight into perceived adaptive management effectiveness, this study aimed to broaden the suite of disciplines, professional affiliations, and geographic backgrounds represented by both practitioners and scholars. A questionnaire contained a series of questions concerning factors that lead to or inhibit effective management, followed by another set of questions focused on adaptive management. Using a continuum representing strategies of both adaptive management and traditional management, respondents selected those strategies that they perceived as being effective. Overall, characteristics (i.e., strategies, stakeholders, and barriers) identified by respondents as contributing to effective management closely aligned with adaptive management. Responses were correlated to the type of adaptive management experience rather than an individual's discipline, occupational, or regional affiliation. In particular, perceptions of characteristics contributing to adaptive management effectiveness varied between respondents who identified as adaptive management scholars (i.e., no implementation experience) and adaptive management practitioners. Together, these results supported two concepts that make adaptive management effective: practitioners emphasized adaptive management's value as a long-term approach and scholars noted the importance of stakeholder involvement. Even so, more communication between practitioners and scholars regarding adaptive management effectiveness could promote interdisciplinary learning and problem solving for improved resources management.

Do waterbody classifications predict water quality?

Many states classify waterbodies according to groups of designated uses, which suggests that classifications may be correlated with water quality. The primary assessments of water quality in the United States (the Biennial Integrated Water Quality Reports) do not consider classification, so the relationship between classification and water quality is untested. Additionally, water quality has been shown to be influenced by watershed land use; however, land use is not typically part of waterbody classification systems. To determine the relationships between waterbody classification, water quality, watershed land cover, and forest fragmentation, we analyzed existing water quality data for the State of Connecticut from the United States Geological Survey and the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection and land cover data from the National Land Cover Dataset. Connecticut uses a unique classification system that includes separation of drinking water sources (Class AA) and waterbodies receiving waste water discharges (Class B). Using a comparison of multiple means, we found that Class B waters had higher levels of nitrogen, solids, chloride, sodium, dissolved copper, total iron, and dissolved manganese than Class AA waters. Watersheds upstream of Class B segments had less forest cover, more development and more impervious cover than watersheds upstream of Class AA segments. Class A sites had some similarities in water quality and land cover with Class AA sites and some with Class B sites. The subset of Class B waterbodies with "Class AA-like" water quality also had "Class AA-like" land cover. Based on this and a multiple linear regression analysis, we found that water quality is more closely related to watershed land cover and forest fragmentation than to waterbody classification. Our results suggest that watershed land cover likely is a better proxy for water quality than waterbody classification.