Cienegas, as defined here, are wetlands in arid and semi-arid regions associated with groundwater or lotic components that ideally result in perennial waters on temporal scales of decades to centuries. Cienegas are typically no lower than 0 m, and higher than 2000 m, rarely lower but sometimes higher elevation localities occur. Cienegas are typified by significant differences in flora and fauna relative to the greater terrestrial conditions in the region in which it is located. Cienegas are freshwater to brackish North American wetlands associated with fluvial systems of arid/semi-arid areas of the southwestern U.S. and northwestern Mexico. Once extensively utilized by the region's indigenous human cultures, early European explorers and settlers, the extent of these aquatic riparian communities has dramatically decreased from historic conditions and the community is now considered imperiled in North America. This dataset provides location information and some limited attributes of cienegas in the southwestern U.S. and northern Mexico. There is no information as to the size of the cienega and other important attributes.

Video of presentation in invited webinar (CCAST - also at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9UIVTxZMnw) - Since 2006, the Fishes of Texas Project at University of Texas Austin has sought to improve freshwater fish occurrence data for the state of Texas and make it openly accessible to facilitate research and improve aquatic resource management. Seven federal and state sponsors have contributed funding, but 73% of the total \$2.7 million has come from US Fish and Wildlife Service’s State Wildlife Grant Program via Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. Initially the Project focused on data digitization and compilation of strictly specimen-vouchered data, followed by georeferencing and development of an interactive website/database (http://www.fishesoftexas.org). More recently, non-vouchered citizen science, angler-based, and agency datasets have been added, thereby increasing both geographic and temporal density of records, and a selected subset of data fields for all records is now published to GBIF and iDigBio.

Video of presentation at meeting - Since 2006 the Fishes of Texas (FoTX) Project at University of Texas Austin (UT) has sought to improve freshwater fish occurrence data for the state of Texas and make it openly accessible to facilitate research and improve aquatic resource management. Seven federal and state sponsors have contributed funding, but 73% of the total \$2.7 million has come from US Fish and Wildlife Service’s State Wildlife Grant Program via Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD). Initially the Project focused on data digitization and compilation of strictly specimen-vouchered data, followed by georeferencing and development of an interactive website/database (http://www.fishesoftexas.org). More recently, non-vouchered citizen science, angler-based, and agency datasets have been added, thereby increasing both geographic and temporal density of records, and a selected subset of data fields for all records is now published to GBIF and iDigBio. The project’s comprehensive data aggregation (44 contributing collections), digitization, normalization, accessibility and high data quality (based, in part on extensive taxonomic determination verification via specimen examination), enabled significant advances in detection and awareness of statewide faunal trends that led to implementation of diverse management advances. Examples include improved field guides and documentation of species’ ranges, expansions and contractions, community composition shifts, improved species conservation status assessments, and documentation of both long-term expansions of invasive species and new introductions. Relatively new to the Project are statewide aquatic bioassessments - intensive fieldwork planned using tools available in our website that facilitate exploration of geographic and temporal sampling histories and reveal under-sampled areas. Consequently, gaps in knowledge of regional faunas have been steadily decreasing. The website and database are widely used; 90% of presentations on related topics at last year’s statewide fisheries meeting utilized FoTX products. This now long-term, consistent funding created a productive partnership between UT and TPWD. With the Project’s bioassessments generating specimens, and TPWD’s independent routine fish sampling increasingly depositing specimens, our collection (TNHCi - https://www.gbif.org/dataset/6080b6cc-1c24-41ff-ad7f-0ebe7b56f311) has nearly doubled in size over the last decade. Last year, TPWD’s list of Species of Greatest Conservation Need was updated, with major changes based on the improved knowledge provided by FoTX. TPWD now funds a full-time Assistant Collection Manager position focusing on bioassessments, but also doing basic collection management and supervision of student and volunteer help. Another grant-funded position, a liaison between the collection and TPWD staff, spawned the ongoing statewide Texas Native Fish Conservation Areas program that coordinates funding and actions of diverse stakeholders for watershed-scale conservation. Both externally funded UT positions participate in diverse collections-based research and outreach endeavors for both UT and TPWD. The FoTX website was developed in large part by staff in UT’s science database group in the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) - a collaboration that blossomed into long-term technical support for collection database management and data publication that has since expanded to support all other collections in UT’s Biodiversity Center.

Each field has its pioneers, and the field of desert fish conservation is no exception. Efforts to conserve aquatic life in the desert have been fueled equally by the ecological understandings developed by science and conservation actions directed by firmly held ethical beliefs. A few individuals are capable of combining scientific knowledge and conservation ethics into an undeniable passion that becomes contagious. These pioneering giants marveled at the ability of certain species to survive in seemingly harsh environments and, when necessary, mounted a vigorous defense when outside forces threatened their survival. This chapter traces the careers of a small handful of highly dedicated and influential scientists who recognized the value of desert fishes and came to their aid at a time when few cared for, or even knew of, such species. They saved species and habitats while influencing so many to follow in their footsteps. In this chapter, the legacies of eight giants in the field desert fish conservation are honored, and it is hoped that through these biographies they will continue to inspire new professional, ethical, committed warriors to join the battle against extinction.

Yaqui Catfish Ictalurus pricei is an understudied species with limited information of its ecology, distribution, and local habitat use. Native to the southwest United States and northwest Mexico, Yaqui Catfish populations are declining which has prompted the species to be listed as threatened in the United States and a species of concern in Mexico. Water over-allocation, habitat degradation, invasive species introductions, and hybridization with non-native Channel Catfish I. punctatus have caused the populations in Mexico to decline. The United States population collapsed after years of low recruitment. To better focus conservation efforts, as well as define habitat associated with Yaqui Catfish occurrences, we assessed the distribution in the Yaqui River Basin of Mexico using historical data at a landscape scale. Yaqui Catfish were historically found across the watershed among a diversity of environments, but most frequently associated with small, intermittent streams. Basin landcover was dominated by forest, shrubland, and grassland and Yaqui Catfish generally occurred in stream segments in similar proportions. However, a small number of Yaqui Catfish occurrences were associated with urban and cropland landcover types greater than that which was present on the landscape. With the species facing declines in the region, this work will help inform future conservation efforts aimed at securing this species, protecting suitable habitat and better defining its current status in Mexico.

The Rio Grande Cichlid, Herichthys cyanoguttatus, is native to the drainages of the Gulf Coast of northern Mexico and southern Texas and has been introduced at several sites in the US. Previous observations have suggested that non-native populations in Louisiana that are currently recognized as H. cyanoguttatus resemble another species, the Lowland Cichlid, H. carpintis. Traditional morphological and genetic techniques have been insufficient to differentiate these species, but H. carpintis has been reported to differ from H. cyanoguttatus in color pattern, so we turned to novel electronic photo archives to determine the identity of the species introduced in Louisiana. First, we used the public databases Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database and Fishes of Texas to infer the historical distributions of these species in the US. We then used museum specimens, live specimens, and two additional databases, The Cichlid Room Companion and iNaturalist, to compare morphology and color patterns among individuals obtained from their native and introduced ranges in Mexico, Texas, and Louisiana. Our general observations found that H. cf. cyanoguttatus from Louisiana tended to have an obliquely oriented mouth and a more rounded ventral profile than H. cyanoguttatus from Texas, consistent with previous descriptions of H. carpintis, but our morphological analyses were unable to identify any significant differences among populations. Our analyses of color patterns found that H. cf. cyanoguttatus from Louisiana had larger iridescent spots than H. cyanoguttatus from Texas as well as black breeding coloration that extended anteriorly to the tip of the mouth, characters consistent with H. carpintis. Our observations indicate that at least some of the cichlids introduced in Louisiana are not H. cyanoguttatus but are instead H. carpintis, and that their presence there is likely due to release by humans. This is the first record of H. carpintis establishing a population in the US. Understanding the biology of not one, but two, species of Herichthys will be necessary to predict and mitigate their continued colonization of new environments in the US.

The Rio Grande Cichlid, Herichthys cyanoguttatus, is native to northeastern Mexico and southern Texas and has been introduced at many places in the US. Recent research has indicated that the true identity of at least some populations of Herichthys cf. cyanoguttatus in Louisiana is H. carpintis and not H. cyanoguttatus. In both their native and introduced ranges, H. carpintis seems to occupy a more lowland/coastal distribution than does Herichthys cyanoguttatus, suggesting that the two species may differ physiologically or ecologically in their ability to invade new environments. Previous research has found that Herichthys cf. cyanoguttatus from Louisiana (which were most likely H. carpintis) have a high tolerance to salinity and pose a threat to both fresh and brackish waters, but the osmoregulatory capacity of H. cyanoguttatus from Texas is unknown. To determine if H. cyanoguttatus from Texas might also have a high tolerance to salinity and pose a threat to both fresh and brackish waters, we performed three experiments to assess response to salinity challenges in H. cyanoguttatus from Texas and in H. carpintis from Louisiana. In response to acute moderate salinity challenge, we found a non-significant salinity*species interaction in change in body mass, a species difference in hematocrit, and no differences in plasma chloride or osmolality. In a 120-day chronic salinity exposure, salinity concentration was inversely related to growth rate, but there was no difference in growth between the two species. In an acute challenge, high salinity concentrations had a strong negative effect on survival, but survival was not different between the two species. Both species were highly tolerant of salinity, indicating that both species might be able to use brackish waters in coastal areas to expand their ranges in the US. Finally, we found that H. cyanoguttatus from Texas spent more time swimming than did H. carpintis from Louisiana, suggesting that the two species could differ in the way they interact behaviorally with native fish communities.

A taxonomic and alphabetic arrangement (TAA) of objects on shelves has prevailed in fluid-preserved natural history collections while they were managed by scientists for their own research. Now most collections are databased and internet-accessible to facilitate very different forms of research accomplished remotely by researchers who require less physical access to specimens. The collections staff who make those data available struggle to manage collection growth with limited space and budgets, while demands on them are increasing, necessitating task and space-efficient collection management solutions. We describe an alternative arrangement of objects based on their size and catalog number (OCA) that capitalizes on modern databases. Our partial implementation of this system facilitated pragmatic between-system comparisons of space use and staff time required for routine tasks. Our OCA allows 17% more jars to be stored in a given space than a TAA (not counting spaces left for growth), but adjusting vertical spacing of shelves could increase that to 115%. Ten of 15 staff tasks were more efficiently accomplished in the OCA section of the collection, and we propose ways to improve efficiency for three of the four tasks for which the TAA outperformed the OCA.