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Effects of tile drainage, seasonality, and cash crop rotation on edge-of-field nitrogen and phosphorus losses from southern Ontario Watersheds
Eutrophication is an ongoing global problem and agriculture is an important non-point source of nutrient loading. Specifically, nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) losses from agricultural landscapes continue to drive water quality issues. In southern Ontario, agriculture has intensified in recent decades, with major expansions of cash crop production and extensive tile drainage (TD). Through intensive monitoring of 12 tile outlets draining operational fields under the conventional corn-soybean-wheat rotation, this study examined differences in measured and volume-weighted total P, total N, and nitrate-N concentrations and loads over 28 months (October 2020- April 2023) amongst crop covers and between growing (GS; May – September) and non-growing seasons (NGS; October – April). Nitrogen concentrations (i.e., TN and NO3-N) in TD eluent were consistently high both between seasons and were found to be significantly highest from winter wheat (WW) fields in the NGS, and corn fields in the GS. Volume-weighted TP concentrations were not significantly different either amongst crop covers or between seasons, although TP losses tended to be highest from the cover crop (CC) fields in the NGS. Differences in N and P losses between years and amongst crop covers were attributed to differences in legacy soil nutrients, the establishment and decomposition of over-winter cover crops, and physical soil properties. The results of this study can inform agricultural management by addressing the urgent need for improved information around the relationship between agricultural practices and nutrient losses, especially in the NGS.
Author Keywords: Best management practices, Crop rotation, Over-winter cover crops, Seasonality, Tile drainage, Water quality
What caring for a child who died was like for me: My experience of pediatric patient death as a new graduate nurse
I utilized analytical autoethnography to analyze and interpret my own experience of what caring for a child that died was like for me within the academic and institutional culture that I was educated and trained in (Chang, 2008). Themes of lack of preparedness, relationships, loss and emotion, death denial, and lasting impacts and growth were identified. Pediatric death and dying education and training for nurses should encompass nursing responsibilities, communication strategies, holistic assessments, symptom management, cultural awareness, and grief literacy (Bensoussan, 2024; Chew, Ang, & Storey, 2021; Kent, Anderson, & Ownes, 2012; RNAO, 2012). A system to accommodate, acknowledge, and value emotion. A platform to share, learn, and grow from the experience with death and dying. This autoethnographic account provides insights into the personal and professional impacts of pediatric patient death on nurses and the importance of associated education, training, and support to improve care for patients, families, and self.
Author Keywords: autoethnography, lasting impacts, metabolizing grief, nurse, pediatric patient death, self-transformation
Boxing and the Third Place: Mapping Community and Urban Revitalization in Early Twentieth Century Winnipeg
This study considers the impact of urban revitalization through community engagement and the promotion of activities, in particular boxing in early twentieth century Winnipeg. It details the development of a multiethnic amateur boxing league which arose in the city during this period, using both qualitative and quantitative sources and a series of maps. This research shows how spaces in Winnipeg, like the Young Men's Christian Society, the One Big Union and the Winnipeg City Police Amateur Athletic Association, used boxing to support young men and boys from various ethnic, class and religious backgrounds. Winnipeg newspapers, such as the Winnipeg Tribune, offer rich quantitative sources, including boxing cards that list fighters' names, dates, and locations. When paired with census data, maps, and archival information from institutions like the YMCA, these sources provide a wealth of detail on Winnipeg's ethnic, class, and religious composition. This study leverages these resources to advance the understanding of spatial dynamics and demonstrates how analyzing third places can address questions about segregation in the city.
Author Keywords: Boxing, GIS, Sports, Third Place, Winnipeg, Young Men's Christian Association
The Impact of Unit Design on Family Experiences in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Kingston General Hospital
The involvement of families in the care of their infant in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) may be influenced by the unit environment (O'Brien et al., 2013). The purpose of this study is to explore the influence of the open pod NICU through the research question: What is the impact of unit design in the NICU at Kingston General Hospital (KGH) on the lived experiences of families? A qualitative descriptive design was followed using semi-structured interviews conducted with family members of infants in the NICU at KGH. Themes constructed through thematic analysis of transcripts included Needing more space, Creating a comfortable environment, Having a sense of community, Desiring consistency in staffing and Barriers to being present. The narrative of these themes aligns with Donabedian's (2003) theoretical model of structure, process and outcome. The findings from this research indicated that being cared for in an open pod NICU impacted their family experiences, displaying areas for improvement in future NICU designs.
Author Keywords: Family experience, FiCare, Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU), NICU design, NICU environment, Open pod NICU
Habitat patch size and breeding site quality drive relative abundance of Ambystoma salamander larvae
Amphibian biodiversity is in global decline, driven primarily by habitat loss and fragmentation arising from landcover alteration. For pond-breeding amphibians, larval abundance should be governed by aquatic breeding site quality, surrounding terrestrial habitat characteristics, and proximity to neighbouring populations. If safeguarding salamander populations is a priority, conservation efforts will benefit from understanding the relative importance of each feature on salamander populations. I sought to identify the factors associated with relative abundance of Ambystoma salamander larvae across habitat patches on Pelee Island, Ontario, Canada. Larval density and a suite of environmental variables were measured at 34 breeding sites across the island. Using spatial analysis, I also determined landcover features surrounding the breeding site, including, terrestrial habitat type, terrestrial patch size, and indices of isolation (e.g., nearest neighbour distance, proximity index). The relative abundance of Ambystoma larvae was best predicted by additive effects of breeding site quality (e.g., canopy cover, submergent vegetation, and cooler water temperature) and size of surrounding terrestrial habitat patches. I did not detect any influence of agricultural land cover within 300 m of the breeding sites on larval count, implying that Ambystoma can persist within agriculture-dominated landscapes provided that high breeding habitat quality is maintained, and ponds are embedded within large forest patches. Further, I failed to detect any impact of breeding site isolation on larval numbers, indicating that local habitat quality and terrestrial patch size more strongly determine larval abundance than patch connectivity. My research highlights the critical importance of conserving high-quality aquatic breeding habitats and maintaining large contiguous patches of terrestrial habitat for amphibian
Author Keywords: Amphibian, Anthropogenic impacts, Biodiversity conservation, Habitat fragmentation, Habitat suitability, Salamanders
I want to do so much more, but I just do not know what to do: Intermediate Teachers' Interactions with the Outdoors in Winter
It is through spending time outside that we develop the ecological literacy and caring attachments to the land that will lead to greater concern and responsibility for the more-than-human world. But intermediate students in the formal education system are taught almost exclusively indoors, especially in winter. If Canadian teachers remain mostly inside when it is cold, they forego many opportunities to connect their students with the land upon which they live and learn. The purpose of this research is to understand the ways intermediate teachers in the formal education system interact with the outdoors in winter during the school day, how they feel about these interactions, and what influences their decisions when it comes to outdoor learning in winter. Understanding the lived experiences of teachers is essential, as it is they who decide whether instruct indoors or out. In the hierarchical education system, teachers' voices are not always considered in policy making. Photovoice is an ideal methodology for this study because it brings the lived experiences of a group who do not have the authority to make policy changes, to those who do. This photovoice study gave eight intermediate teachers the opportunity to document experiences in their own lives, raise their own consciousness about outdoor learning, and to share their voices with policymakers through their photographic art. This study draws four main conclusions: a) teachers need to develop stronger personal relationships with the outdoors in winter; b) schools need to reconsider the traditional recess model as it is often a time of stress for teachers and students; c) the curriculum needs to expect outdoor learning in all seasons; and d) teachers' voices need to be heard in relation to outdoor learning initiatives in schools. The findings are significant because they can influence policymakers to improve outdoor learning in schools which, in turn, will help teachers and students develop more comfortable and caring relationships with the outdoors in winter.
Keywords: winter, outdoor education, environmental education, outdoor learning, photovoice, intermediate teachers, intermediate students, formal education system
Author Keywords: environmental education, formal education system, outdoor education, outdoor learning, winter
Intra-Site Analysis of Dwellings in Neolithic Tamsagbulag, Mongolia
Recent work at the site of Tamsagbulag, Mongolia, suggests it predates both agriculture and herding in the broader region by more than 2000 years. These excavations showed a more intensive use than expected, consistent with a hypothesis of year-round sedentism alongside a primary reliance on large game. This is noteworthy because, while sedentary hunter-gatherers are known, they are often heavily reliant on plant foods and/or small prey such as fish. Based on the evidence, this thesis concludes that the dwellings are most likely seasonally used rather than year-round settlements. Studying patterns in artifact distribution can inform our understanding of relative length of occupation through a study of accretion and depletion as they relate to habitation, abandonment, and post-abandonment processes. This research utilizes spatial analyses to visualize level-specific patterns in artifact distributions within each excavated dwelling and identify specific clusters of artifacts that may hold insight into potential waste management practices.
Author Keywords: House floor assemblages, Neolithic, Seasonality, Sedentism, Site formation processes, Spatial analysis
Spaced Learning Parameters for HPC-Independent Context Fear Memory
Damage to the hippocampus (HPC) causes retrograde amnesia for some memories, but spaced learning mitigates this. Contextual fear conditioning (CFC) studies in rats demonstrate that distributing conditioning over multiple sessions makes a memory less vulnerable to HPC damage, and it has been suggested this occurs through incremental strengthening of the memory outside the HPC via separate bouts of cellular consolidation. To explore this, we examined the number of, and temporal intervals between, spaced CFC sessions required to make a memory less vulnerable to HPC damage. Experiment 1 established six sessions spaced over three days as sufficient to create a memory no longer requiring the HPC. Experiments 2 and 3 found that spacing those six sessions in a single day also created a memory no longer requiring the HPC, but only when the sessions were separated by an interval believed to be sufficient for separate bouts of cellular consolidation to occur.
Author Keywords: consolidation, context fear, hippocampus, memory, retrograde amnesia, spaced learning
Impacts of wildfire on dissolved organic matter in boreal headwater streams
Increasing wildfire frequency, driven by climate change, can change the concentration andcomposition of dissolved organic matter (DOM) exported from land into receiving waters by removing terrestrial vegetation, changing soil hydrology, and interrupting microbial degradation. In this thesis, I tested how wildfire impacts the molecular composition and reactivity of DOM. I compared DOM from boreal headwater streams in northwestern Ontario, Canada between 10 catchments recently affected and 10 comparable catchments that were undisturbed for at least 20 years. Using optical spectroscopy, ultra-high-resolution mass spectrometry, and incubation experiments, I found that burned streams had 29% higher average DOM concentrations and contained less bioavailable DOM, which resulted in microbes respiring more CO2 in burned streams rather than using carbon to build biomass. These results indicate that the impacts of wildfire on carbon sequestration have been underestimated and highlight the need to consider wildfire in forest carbon budgets.
Author Keywords: boreal forest, carbon flux, dissolved organic matter, Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry (FT-ICR MS), headwater streams, Wildfire
Survival and roost selection of eastern wild turkeys in their northern range
Understanding habitat needs of a species is critical, especially for species reintroduced to an area or expanding their range. I evaluated roost tree selection and survival probability of GPS-tagged eastern wild turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo silvestris) from 2017–2020 and 2022 in Peterborough County, Ontario, Canada. Fine-scale roost tree selection was associated with larger trees, with microclimate factors such as wind speed, temperature, and precipitation having little to no influence. Turkeys showed high annual survival probabilities relative to other northern regions of their range, but survival was not influenced by proximity of roost tree to a building. The behaviour of roosting in an elevated perch helps turkeys avoid ground-dwelling predators, but specific selection of one tree versus another has little additional benefit to survival. Turkeys appear to survive well in a landscape that is a mix of agricultural and urban, with forest patches intact for roosting habitat.
Author Keywords: Eastern wild turkey, habitat, Meleagris gallopavo silvestris, microclimate, roost sites, survival