About

Mary Lusk is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Soil, Water, and Ecosystem Sciences at the University of Florida, affiliated with the Gulf Coast Research and Education Center. Her research focuses on urban soil and water quality, particularly how landscape management practices at site and neighborhood scales influence the storage, transport, and fate of constituents that may lead to water quality degradation. She investigates the flux and storage of nutrients in managed urban landscapes and explores the linkages between landscape management practices and urban soil and water quality. Her work is driven by the hypothesis that human decisions in urban land management can influence the accumulation and turnover of ecologically important elements such as carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus in urban soils, which in turn affects land-water exchanges of these elements. Her research includes elucidating mechanisms of nutrient cycling under ecological disturbance and developing urban best management practices to maintain soil organic matter, reduce stormwater flows, and improve nutrient efficiency. In addition to her research, Mary Lusk leads extension programs aimed at developing regional partnerships to provide Floridians with science-based information on water conservation. Her extension efforts focus on educating the public about water conservation, alternative water supplies, and water use efficiency, with goals to reduce water use in landscapes, increase urban irrigation efficiency, and promote the beneficial reuse of reclaimed water. She also works to develop educational programs that address nonpoint source pollution, promote Florida Friendly Landscaping, and equip green industry professionals and builders with sustainable practices. Her contributions support the sustainable management of urban soils and water resources in Florida amidst rapid urbanization and population growth.

Research topics

• Environmental science
• Ecology
• Chemistry
• Environmental chemistry
• Geotechnical engineering
• Biology
• Meteorology
• Geology
• Forestry
• Geography
• Agroforestry
• Physical geography

Selected publications

• Leveraging advanced deep learning models for large-scale hydrological forecasting in Florida

  Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment · 2026-05-13

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Incentive-Based Policy for Tree Protection: A United States National Review

  Preprints.org · 2026-02-10

  preprintOpen accessSenior author

  Trees located on private property constitute a substantial portion of the urban forest canopy, yet management responsibilities vary widely across different jurisdictions. While property owners are granted freedom over their land-use decisions, some governments promote tree preservation by regulating and restricting how property owners manage trees on their properties. Incentive-based policies for tree protection can serve as an alternative to enact behavior change through positive reinforcement. In this study, we provide a comprehensive national review in the United States (U.S.) to identify, consolidate, and organize existing urban forest incentives offered by local governments targeting private property owners. In reviewing codes and official government websites across all U.S. states and the District of Columbia, focusing on communities with populations of over 50,000 (n=1839), we found that 27.90% of these locations included provisions for offering some type of incentive to property owners, and 6.14% indicated plans to add such practices in future updates. We organized these mechanisms into 15 broad categories to improve navigation and highlighted some examples to present a wide range of possible approaches for adopting and implementing these practices. Our results indicate that incentives are not always substantiated in official documents, can vary in ease of implementation, and often target only one stage of a tree’s life cycle. We align with previous research that there is no “one-size-fits-all” approach and conclude that it is important to consider the holistic process of a tree’s life cycle, the specific and individual details for each situation, as well as evaluate long-term impacts before tailoring the most suitable incentive mechanism for context-appropriate urban forest management plans.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Soil microbial responses to reclaimed water irrigation and implications for soil health

  Journal of Environmental Quality · 2025-12-14

  articleOpen accessCorresponding

  Reclaimed water (RW), which is treated municipal wastewater suitable for beneficial reuse, is increasingly recognized as a viable option for agricultural irrigation worldwide due to its numerous benefits. However, RW contains various contaminants whose fate in soils is variable and not fully understood. These contaminants may accumulate in soils, degrade, be taken up by plants and microbes, leach into groundwater, or be transported to surface waters via runoff. This review examines the impacts of RW contaminants on soil microbial communities, which play critical roles in nutrient mineralization, cycling, enzyme activities, and overall soil function. Evidence from literature is mixed: some studies report reductions in total bacterial and archaeal populations and decreased diversity of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, whereas others indicate enhanced microbial proliferation and enzyme activity due to increased availability of microbial growth substrates. These variable effects suggest that the impact of RW contaminants on soil microbial communities and their functions depends on soil properties (e.g., pH, organic matter content, texture, and mineralogy), the type and concentration of contaminants, and the wastewater treatment methods applied. Further research across diverse soil types and environmental conditions is needed to better understand how RW contaminants influence microbial communities, enzyme activities, and overall soil health.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Dissolved nitrogen and organic carbon fluxes from urban stormwater runoff and rainfall into harmful algal bloom-prone waters: seasonal variability and insights into dissolved organic matter composition

  Water Research X · 2025-10-17

  articleOpen accessCorresponding

  Constraining the delivery window of labile nitrogen (N) and dissolved organic matter (DOM) loadings from rainfall and stormwater runoff is critical as these inputs can drive harmful algal blooms (HABs) and declines in water quality. Here, we quantified monthly and seasonal fluxes of dissolved N species and dissolved organic carbon (DOC) in rainfall and stormwater runoff to determine the timing of reactive DOM and N delivery to Tampa Bay, a highly urbanized estuary of national significance. Reactive DOM fractions were identified via fluorescence excitation-emission matrix-parallel factor analysis (EEM-PARAFAC). Rainfall and stormwater runoff samples were collected during forty storm events encompassing two wet and dry seasons from four urban residential sites which convey stormwater runoff directly into Tampa Bay. Overall, dissolved organic N (DON) was the dominant N form in runoff across all sites and seasons (up to 83%), and up to 57% of total N in rainfall samples. Fluxes of DON and DOC in runoff were the greatest in August – September, which can coincide with HABs in the bay. Rainfall was a source of labile proteinaceous DOM during the wet season only. Labile microbial humic- and protein-like DOM was observed only in the wet season in runoff and driven by increased imperviousness. Dry season DOM was recalcitrant humic and fulvic-like and driven by antecedent dry days. These results highlight the importance of nutrient flux monitoring and the utility of EEM-PARAFAC in identifying critical windows of labile DOM and N delivery which can be used for focused nutrient management efforts.

  PublisherDOI

• Inorganic nitrogen dynamics under cover crops in Florida’s sandy soils

  Nutrient Cycling in Agroecosystems · 2025-09-27 · 1 citations

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Identifying Priority Research Questions for Decentralized Wastewater

  Environmental Science & Technology · 2025-12-30 · 3 citations

  articleOpen access

  Decentralized wastewater treatment and reuse represent critical infrastructure across the rural-periurban-urban continuum around the world. Effective, efficient, resilient, and equitable implementation of on-premise technologies and management systems is part of a One Water approach and necessary to protect public health and the environment, yet inconsistent delivery of essential public health services persists in many regions, including across states, tribes, and territories of the United States. We initiated a groundbreaking effort to understand challenges and to identify research opportunities related to the science and practice of decentralized wastewater. A horizon scanning exercise using a bottom up and transparent key questions approach was performed in which research needs were submitted by over 450 professionals working in academia, government, industry, and nonprofit organizations. We then further considered these research needs through facilitated focus group discussions and identified priority research questions through a consensus process during an in-person synthesis workshop. These key questions included technical and management topics, which were partitioned among six research categories: treatment, performance, and resource recovery; resiliency, efficacy, and sustainability; environmental quality and public health; assessment, monitoring, and operation and maintenance; implementation; and regulations, enforcement, and environmental justice. We offer recommendations to answer the priority research questions presented here; doing so promises to advance the science and improve the practice across rural-periurban-urban gradients.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Improving Turfgrass Health: Proper Irrigation Techniques

  EDIS · 2025-09-15

  articleOpen access

  This guide is meant to inform homeowners and landscape personnel about common mistakes to avoid and the importance of using appropriate watering procedures when irrigating turfgrass to further promote the vitality of lawns.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Stormwater ponds: Unaccounted environmental challenges of a widely-adopted best management practice in urban landscapes

  Journal of Environmental Management · 2025-01-18 · 8 citations

  reviewOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Stormwater ponds (SWPs) are an increasingly common management tool for flood control and water quality protection in urban areas. They are designed to buffer the impacts to downstream environments caused by altered hydrologic, chemical, biological, and ecological processes in developed watersheds. While small in size, they can have disproportionately large impacts on watersheds because they store, transform, and release inputs of carbon (C) and nutrients, mainly nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P). In this review, we discuss how SWPs are not passive conveyances of nutrients and C, where minimal internal processing occurs. Rather, they are active hotspots of biogeochemical processing, with implications for downstream water quality protection. We highlight how processes of assimilation, sedimentation, erosion, filtration, remineralization and remobilization, gaseous transformations, and the activities of living organisms all transform nutrients and C in SWPs, sometimes making ponds net exporters of nutrients, rather than net sinks or removers, as is often believed. There are numerous unaccounted challenges in SWP management, such as in-pond processes that decouple pond effluent and influent quality; that sedimentation often fails as a proxy indicator for nutrient removal; how optimizing for removal of one nutrient (nitrogen or phosphorus) may reduce removal efficiencies of the other; or how nutrient removal strategies may be at odds with strategies to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions from SWPs. Our goal is to show that SWPs play large roles in constraining and mediating the fluxes of materials and energy in urban ecosystems and that their effluent water quality is driven not only by inflowing water quality but largely also by in-pond processes that warrant increased future research. • Stormwater ponds (SWPs) are increasingly common feature of urban landscapes. • SWPs do not meet nutrient removal targets. • Carbon, Nitrogen and Phosphorus inputs are transformed before downstream export. • Multiple internal, understudied processes regulate carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus dynamics. • Effectively managing C N, and P export via SWPs requires a better understanding of internal pond processes.

  PublisherDOI

• How to Use the Web Soil Survey to Find Information about Your Land

  EDIS · 2025-04-10 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  The purpose of this publication is to provide step-by-step guidance on how to find soil data about a given parcel of land in the Web Soil Survey. This publication can be used by residents, growers, gardeners, construction personnel, landscape managers, septic system installers and inspectors, and many others. Written by Mary G. Lusk, and published by the UF/IFAS Department of Soil, Water, and Ecosystem Sciences, February 2025.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Urban Nature Preserves as Habitats for Rare and Endemic Flora in a Scrubland and Pine Flatwoods Region of the Southeastern United States

  Diversity · 2024-11-20

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Florida, USA, has 215 endemic or near-endemic plant species, most of which are found in scrubland and pine flatwood habitats and some of which are globally threatened or endangered. Florida is also one of the most rapidly urbanizing states in the United States, and natural lands are being rapidly replaced by urban development in this state. Conservation easements and nature preserves are two tools for sustaining biodiversity in urbanizing landscapes. This collection of images documents observational research on rare and endemic wildflower species in the nature preserves of Hillsborough County, Florida (population of 1.5 million), part of the larger Tampa metropolitan area (population of 3.2 million). A two-year survey of wildflowers in 27 nature preserves dispersed throughout the county’s total 3.3 km2 area observed 410 species across 97 families. Of these 410 species, there were 19 species endemic to Florida, including the critically globally endangered Florida goldenaster (Chrysopsis floridana). Each of these endemic species relies on the unique soil and hydrologic conditions of the Florida scrubland and flatwood ecosystems, and preservation of these lands amidst urban development is critical for their conservation. The objective of this work is to document the role of the nature preserves as habitats for rare and endemic wildflower species, with the goal of providing science-based support for maintaining preserve land within and near urbanizing areas.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Gurpal S. Toor

  University of Maryland, College Park

  25 shared

• Andrew K. Koeser

  University of Florida

  9 shared

• Deborah R. Hilbert

  Purchase College

  9 shared

• Amanda Lorraine Muni-Morgan

  University of Florida

  9 shared

• Lisa Krimsky

  University of Florida

  8 shared

• Alexander J. Reisinger

  6 shared

• Yun‐Ya Yang

  Alameda Hospital

  6 shared

• Juma Bukomba

  University of Florida

  6 shared