EARLY HEARING DETECTION AND INTERVENTION VIRTUAL CONFERENCE
MARCH 2-5, 2021

(Virtually the same conference, without elevators, airplane tickets, or hotel room keys)

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6/06/2017  |   11:30 AM - 11:45 AM   |  THE CONCEPT OF REFERENCE CONDITION, REVISITED   |  301A

THE CONCEPT OF REFERENCE CONDITION, REVISITED

Ecological assessments of aquatic ecosystems depend on the ability to compare current conditions against some expectation of how they could be in the absence of significant human disturbance. The concept of a ‘‘reference condition’’ is often used to describe the standard or benchmark against which current condition is compared. If assessments are to be conducted consistently, then a common understanding of the definitions and complications of reference condition is necessary. A 2006 paper (Stoddard et al., 2006, Ecological Applications 16:1267-1276) made an early attempt at codifying the reference condition concept; in this presentation we will revisit the points raised in that paper (and others) and examine how our thinking has changed in a little over 10 years. Among the issues to be discussed: (1) the “moving target” created when reference site data are used to set thresholds in large scale assessments; (2) natural vs. human disturbance and their effects on reference site distributions; (3) circularity and the use of biological data to assist in reference site identification; (4) using site-scale (in-stream or in-lake) measurements vs. landscape-level human activity to identify reference conditions.

  • S27 Advancing Consistency in Ecological Assessments
  • S27 Advancing Consistency in Ecological Assessments
  • S27 Advancing Consistency in Ecological Assessments

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Presenters/Authors

John Stoddard (), US EPA, Pacific Ecological Systems Division, Corvallis, OR, Stoddard.John@epa.gov;


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Charles Hawkins (), Utah State University, chuck.hawkins@usu.edu;


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Jan Stevenson (), Michigan State University, rjstev@cns.msu.edu;


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