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Full-Text Articles in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Initial Assessment And Effects Of Snake Fungal Disease On Populations Of Snakes In Kentucky, Jennifer Mckenzie
Initial Assessment And Effects Of Snake Fungal Disease On Populations Of Snakes In Kentucky, Jennifer Mckenzie
Theses and Dissertations--Forestry and Natural Resources
Pathogenic fungi are increasingly associated with epidemics in wildlife populations and represent a significant threat to global biodiversity. Snake fungal disease is an emerging disease caused by the fungus, Ophidiomyces ophiodiicola, and appears to be widespread in the eastern United States. Yet an evaluation of field diagnostics, and an understanding of the population-level consequences of the disease, are lacking. First, I evaluated the use of clinical signs to predict the presence of O. ophiodiicola across season and snake habitat affiliation (aquatic or terrestrial) and I compared two sampling methods to see if collection method impacts PCR result. Overall, snakes with …
Diet And Space Use Of The Martial Eagle (Polemaetus Bellicosus) In The Maasai Mara Region Of Kenya, Richard Stratton Hatfield
Diet And Space Use Of The Martial Eagle (Polemaetus Bellicosus) In The Maasai Mara Region Of Kenya, Richard Stratton Hatfield
Theses and Dissertations--Forestry and Natural Resources
The martial eagle (Polemaetus bellicosus) is a vulnerable species that is declining throughout large portions of its range. There is an urgent need to improve understanding of this species’ ecology to inform its conservation. I equipped 20 adult martial eagles with global positioning system backpack transmitters to characterize diet and space use of the species in the Maasai Mara region of Kenya. The resulting high-resolution transmitter data sets allowed for the rapid location of kills and provided a means to estimate home range size. From November 2016 to April 2018, 191 kills were identified from 206 kill location …