Stretching across 31 US states and 2 Canadian provinces, America’s Watershed benefits millions of people and thousands of communities. It supports our many economic activities while remaining a natural and recreational treasure of global importance.

Read more

Pacific and Atlantic data from 2012–2018 indicate that U.S. coral reefs are in fair condition. Most themes did not meet their historical references, meaning they are moderately to very impacted. There are exceptions, but overall, the data suggest that reefs are vulnerable to further decline due to threats from ocean warming and acidification, coral disease, and fishing impacts. Download the document to learn more about U.S. Coral Reef condition.

Read more

The primary purpose of this document is to describe the scoring process used for all the Atlantic jurisdictions: Florida, the United States Virgin Islands (USVI), Puerto Rico, and the Flower Garden Banks.

Read more

The first-ever Lower Kafue River Basin Report Card examines the health of the Kafue River in Zambia. Sixteen indicators in five categories were assessed across seven regions within the basin. The basin received a moderate score of 49, a C, illustrating that some regions of the basin are in better condition than others. This report card includes a detailed summary of the process and indicators as well as proposed management interventions and strategic actions to improve basin and river health.

Read more

Novel forms of drought are emerging globally, due to climate change, shifting teleconnection patterns, expanding human water use, and a history of human influence on the environment that increases the probability of transformational ecological impacts. These costly ecological impacts cascade to human communities, and understanding this changing drought landscape is one of today’s grand challenges.

Read more

The Evaluating Transdisciplinary Approaches Workshop was convened by the Belmont Forum at the National Science Foundation and facilitated by the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science in Alexandria, VA, USA on 26–28 June 2019. Participants of the workshop are part of a growing community of transdisciplinary research supporters and practitioners. Their efforts contribute to our fundamental and applied understanding of complex systems.

Read more

Coastal wetlands, such as saltmarshes and mangroves that fringe transitional waters, deliver important ecosystem services that support human development. Coastal … wetlands are complex social-ecological systems that occur at all latitudes, from polar … regions to the tropics. This overview covers wetlands in five continents. The wetlands … are of varying size, catchment size, human population and stages of economic … development.

Read more

This newsletter summarizes outputs from the initial stakeholder workshop to develop the Kwando River Basin Report Card. The workshop took place from 9–11 March in Kasane, Botswana. More than 35 diverse stakeholders from 19 institutions came together at this workshop to conceptualize the river basin, create a shared vision, and discuss indicators for the Kwando River Basin Report Card.

Read more

This report card provides a transparent, timely, and geographically detailed assessment of Chesapeake Bay. Since 2016, UMCES has engaged stakeholders throughout the watershed to transform the report card into an evaluation of the Chesapeake Watershed health. Watershed health includes traditional ecosystem indicators, but also social, economic, and cultural indicators. This is the first year the watershed has been scored, using five indicators of ecological and socioeconomic health.

Read more

Effective coral reef conservation cannot be accomplished without an informed and engaged public. This status report is part of an ongoing series of documents to track the status and trends of coral reefs across the U.S. and its territories. Florida's Coral Reef status report is part of a larger effort to provide the public and decision-makers with information about managing and conserving coral reef ecosystems.

Read more