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Articles 1 - 14 of 14
Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences
Using Spatial Methods To Analyse Anthropogenic Predation Risk And Movement Ecology Of White-Tailed Deer (Odocoileus Virginianus), Rhiannon D. Kirton
Using Spatial Methods To Analyse Anthropogenic Predation Risk And Movement Ecology Of White-Tailed Deer (Odocoileus Virginianus), Rhiannon D. Kirton
Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository
Hunting has been used as a central tool by wildlife managers to maintain populations of game species, however, we still lack a good understanding of exactly how hunting influences deer biology. Technological advances in GPS data over the last two decades now enable us to perform more detailed analysis on the effects of human hunters on wildlife populations. This research explores the spatial ecology of hunters and White-tailed deer in the Cross Timbers ecoregion of Oklahoma. Using new statistical methodologies to analyse simultaneous GPS tracking data on deer and hunters to study their spatial interactions. The results show how new …
Body Mass And Body Condition Variation Of Mallards (Anas Platyrhynchos) Within And Among Winters Within The Lower Mississippi Alluvial Valley, John Thompson Veon
Body Mass And Body Condition Variation Of Mallards (Anas Platyrhynchos) Within And Among Winters Within The Lower Mississippi Alluvial Valley, John Thompson Veon
Graduate Theses and Dissertations
Most North American waterfowl overwinter in southern North America before migrating back to breeding grounds in the northern US and Canada. These species face the challenge of needing to maintain or increase their body mass during an environmentally difficult winter period. Successful body mass maintenance during the winter period has major ramifications not only for their winter survival but for their fitness across the entire year. Recent research in Europe and the western United States suggests that the body mass of mallards (Anas platyrhynchos) has increased from the late 1960s to early 2000s. However, the factors responsible for increases in …
Resource Allocation And Phenotypic Plasticity Of Simultaneous Hermaphroditic Turtle Barnacles (Chelonibia Testudinaria), Kevin C. Cash
Resource Allocation And Phenotypic Plasticity Of Simultaneous Hermaphroditic Turtle Barnacles (Chelonibia Testudinaria), Kevin C. Cash
All HCAS Student Capstones, Theses, and Dissertations
This research addresses the knowledge gap of phenotypic plasticity in a commonly found and important species of epizoic barnacle, Chelonibia testudinaria. Limited research has been published regarding how phenotypic expression is mediated the spatial distribution of barnacles on a mobile host. To investigate this potential relationship, barnacles were collected from the backs of turtles along the beaches of Fort Lauderdale Florida. These barnacles were assessed for various phenotypic traits as well as their corresponding spatial distribution on the turtle carapace. Barnacles were safely removed from the carapace using a chisel before their preservation in ethanol. Barnacles were then numbered …
Machine Learning For Species Habitat Analysis, Abigail Lavallin
Machine Learning For Species Habitat Analysis, Abigail Lavallin
USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations
Management and conservation initiatives will always be controlled by finite resources, whether financialor temporal. Understanding a species’ spatial ecology, and how its requirements vary across habitats and locations is key to a successful species management plan. During recent decades, it has been noted how many species populations have declined, despite conservation practices working to increase their numbers. The most prevalent impacts affecting fauna populations have come from anthropogenic change in the form of habitat loss and destruction, along with fragmentation, and global climate change. There is a clear need for management practices to now operate on an entire landscape instead …
Observations Of Post-Wildfire Landcover Trends In Boreal Alaska Using A Suite Of Remote Sensing Approaches, Eric John Deutsch
Observations Of Post-Wildfire Landcover Trends In Boreal Alaska Using A Suite Of Remote Sensing Approaches, Eric John Deutsch
Theses - ALL
Wildfires are a common occurrence in the boreal ecosystems of the Pacific Northwest. Studies suggest that anthropogenic climate change has fostered more frequent and higher severity fires in recent decades in these forests, which may result in substantial changes in vegetation structure and ecosystem functioning. However, large-scale studies examining the linkages between changing boreal wildfire regimes and vegetation structure have historically been limited in spatial scope due to the broad area and inaccessibility of many boreal regions, including the Alaskan interior. The development and advancement of satellite remote sensing instruments and geospatial analysis techniques provide researchers with unmatched abilities to …
Landscape Population And Evolutionary Genomics Of Several Closely Related Species Of Mallard-Like Ducks, Joshua Brown
Landscape Population And Evolutionary Genomics Of Several Closely Related Species Of Mallard-Like Ducks, Joshua Brown
Open Access Theses & Dissertations
Divergence and speciation proceed through three major evolutionary forces (i.e., selection, genetic drift, and gene flow) that are often spatially and temporally heterogeneous across the landscape. Moreover, these forces can have differing but subtle effects within the genomes of diverging taxa, and therefore, disentangling the effects of these evolutionary mechanisms throughout the speciation process can be challenging. Here, I use a recent species radiation, the mallard complex, to investigate how strong, yet varied, evolutionary pressures influence the speciation process. The mallard complex consists of 14 mallard-like waterfowl species around the world that have some of the highest rates of hybridization …
A Year In Syntropy: Exploring Syntropic Agriculture, Ajah Eills
A Year In Syntropy: Exploring Syntropic Agriculture, Ajah Eills
College Honors Program
Syntropic agriculture is a form of sustainable agriculture that originated in Brazil around 25 years ago. Although it has since spread throughout Brazil and Australia, there has yet to be a comprehensive study of the driving scientific principles behind syntropy. For my thesis, I conducted literature research and interviews with farmers, with the goal of describing the ecological principles on which syntropy is based, including its primary goal to improve soil health. Much of my thesis contrasted syntropic agriculture with conventional agriculture as practiced in the United States today, but I also explored the differences between syntropic agriculture and other …
The Effects Of Urbanization On The Avian Gut Microbiome, Mae Berlow
The Effects Of Urbanization On The Avian Gut Microbiome, Mae Berlow
Doctoral Dissertations
The gut microbiome influences and is influenced by the host, and can affect the host organism by contributing to health, development and immunity. Similarly, the host can influence this community; it’s makeup can vary with host species, locality, diet, social stressors, and environmental stressors. Some of these environmental stressors have arisen due to human-induced rapid environmental change, like urbanization. The physiology and behaviors of organisms that are able to persist in urban environments are often different from their non-urban congeners. Nutrition, development, and immunity—all of which are affected by the gut microbiome—are important factors that can determine survival in urban …
Incorporating Demographic Structure And Variable Interaction Types Into Community Assembly Models, Akhil Reddy Alasandagutti, Nayan Chawla
Incorporating Demographic Structure And Variable Interaction Types Into Community Assembly Models, Akhil Reddy Alasandagutti, Nayan Chawla
Honors Theses
Theoretical studies of ecological food webs have allowed ecologists to remove the constraints of specific location and timescales from their study of ecological communities; food webs are generally complex and thus empirical study is difficult. Further, this theoretical approach allows ecologists to compare ecological processes and outcomes across any possible food web structures. However, these simulated communities are only as useful as the model from which they were constructed. Modifying existing considerations in these models, and generating new ones, are the jobs of theoretical ecologists that seek to achieve the shared goal of a majority of simulations: representation of real …
Distributions And Habitat Associations Of Blue Point Pyrgulopsis And Blue Point Tryonia, Chenoa Janine Wilcox
Distributions And Habitat Associations Of Blue Point Pyrgulopsis And Blue Point Tryonia, Chenoa Janine Wilcox
UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones
Springsnails and other crenophilic species are often of conservation concern due to endemism, narrow habitat requirements, and susceptibility to habitat degradation. Because there is a distinct lack of natural history information for many of these organisms, management of species that are of concern is often based on data from non-target species related to the species of interest. In this thesis, I provide background information regarding springsnails in western North America (Chapter 1), describe a study investigating the distribution and habitat associations of two springsnails endemic to a single spring (Chapter 2), and provide supplemental information on habitat characteristics associated with …
Monitoring Relationships Between Corticosterone And Snake Fungal Disease In Timber Rattlesnakes (Crotalus Horridus) In Western Kentucky, John Bromley Hewlett
Monitoring Relationships Between Corticosterone And Snake Fungal Disease In Timber Rattlesnakes (Crotalus Horridus) In Western Kentucky, John Bromley Hewlett
Murray State Theses and Dissertations
Over the past four decades, emergent fungal diseases have been the most devastating relative to species declines and extinctions. While most research has focused on fungal diseases affecting amphibians and bats, less has focused on diseases like snake fungal disease (SFD), caused by Ophidiomyces ophiodiicola (Oo). SFD was first described in 2006 in North America within a Timber rattlesnake (Crotalus horridus) population in New Hampshire. Since then SFD has been documented in 19 US states, one US territory (Puerto Rico), and Europe. SFD causes high mortality in some species, including the Eastern Massasauga rattlesnakes (Sistrurus …
Clarifying Patterns In Host Plant Use By Adelpha Butterflies (Nymphalidae: Limenitidinae), Karina Torres
Clarifying Patterns In Host Plant Use By Adelpha Butterflies (Nymphalidae: Limenitidinae), Karina Torres
University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations
The remarkable diversity of plant-feeding insects could be explained by the dynamics of their plant associations, where host plant shifts and specialization onto a small fraction of available plants may promote diversification. Neotropical Adelpha butterflies contain a large number of species, and previous work indicated the colonization of a novel host plant family (Rubiaceae) fueled its rapid diversification. However, accumulating host records indicate wide taxonomic host breadth at family level and below. Here, we categorize Adelpha diet breadth based on known host plant relationships across the Neotropics and from Costa Rica, Ecuador and Brazil. We also use a diet breadth …
Ecological Repentance, Emmanuel Salem
Ecological Repentance, Emmanuel Salem
Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects
In an age ripe with discovery and analysis regarding anthropogenic pollution and the resultant climate change, a causal ideological explanation is naturally sought. This paper seeks to delve deep into the Christian religion and its relationship to the current climate crisis, as well as discuss whether or not predictions and speculative assertions professed in the famous essay by Lynn White, Historical Roots of our Ecological Crisis, hold up when surveyed with a more critical and thorough evaluative lens. This conversation is undertaken under three core considerations: biblical cosmology, what has happened in the world of Christian bioethics since White’s time, …
Measuring The Success Of A Coastal Sand Dune Restoration On Tybee Island: Plant Growth, Sand Accretion, And Implications For Management, Shannon Matzke
Measuring The Success Of A Coastal Sand Dune Restoration On Tybee Island: Plant Growth, Sand Accretion, And Implications For Management, Shannon Matzke
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Coastal communities are developing rapidly in the face of increased risks of sea level rise and hurricanes stemming from anthropogenic climate change. In the US, erosion is projected to cost $530 million/year in property loss, but beaches and dune systems can minimize these losses. Dunes are vital to coastal protection, particularly when they are colonized by native plant species that stabilize sand with their root systems and accumulate sand by trapping particles with their stems and leaves. Dune construction can be used as a nature-based solution to climate change, but more studies are needed to fully understand the best practices …