Movement, distribution, and habitat use of juvenile bull sharks were examined in two studies using manual and passive acoustic telemetry. Research was conducted in the Caloosahatchee River, which serves as nursery habitat for this species, and is highly impacted due to anthropogenic alterations in water quality and quantity via dams and locks. Manual tracking yielded fine-scale results for eight individuals on home range size, rate of movement, swimming depth, linearity, direction of travel, tidal influence, diel pattern, as well as correlation with environmental variables. Changes in salinity, temperature, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, and pH played a role on the distribution of bull sharks. Passive monitoring of twelve individuals allowed for examination of trends in residency, home range, depth, and distribution in response to water quality alterations. Both studies documented a shift in the distribution of animals in response to significant modifications in salinity and flow levels. Sharks were distributed throughout the river at low flow rates, but were located only near the river mouth, or exited the river at discharges rates above 75 m³s-1. Current water management policies are examined and recommendations are made which include the physiological preferences of this top-level predator.

The disciplines of informatics and information visualization have developed in response to societal needs to find new insight in complex datasets and have been enabled by technological advancements. Joint application of these fields can demonstrate themes and connections that are otherwise not apparent. Methodological approaches, such as direct network analysis, can be applied to policy documents to determine if action or policy recommendations match the goals or objectives stated in the within the same documents. Informatics and information visualization can also be used to analyze changes of themes found within the documents over time. This paper seeks to leverage informatics and information visualization methodologies as a novel approach to policy analysis. In particular, directed network and time burst techniques are used to analyze water management policy documents for the State of Texas. The congruency between the stated goals or objectives and recommendations sections is evaluated at a topical level within each planning document and possible changes in important water policy concepts over time are highlighted by comparing among multiple planning documents. Although there limitations to the process at the time of publication due to the newness of the software utilized, this paper demonstrates that the products still lead to unique and insightful conclusions. / text

California has one highly-coveted possession: the Bay-Delta, which is the second largest estuary in the United States. Today, tensions are higher than ever as Southern California continues to grow and demand water from the Delta, agriculture suffers from drought and less-than-promised water allocations, and aquatic life diminishes due to environmentally damaging processes like pumping and exporting of water elsewhere. This paper will examine the historic policies that have shaped how the Delta has been managed, their successes and failures, and current plans in discussion for continuing improvement of the Delta. The Bay-Delta Conservation Plan and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Valley Water Reliability Act (HR 1837) are the specific current plans presented and analyzed for potential effectiveness. Despite some of the promising suggestions in HR 1837 and the Bay-Delta Conservation Plan, the Delta will remain a problem in the 21st century until stakeholders from all perspectives compromise enough to enact a single, clear-cut solution.

The Commission for making the river Vltava and the river Labe in Bohemia navigable was founded in 1896 on the basis of a decree of the ministry of interior as the first water management office to be systematically engaged in making Czech rivers navigable by the canalization method. The Commission was headed by the vice-regent of the Kingdom of Bohemia to whom the members of state's and country's curia were subordinate. The executive section was represented by the central office, composed of the technical and administrative departments. Its activities were financed by two thirds by the Austrian state, one third was paid from the Czech country's treasury. After the establishment of the independent Czechoslovak republic, both curias were dissolved and the Commission was put under the control of the ministry of public works. The president of the country's political administration was appointed as the head of the Commission. The competence of the Commission was step by step extended from the initially entrusted task of making the river Vltava and the river Labe in the division Prague - Ústí nad Labem navigable also to making the river Vltava in Prague navigable as well as to the adaptation of the Holešovice port in Prague to a modern trade port and to drawing up studies on the utilization of water...