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Item Embargo Accessing Nature: Accessibility Frameworks and Strategies for Vermont Town Forests(2026-05-08)Natural areas provide visitors a host of health benefits, facilitate community bonds, and foster connections to nature and the land. In Vermont, the majority of Vermont’s 251 municipalities own at least one town forest, forested natural areas that range from five acres to over 1,000 acres and provide wildlife habitat, recreation and education opportunities, watershed protection, forest products, and cultural significance, among many benefits. Recreation is the most common management objective for town forests; in order to achieve the goal of equitable recreational use of town forests for all people, the accessibility of these spaces must be considered. However, ensuring access to these publicly owned areas for people of all abilities is the most commonly reported challenge by stewards of town forests. Spatial accessibility refers to how logistically difficult it is to utilize a greenspace; this includes factors such as how far it is located from people’s homes or town centers, the condition of roads leading to the space, the availability of parking, the presence of maintained trails within the greenspace, and other physical characteristics of the space. Perceived accessibility refers to how people feel about a greenspace, including how easy it is to access and how desirable and socially acceptable it is to visit the space. This thesis utilized mixed methods of case studies and review of Vermont Town Forest Census responses to provide a framework for understanding town forest accessibility through both spatial and perceived accessibility lenses. Findings show that accessibility in town forests is as variable and diverse as the history and uses of the forests themselves. Common challenges reported regarding accessibility include difficulty building and maintaining trail systems, poor road access to the forest by road, and lack of parking at the forest. Many forests indicated interest in receiving help in improving accessibility. Strategies for improvement of accessibility may include peer learning, partnerships with non-profits, and the creation and use of individualized management plans for forests.Item Embargo Bottom-Up Modeling of Agricultural Phosphorus Mass Balance in the Little Otter Creek Headwaters Watershed, Vermont(2026-05-08)Excess phosphorus (P) applied to croplands can accumulate within agricultural soils over time. Managing agricultural soil P is critical to prevent P runoff into receiving waters, where it can degrade environmental quality and negatively impact related socioeconomic systems. Mass balance offers a method to quantify agricultural soil P flows, which is conducted in this study in Vermont’s Little Otter Creek watershed. This study applies a bottom-up method, in which spatially heterogeneous soil test and P management data are extrapolated from a subset of agricultural fields with available data to all agricultural fields in the watershed. Extrapolation is conducted within clusters of fields, which are grouped based on crop type, soil clay content, and slope. A Monte Carlo simulation of 10,000 repeated extrapolations is conducted to identify the central tendency for partial P mass balance and other metrics. The model produced a net P mass balance of 8.21 ± 0.90 kg P ha-1 yr-1 for all agricultural land in the watershed, with a higher mass balance surplus for hay compared to corn on average. Results include evidence of good nutrient management practices, with the distribution of excess agricultural P biased toward soils with a greater capacity to retain the added P. However, an overall P surplus, if continued, will continue to grow the legacy P pool stored within the watershed’s soils and pose long-term risks to receiving waters. Current Vermont policy focuses primarily on limiting P mobility from agricultural soils but does not consider watershed P mass balance. Future efforts to improve P management at the watershed scale could include reduction of synthetic P fertilizer use and new approaches to reduce and manage surplus P to achieve greater nutrient management circularity in Vermont’s working landscape.Item Open Access A Multiyear Characterization of the Caño Island Biological Reserve Soundscape(2026-04-27)The study of soundscapes is crucial to monitoring the relationship between organisms and their environment. In this study, we characterize the marine soundscape of Caño Island Biological Reserve, Costa Rica, a popular diving destination and key breeding area for two humpback whale populations. A single autonomous recorder was deployed during wet (July–November) and dry (January–April) seasons from 2023–2025. Presence–absence of dolphins, humpback whales, fish, and boats was scored. Generalized Linear and Additive Models were used to compare seasonal soundscape composition. Results show significant seasonal differences in soundscape (p<0.0001). Wet seasons were dominated by humpback whales from the BSG population, while dry seasons were dominated by fish and boats. Overall, boat presence peaked between 9:00 a.m.- 3:00 p.m., which coincides with tour-boat activity. The findings underscore the value of long-term passive acoustic monitoring and highlight the need for improved management of boat noise within this marine protected area.Item Embargo What Geocaching Tells Us About Cultural Ecosystem Services in Chittenden County, Vermont(2026-04-29)Cultural ecosystem services (CES) are intangible and subjective, thus difficult to study, yet still important to account for in decision making as they provide benefits and value to everyone who spends time in nature. This study used geocaching, an outdoor treasure hunting activity where participants find hidden containers using GPS enabled devices, to analyze spatial patterns of CES in Chittenden County, Vermont. It asked first how land cover and accessibility related to geocache popularity, and second, what CES are people experiencing, and where, when they geocache. This project also addressed several gaps in knowledge and methodology. This study used revealed cache popularity, measured via quests-per-year, land cover data, and road data to understand the importance of land cover and accessibility in cache popularity, finding that land cover was not influential in cache popularity while accessibility did influence popularity. The second question was answered by analyzing the content of text logs of the most popular geocaches. Logs were thematically analyzed for mention of CES manually and with the assistance of artificial intelligence, and mapped using ArcGIS Pro to identify patterns. Community, recreation/fun, and aesthetics were the most frequently mentioned CES, while spirituality and reflection was the least frequently mentioned. Some patterns remained consistent across land types, such as community being the most mentioned CES, while other patterns were variable. Interestingly, built environments had some of the highest mentions of aesthetics, in addition to water. Overall, this study highlighted the role geocaching plays in building community and connecting people to their environment, as well as quantifying the benefits that geocachers get when they cache. This study provides valuable information for land use decision making processes and demonstrates one application of a new method of collecting and analyzing spatially explicit data.Item Open Access Support for Wild Bee Populations in Pollinator Plantings vs Agricultural Hedgerows(2026-05-04)Globally, wild bee populations are under increasing threat from habitat loss, landscape fragmentation, and agriculture. The preservation and establishment of bee habitat is an effective strategy for increasing bee abundance and diversity in agricultural landscapes. However, little research has been done on the relative effect of pollinator plantings on wild bee populations compared to native hedgerows. In order to investigate the effect of these landscape features on wild bee abundance and species richness, both within habitat and in nearby fields, wild bee populations were sampled at four farms at the Intervale Center from May to September 2025. Bees were sampled using pan traps and blue vane traps once a month for five months. A total of 538 bees were collected over the course of the summer, consisting of 59 species in 25 different genera. Overall bee abundance within the habitat was similar between pollinator plantings and hedgerows when pooled across the entire summer, but abundance was significantly higher in pollinator plantings than in hedgerows in May. Pollinator plantings also had more consistent bee abundance than hedgerows over the course of the season. There were no significant differences in species richness between the two habitat types. There were few significant differences in bee abundance or species richness between the habitat and nearby fields for either habitat type. These results highlight the importance of promoting and conserving bee habitat, even in landscapes that are already diverse and rich in flowering plants, and the importance of ensuring consistent, season-long habitat when creating or conserving wild bee habitat. Understanding the effects and dynamics of different forms of pollinator habitat is an important step in informing our understanding of wild bee conservation and vital to protecting bee populations in the face of increasing threats, ultimately supporting both natural ecosystems and agriculture.
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