Development of reference conditions for suspended solids in streams
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Our aim was to develop protective physical and biological thresholds that identify the upper limit of the least disturbed (reference) condition for total suspended solids (TSS). The study focuses on streams in agricultural regions across Canada from which we collected contemporary TSS and benthic invertebrate data, and compiled long-term TSS data sets. Reference conditions for TSS were analyzed by five approaches previously applied in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, and the USA. In addition, ecological reference conditions for TSS were developed using regression-tree analysis to determine change-points along TSS gradients for three invertebrate metrics (percentage Ephemeroptera-Plecoptera-Trichoptera, total richness, and modified family biotic index). Increased agricultural land-cover was linked to higher TSS in most agricultural regions which, in turn, was associated with degraded environmental conditions and a reduction in the relative abundance of pollution-intolerant taxa. The five physical approaches produced a narrow range of regional TSS reference condition values (2.7 to 6.2 mg L–1). Ecological reference conditions for TSS ranged from 3.5 to 11.1 mg L–1 across Canada. We conclude that long-term TSS databases may serve to generate interim sediment criteria because ecological reference conditions were similar to those calculated from physical data alone. These interim sediment criteria may be appropriate targets for use in evaluation of restoration programs designed to improve environmental quality of aquatic ecosystems (e.g., beneficial or best management practice applications).
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.002 | 0.006 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".