Monday, November 24, 2014

Episode 241 (11/24/14): Classifying Fish is Largely a Family Affair

Click to listen to episode (3:24)

TRANSCRIPT


From the Cumberland Gap to the Atlantic Ocean, this is Virginia Water Radio for the week of November 24, 2014.

VOICE


If you think there’s something fishy about the “drumstick” just mentioned, you’re exactly right.  That was a description of a Northern Hogsucker, a fish found widely in Virginia’s streams and rivers.  The speaker was Jamie Roberts, a fisheries scientist formerly at Virginia Tech and now at Georgia Southern University, during a May 2013 fish-diversity lesson for the Virginia Master Naturalists’ New River Valley chapter.  This week, as Virginia families gather and focus on turkey drumsticks and other favorite Thanksgiving traditions, we focus on families of a different kind—the ones used to categorize Virginia’s freshwater fish.  Have a listen to Dr. Roberts for about 35 more seconds.

VOICE – 35 sec [listing five main families of freshwater fish in Virginia: minnows, catfish, sunfish and basses, perches and darters, and suckers].

A family is one level of organization used in taxonomy, the science of classifying living things based on their physical characteristics, genetic traits, and evidence of shared evolutionary history.  Fish in 25 families overall inhabit Virginia’s fresh waters.  Those families range from the well-known, such as the catfish family or the family of salmon and trout; to the relatively obscure, such as the Pirate Perch family, which contains only one species.  But as Dr. Roberts noted, most of the over 200 freshwater fish species in Virginia are categorized into just five families.  Let’s close with a quick review of those families, courtesy of several friends of Virginia Water Radio, and accompanied by part of “Bass Fisherman’s Reel,” courtesy of Williamsburg musician Timothy Seaman.

VOICES/MUSIC – 17 sec


Happy Thanksgiving!

For other water sounds and music, and for more Virginia water information, visit our Web site at virginiawaterradio.org, or call us at (540) 231-5463.  From the Virginia Water Resources Research Center in Blacksburg, I’m Alan Raflo, thanking you for listening, and wishing you health, wisdom, and good water. 



SHOW NOTES 
[All Internet addresses mentioned were functional as of 11/24/14]


Gravel fish nest attracting several kinds of Minnow-family species in Toms Creek (New River watershed), Blacksburg, Va., May 8, 2010.
 Acknowledgments
The comments by Jamie Roberts were recorded May 13, 2013, along Toms Creek in Montgomery County, Virginia, at a class of the New River Valley Chapter of the Virginia Master Naturalists Program.  Thanks to Dr. Roberts, of the Department of Biology at Georgia Southern University in Statesboro, and to this Master Naturalists class for permission to record the session.  At the time of this recording, Dr. Roberts was a research scientist in the Virginia Tech Department of Fish and Wildlife Conservation.

Information about the Virginia Master Naturalists Program is available online at http://www.virginiamasternaturalist.org/, or by contacting 60 Stagecoach Road, Charlottesville, VA 22902; phone (434) 872-4580; e-mail: masternaturalist@vt.edu.

Information about the Virginia Tech Department of Fish and Wildlife Conservation is available online at http://fishwild.vt.edu/, or by contacting 100 Cheatham Hall, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061-0321; phone (540) 231-5573; e-mail: fishwild@vt.edu.

Thanks to Eli Archer and several of his friends for their Nov. 19, 2014, recording of the names of Virginia’s main freshwater fish families.

“Bass Fisherman’s Reel” is on the 2004 CD “Virginia Wildlife,” copyright Timothy Seaman and Pine Wind Music, used with permission.  More information about Timothy Seaman is available online at http://timothyseaman.com/.



Sources for this Episode and For More Information:

“Classification of Animals,” University of Georgia Museum of Natural History, online at http://naturalhistory.uga.edu/~GMNH/gawildlife/index.php?page=information/classification.

“EFish—The Virtual Aquarium,” Virginia Tech Department of Fisheries and Wildlife Sciences, online at http://web1.cnre.vt.edu/efish/; this site is organized by fish families, with each family link providing access to information on species numbers, distribution, uses, photos, etc.

“Fish and Wildlife Information Service,” Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, online at http://vafwis.org/fwis/?Title=VaFWIS+Species+Information+By+Name&vUT=Visitor.

Freshwater Fishes of Virginia
, by Robert E. Jenkins and Noel M. Burkhead (Bethesda, Md.: American Fisheries Society), 1994.

“Selected Freshwater Fish Families,” by John J. Ney and Louis A. Helfrich, Virginia Cooperative Extension Publication 420-526, 2009; online at https://pubs.ext.vt.edu/420/420-526/420-526_pdf.pdf.


“Virginia Fishes” [freshwater game species], Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, online at http://www.dgif.virginia.gov/wildlife/fish/.

“Virginia Saltwater Angler’s Guide/Fish Identification Guide,” Virginia Marine Resources Commission (2006), online at http://www.mrc.virginia.gov/vswft/Angler_Guide/; this site includes links to different publications (as PDFs) on Virginia marine fish species, boat ramps, resource management, law enforcement, etc.


Selected News, Events, and Resources Relevant to Fish and Shellfish in Virginia
Virginia Water Central News Grouper posts, available online at http://vawatercentralnewsgrouper.wordpress.com/category/fisheries/.


Related Virginia Water Radio Episodes
Episode 73, 8/1/11 – Bass Fisherman’s Reel, by Timothy Seaman (on bass species in Virginia).

Episode 128, 9/17/12 – Northern Neck Chantey Singers (Atlantic Menhaden fishing tradition).
Episode 77, 8/29/11 – A Medley of Fish Sounds.
Episode 172, 7/29/13 – Fish Sampling (this includes other audio from Jamie Roberts’ session on May 13, 2013, with the New River Valley chapter of Virginia Master Naturalists).
Episode 211, 4/28/14 – Going Underwater to Explore Fish Migration.


SOLs Information for Virginia Teachers
This episode may help with Science Standards of Learning (SOLs) for Earth Resources in grade 4, for Living Systems in grades 5 and 6, in Life Sciences (especially LS.4), and in Biology (especially BIO.6 and BIO.8).

Monday, November 17, 2014

Episode 240 (11-17-14): Solid-waste Recycling Does a "Solid" for Water, Too

Click to listen to episode (3:16)

TRANSCRIPT

From the Cumberland Gap to the Atlantic Ocean, this is Virginia Water Radio for the week of November 17, 2014.


Sound - 4 sec.

What does that clatter have to do with water?  Have a listen for about 15 seconds to some of the components of the clatter, and see if you can guess what widespread household practice for handling these components has several water benefits.  And here’s a hint: you might have to go around and around to guess this.

Sounds – 15 sec.

If you guessed waste recycling, you’re right!  Those were the sounds of plastic and glass bottles, an aluminum can, mixed paper, and an electronics device.   All are common components in the municipal solid waste stream—that is, the mix of materials that households, businesses, and institutions routinely must manage either by disposal or by recycling.  In recent years, Virginians have been recycling about 40 percent of their municipal solid waste.  That choice has saved not only landfill space but also significant amounts of energy.  According to the U.S. EPA, in 2012 nationwide recycling of municipal solid waste saved the amount of energy typically used annually by almost 10 million households.

And energy is a big water issue:

Water is used in all phases of electricity and fuels generation. [Sound - electric power line]

Energy is needed to provide water for human uses and to treat wastewater. [Sound - household faucet and drain]

And energy use is implicated in climate change, which has many effects on water resources. [Sound - thunder and rain]

But solid-waste recycling has non-energy-related water benefits, too.  Recycling certain materials—for example, electronics—can reduce the levels of metals and other pollutants that may ultimately reach water bodies.  Mid-November offers a perfect time to consider these connections between solid waste and water, because November 15 is America Recycles Day—an annual, nationwide recycling initiative organized by Keep America Beautiful.  On that day, or any day, how citizens manage this kind of stream [Sound - commingled containers - 2-3 sec.] – has important consequences for this kind [Sound – flowing water - 2-3 sec.].

For other water sounds and music, and for more Virginia water information, visit our Web site at virginiawaterradio.org, or call us at (540) 231-5463.  From the Virginia Water Resources Research Center in Blacksburg, I’m Alan Raflo, thanking you for listening, and wishing you health, wisdom, and good water.

SHOW NOTES

[All Internet addresses mentioned were functional as of 11/13/14]



Mixed paper recycling bin (upper photo) and commingled containers recycling bin instructions (lower photo), both on the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, Nov. 12, 2014.

Sources for This Episode and for More Information on Waste Management and Recycling

Keep America Beautiful, “America Recycles Day” Web site, http://americarecyclesday.org/.

U.S. Department of Energy, “The Water-Energy Nexus: Challenged and Opportunities,” June 2014, online at http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2014/07/f17/Water%20Energy%20Nexus%20Full%20Report%20July%202014.pdf.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), “Electronic Donations and Recycling” Web site, http://www.epa.gov/epawaste/conserve/materials/ecycling/donate.htm.

U.S. EPA, “Municipal Solid Waste Generation, Recycling, and Disposal in the United States: Facts and Figures for 2012,” February 2014, online at http://www.epa.gov/epawaste/nonhaz/municipal/pubs/2012_msw_fs.pdf.

EPA “Resource Conservation/Common Waste and Materials” Web site, http://www.epa.gov/osw/conserve/materials/index.htm.  At this site, see individual links to paper, glass, etc.

U.S. EPA, “Wastes” Web site, http://www.epa.gov/epawaste/index.htm.  At this site, see links to non-hazardous, municipal solid waste, resource conservation, etc.

Virginia Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Land Protection and Revitalization, online at http://www.deq.virginia.gov/Programs/LandProtectionRevitalization.aspx.  Annual solid waste reports and the current recycling rate report (November 2013, for 2012 data) are available online at http://www.deq.virginia.gov/Programs/LandProtectionRevitalization/ReportsPublications.aspx.

For selected news, events, and resources relevant to waste management and water in Virginia, please see the Virginia Water Central News Grouper posts available online at http://vawatercentralnewsgrouper.wordpress.com/category/waste-management/.

Related Virginia Water Radio Episodes

Episode 107, 4/16/12 – Disposing of Medications Properly.
Episode 180, 9/23/13 – Annual Virginia Waterways Cleanups.
Episode 188, 11/18/13 – Putting Used Motor Oil in its Place.

SOLs Information for Virginia Teachers

This episode may help with Science Standards of Learning (SOLs) for Earth Resources in grades 4 and 6, and Earth Science SOL ES.6.