For students and practitioners, a comprehensive primer on the key literature in stream and river ecology.
 
The study of streams and rivers combines ecology, chemistry, hydrology, and geology to reveal the factors that control the biological diversity and functioning of these unique ecosystems. Although stream ecology is a relatively young discipline, foundational papers published over the past half century have shaped our current understanding of these ecosystems and have informed our efforts to manage and protect them. Organized by topics such as the physical template, community structure, food webs, ecosystem energetics, and nutrient dynamics, the chapters of this book offer summaries of the key literature, historical and contextual information, and insightful discussions of how past research has influenced present studies and may shape future work.

As the Mississippi and other midwestern rivers inundated town after town during the summer of 1993, concerned and angry citizens questioned whether the very technologies and structures intended to "tame" the rivers did not, in fact, increase the severity of the floods. Much of the controversy swirled around the apparent culpability of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the builder of many of the flood control systems that failed.

In this book, Todd Shallat examines the turbulent first century of the dam and canal building Corps and follows the agency's rise from European antecedents through the boom years of river development after the American Civil War. Combining extensive research with a lively style, Shallat tells the story of monumental construction and engineering fiascoes, public service and public corruption, and the rise of science and the army expert as agents of the state.

More than an institutional history, Structures in the Stream offers significant insights into American society, which has alternately supported the public works projects that are a legacy of our French heritage and opposed them based on the democratic, individualist tradition inherited from Britain. It will be important reading for a wide audience in environmental, military, and scientific history, policy studies, and American cultural history.