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Blooming wildflowers in Pinnacles National Park.

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Tricolored Heron at Ding Darling National Park

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Yellow-billed Loon on a lake in the northern area of Alaska.

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Filter Total Items: 3984

Attributes of seasonal home range influence choice of migratory strategy in white-tailed deer

Partial migration is a common life-history strategy among ungulates living in seasonal environments. The decision to migrate or remain on a seasonal range may be influenced strongly by access to high-quality habitat. We evaluated the influence of access to winter habitat of high quality on the probability of a female white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) migrating to a separate summer range a
Authors
Charles R. Henderson, Michael S. Mitchell, Woodrow L. Myers, Paul M. Lukacs, Gerald P. Nelson
By
Cooperative Research Units

Nonbreeding home‐range size and survival of lesser prairie‐chickens

The lesser prairie‐chicken (Tympanuchus pallidicinctus), a species of conservation concern with uncertain regulatory status, has experienced population declines over the past century. Most research on lesser prairie‐chickens has focused on the breeding season, with little research conducted during the nonbreeding season, a period that exerts a strong influence on demography in other upland game bi
Authors
Samantha G. Robinson, David A. Haukos, Reid T. Plumb, Joseph M. Lautenbach, Daniel S. Sullins, John D. Kraft, Jonathan D. Lautenbach, Christian A. Hagen, James C. Pitman
By
Cooperative Research Units

Vertical self-sorting behavior in juvenile Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha): evidence for family differences and variation in growth and morphology

Life history variation is fundamental to the evolution of Pacific salmon and their persistence under variable conditions. We discovered that Chinook salmon sort themselves into surface- and bottom-oriented groups in tanks within days after exogenous feeding. We hypothesised that this behaviour is correlated with subsequent differences in body morphology and growth (as measured by final length and
Authors
Julia R. Unrein, E.J. Billman, Karen M. Cogliati, Rob S. Chitwood, David L. G. Noakes, Carl B. Schreck
By
Cooperative Research Units

Three-dimensional foraging habitat use and niche partitioning in two sympatric seabird species, Phalacrocorax auritus and P. penicillatus

Ecological theory predicts that co-existing, morphologically similar species will partition prey resources when faced with resource limitations. We investigated local movements, foraging dive behavior, and foraging habitat selection by breeding adults of 2 closely related cormorant species, double-crested cormorants Phalacrocorax auritus and Brandt’s cormorants P. penicillatus. These species nest
Authors
Adam G. Peck-Richardson, Donald E. Lyons, Daniel D. Roby, Daniel A. Cushing, James A. Lerczak
By
Cooperative Research Units

Moving in the Anthropocene: Global reductions in terrestrial mammalian movements

Animal movement is fundamental for ecosystem functioning and species survival, yet the effects of the anthropogenic footprint on animal movements have not been estimated across species. Using a unique GPS-tracking database of 803 individuals across 57 species, we found that movements of mammals in areas with a comparatively high human footprint were on average one-half to one-third the extent of t
Authors
Marlee A. Tucker, Katrin Böhning-Gaese, William F. Fagan, John Fryxell, Bram Van Moorter, Susan C Alberts, Abdullahi H. Ali, Andrew M. Allen, Nina Attias, Tal Avgar, Hattie Bartlam-Brooks, Buuveibaatar Bayarbaatar, Jerrold L. Belant, Alessandra Bertassoni, Dean Beyer, Laura Bidner, Floris M. van Beest, Stephen Blake, Niels Blaum, Chloe Bracis, Danielle Brown, P. J. Nico de Bruyn, Francesca Cagnacci, J.M. Calabrese, Constança Camilo-Alves, Simon Chamaillé-Jammes, Andre Chiaradia, Sarah C. Davidson, Todd Dennis, Stephen DeStefano, Duane R. Diefenbach, Iain Douglas-Hamilton, Julian Fennessy, Claudia Fichtel, Wolfgang Fiedler, Christina Fischer, Ilya Fischhoff, Christen H. Fleming, Adam T. Ford, Susanne A. Fritz, Benedikt Gehr, Jacob R. Goheen, Eliezer Gurarie, Mark Hebblewhite, Marco Heurich, A. J. Mark Hewison, Christian Hof, Edward Hurme, Lynne A. Isbell, René Janssen, Florian Jeltsch, Petra Kaczensky, Adam Kane, Peter M. Kappeler, Matthew J. Kauffman, Roland Kays, Duncan Kimuyu, Flavia Koch, Bart Kranstauber, Scott LaPoint, Peter Leimgruber, John D. C. Linnell, Pascual López-López, A. Catherine Markham, Jenny Mattisson, Emilia Patricia Medici, Ugo Mellone, E. Merrill, Guilherme de Miranda Mourão, Ronaldo G. Morato, Nicolas Morellet, Thomas A. Morrison, Samuel L. Díaz-Muñoz, Atle Mysterud, Dejid Nandintsetseg, Ran Nathan, Aidin Niamir, John Odden, Robert B. O'Hara, Luiz G. R. Oliveira-Santos, Kirk A. Olson, Bruce D. Patterson, Rogerio Cunha de Paula, Luca Pedrotti, Björn Reineking, Martin Rimmler, T. L. Rogers, Christer Moe Rolandsen, Christopher S. Rosenberry, Daniel I. Rubenstein, Kamran Safi, Sonia Saïd, Nir Sapir, Hall Sawyer, Niels Martin Schmidt, Nuria Selva, Agnieszka Sergiel, Enkhtuvshin Shiilegdamba, João Paulo Silva, N. Singh, Erling J. Solberg, Orr Spiegel, Olav Strand, S.R. Sundaresan, Wiebke Ullmann, Ulrich Voigt, J. Wall, David W. Wattles, Martin Wikelski, Christopher C. Wilmers, John W. Wilson, George Wittemyer, Filip Zięba, Tomasz Zwijacz-Kozica, Thomas Mueller
By
Cooperative Research Units

Hematological indices of injury to lightly oiled birds from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill

Avian mortality events are common following large‐scale oil spills. However, the sublethal effects of oil on birds exposed to light external oiling are not clearly understood. We found that American oystercatchers (area of potential impact n = 42, reference n = 21), black skimmers (area of potential impact n = 121, reference n = 88), brown pelicans (area of potential impact n = 91, reference n = 4
Authors
Jesse A. Fallon, Eric P. Smith, Nina Schoch, James D. Paruk, Evan A. Adams, David C. Evers, Patrick G.R. Jodice, Christopher Perkins, Shiloh A. Schulte, William A. Hopkins
By
Cooperative Research Units, Species Management Research Program, Gulf of Mexico

Seventy years of stream‐fish collections reveal invasions and native range contractions in an Appalachian (USA) watershed

AimKnowledge of expanding and contracting ranges is critical for monitoring invasions and assessing conservation status, yet reliable data on distributional trends are lacking for most freshwater species. We developed a quantitative technique to detect the sign (expansion or contraction) and functional form of range‐size changes for freshwater species based on collections data, while accounting fo
Authors
Joseph D. Buckwalter, Emmanuel A. Frimpong, Paul L. Angermeier, Jacob N. Barney
By
Cooperative Research Units

Examining fluvial fish range loss with SDMs

Fluvial fishes face increased imperilment from anthropogenic activities, but the specific factors contributing most to range declines are often poorly understood. For example, the range of the fluvial‐specialist shoal bass (Micropterus cataractae) continues to decrease, yet how perceived threats have contributed to range loss is largely unknown. We used species distribution models to determine whi
Authors
Andrew T. Taylor, Monica Papeş, James M. Long
By
Cooperative Research Units

Effect of fishing effort on catch rate and catchability of largemouth bass in small impoundments

Largemouth bass Micropterus salmoides (Lacepède) catch rates decline with sustained fishing effort, even without harvest. It is unclear why declines in catch rate occur, and little research has been directed at how to improve catch rate. Learning has been proposed as a reason for declining catch rate, but has never been tested on largemouth bass. If catch rate declines because fish learn to avoid
Authors
M. G. Wegener, Harold Schramm, J. W. Neal, P.D. Gerard
By
Cooperative Research Units

Monitoring dynamic spatio-temporal ecological processes optimally

Population dynamics vary in space and time. Survey designs that ignore these dynamics may be inefficient and fail to capture essential spatio‐temporal variability of a process. Alternatively, dynamic survey designs explicitly incorporate knowledge of ecological processes, the associated uncertainty in those processes, and can be optimized with respect to monitoring objectives. We describe a cohesi
Authors
Perry J. Williams, Mevin Hooten, Jamie N. Womble, George G. Esslinger, Michael R. Bower
By
Cooperative Research Units

Evaluation of a decoy-only public good hunting opportunity in central South Dakota: The role of harvest success on hunter satisfaction

An important measure of success for wildlife managers is hunter satisfaction, and it often has been assumed that harvest success is related to satisfaction and may even be a surrogate measure for hunter satisfaction. However, introduction of the multiple satisfactions concept, showing that hunters seek and receive a number of benefits from hunting in addition to harvest success, has directed resea
Authors
Larry M. Gigliotti
By
Cooperative Research Units

The use of remote camera trapping to study cheetahs

Remote camera trapping is an efficient noninvasive technique for monitoring rare and elusive species, such as cheetahs. The unique pelage pattern of cheetahs allows for identification of individuals from photographs, providing detection histories that are naturally suited for abundance estimation using capture–recapture methods. Furthermore, the spatial location of photographic detections allows f
Authors
Ezequiel Fabiano, Lorraine Boast, Angela K. Fuller, Chris Sutherland
By
Cooperative Research Units