Digital Commons Network^™

Classical Swine Fever Surveillance In Feral Swine, Seth R. Swafford, Brandon S. Schmit, Kerri Pedersen, Mark W. Lutman, Thomas J. Deliberto

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Diseases such as classical swine fever (CSF) and foot-and-mouth disease have been eradicated in the United States, but possible reintroductions merit the development of an enhanced surveillance system. Important foreign animal or transboundary diseases like these pose a significant risk to the health of wildlife and livestock in the United States. Wildlife Services (WS) performs surveillance in targeted feral swine (Sus scrofa) populations as part of a comprehensive United States Department of Agriculture, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service effort to demonstrate disease-free status in our nation's livestock and wildlife. Surveillance is based on risk assessments which identify …

Effect Of Deer Density On Breeding Birds In Delaware, Liz Tymkiw, J. L. Bowman, W. G. Shriver

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Previous research has suggested that high deer densities negatively impact bird communities. Most of this research was conducted using a very high deer density compared to no deer. Our research investigated deer impacts across a density gradient to determine an appropriate density for deer management efforts. Using Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) data from 2005- 2006 and Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) deer density data for the same time period, we compared avian richness and relative abundance for BBS points to deer density in Delaware. We divided deer densities into 3 categories: low (<12 deer/km²), medium …

Changing Attitudes, Troubled Times: Lessons Learned From Protected Species Management In Urban Environments, Sean P. Guinan

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

The United States is becoming increasingly urbanized, with nearly 80% of the American population currently residing in urban centers. This trend in human settlement patterns away from rural areas has coincided with a shift in human values and perceptions regarding the natural environment. Urban wildlife managers are therefore presented with unique challenges not experienced by managers of times past and are left having to blend principles of wildlife ecology within a changed ethical and sociological context. Standard wildlife management practices may not be appropriate for this shifting paradigm and there is an ever-increasing need for innovative and collaborative efforts that …

Evolving Bird Management Research At The Usda Wildlife Service's National Wildlife Research Center, Mark E. Tobin

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

As the methods-development arm of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Wildlife Services program, the National Wildlife Research Center (NWRC) is charged with developing tools and information for protecting agriculture, human health and safety, and property from problems caused by wildlife, including birds. Increasingly the NWRC is being asked to provide basic ecological information on the population status of various bird species, and its role is expanding from a reactive one of providing management options to that of predicting long-term implications of various management actions. This paper describes several areas of research by NWRC scientists to address population-level questions in support …

Dogs Gone Wild: Feral Dog Damage In The United States, David L. Bergman, Stewart W. Breck, Scott C. Bender

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Feral dogs have been documented in all 50 states and estimates of damage in the U.S. from these animals amount to >$620 million annually. In Texas alone, it is estimated that over $5 million in damage to livestock annually can be attributed to feral dogs. We reviewed national statistics on feral dog damage reported to USDA, APHIS, Wildlife Services for a 10-year period from 1997 through 2006. Damage by feral dogs crossed multiple resource categories (e.g., agriculture, natural resources); some examples of damage include killing and affecting the behavior and habitat use of native wildlife; killing and maiming livestock; and …

Vole Problems, Management Options, And Research Needs In The United States, Gary W. Witmer, Nathan P. Snow, L. Humberg, T. Salmon

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Voles (Microtus spp.) are ubiquitous to the northern hemisphere. Numerous species occur in North America and several species cause significant damage of various types: food crops, livestock forage production (e.g., alfalfa), nursery trees, reforestation, orchards, rangeland forage, and damage to lawns, golf courses and ground cover. Much research has been conducted with voles and a number of management options have been developed, including habitat manipulation, rodenticides, traps, repellents, barriers, supplemental feeding, and increased natural predation. However, significant damage still occurs because voles are not easily managed. Voles are small and secretive, prolific, active year-round, able to exploit refugia, and …

Human Dimensions Of Invasive Vertebrate Species Management, Gary W. Witmer, G. M. Keirn, N. Hawley, C. Martin, J. K. Reaser

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Invasive vertebrate species can cause substantial damage to natural resources, property, crops, livestock, and pose a disease hazard to humans, native wildlife and domestic animals. Numerous island species have become extinct or are threatened with extinction from invasive species. The high rate of invasive species introductions continues because of the large volumes of world trade and international travel. Humans are often responsible for introductions, but are also the key to their prevention, management, and eradication. However, many of the values and perceptions of invasive species vary among humans. Hence, the prevention and control of invasive vertebrates often requires adjusting human …

An Overview Of Double-Crested Cormorant Management To Protect Natural Resources In Michigan: The First Five Years (2004-2008), Peter H. Butchko, Mark Ebener

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Michigan, like other Great Lakes states, experienced a tremendous increase of double-crested cormorants (DCCO) in the 1990s that prompted substantial concern about their impacts on natural resources such as sport fish, nesting birds and vegetation. To address these issues, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued the Public Resource Depredation Order (PRDO) in November 2003 that created a new authority for managing DCCO damage. In this overview, we provide a summary of the collective implementation of the new authority by two agencies, i.e., USDA, Wildlife Services (WS) and five Native American governments for the first five years of PRDO in …

An Overview Of Historical Beaver Management In Arizona, Christopher D. Carrillo, David L. Bergman, Jimmy Taylor, Dale Nolte, Patrick Viehoever, Mike Disney

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

In the mid-1820s, Anglo-American fur trappers, known as "mountain men," entered Arizona and began trapping beaver (Castor canadensis). In Arizona there have been a number of famous mountain men such as Sylvester and James Pattie, Ewing Young, Jededia Smith, and Bill Williams who trapped along the waterways in northern and southern Arizona. Although the heyday of mountain men lasted only a few decades due to a population decline of beaver, management of these animals continues to this day. The purpose of managing beavers shifted from monetary gain to controlling wildlife damage. During the late 1900s, beaver were still …

Numerically Common, Functionally Rare: Difficulties In Detecting Urban Coyotes For Population Monitoring, Daniel A. Bogan, Paul D. Curtis, Geriann F. Albers

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

When monitoring wildlife for research and management, researchers must cope with methodological limitations associated with idiosyncrasies of animal behavioral ecology and operational constraints. In addition to wildlife behavioral limitations, urban lands present hurdles to researchers because of fragmentation of land ownership, and limited access to land parcels, which may preclude appropriate sampling strategies. Across the coyote's (Canis latrans) range, it is difficult to detect animals for robust, yet inexpensive population monitoring. We tested the efficacy of howling surveys to estimate coyote presence in an urbanized landscape, Westchester County, New York. This was an inexpensive, non-invasive sampling technique that …

Native And Naturalized Turf Species Suitable For Use On Airfields Managed For Wildlife Hazards In The Northeast, K. Dorsch, D. Vogler

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Habitat management is an important component of an integrated approach for reducing wildlife hazards on airfields. This research examines alternative turf species that are either native or naturalized in the northeastern United States. Many native turf species tend to not be attractive to wildlife due to their low palatability and seed production. These species may have uses on airfields, golf courses and in residential areas where geese and other wildlife are in conflict with humans. While the low seed productivity in some native species is a wildlife deterrent, this same trait is associated with poor establishment rates. Our goal was …

What Is New On The Animal Protection Radar?, John Hadidian

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

American attitudes toward wildlife have often been cast as falling within an urban/rural dichotomy that separates protectionist from utilitarian value orientations. Long held as a major challenge to wildlife managers, the urban/rural dichotomy may be yielding to change as new attitude and value orientations arise from direct conflicts people have with wild animals as well as from a generational disenfranchisement of young people who lack direct experience with the outdoors. Both may loom as larger challenges for the future and shift the focus of once opposing interests more toward efforts to establish cooperation. Currently, much of the disagreement over wildlife …

Integrating Lethal And Nonlethal Approaches For Management Of Suburban Deer, Jason R. Boulanger, Paul D. Curtis, Michael L. Ashdown

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Evaluations of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) population management in suburban landscapes has included debate over lethal control (e.g., sharp-shooting and hunting). These management techniques are often stymied by political impediments, safety concerns, and public attitudes. We are implementing the novel use of surgical sterilization in combination with hunting to mitigate deer-related impacts on Cornell University lands near Ithaca, New York. The project lands are composed of 2 zones: a suburban core campus area (446 ha) and adjacent outlying areas that contain agricultural fields and natural areas where deer hunting is permitted (582 ha). Surgical sterilization will be the …

Attitudes Of Students In A Wildlife Damage Management Class Towards Nuisance Wildlife Control, Michael T. Mengak, Craig A. Miller, Douglas I. Hall

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Students majoring in wildlife management at the University of Georgia have the option of enrolling in our Wildlife Damage Management course. Students participate in a variety of field activities associated with the laboratory portion of the class while also attending twice-weekly lectures on wildlife damage topics. Each spring at the beginning of the semester, students participate in a short survey to assess their opinions on various topics related to wildlife damage management. The same students participate in the same survey at the end of the semester. We have been collecting pre-and post-course data since 1994. Significantly more students agreed with …

Effect Of Goose Removals On A Suburban Canada Goose Population, Bryan L. Swift, Richard B. Chipman, Kenneth J. Preusser

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Local-nesting or "resident" Canada geese (Branta canadensis) are coming into conflict with people and human activities in urban-suburban areas throughout North America. Capture and removal of molting geese, followed by translocation or euthanasia, is a simple way to reduce the number of geese in an area, but some critics of lethal goose control methods claim that other geese will quickly fill the void left when geese are removed from a problem area. To better understand the effectiveness of urban-suburban goose removal programs, we captured 591 resident geese (mostly adult birds) in suburban Rockland County, New York, during the …

Evaluation Of A Floating Bird Diverter, W. Paul Gorenzel, Terrell P. Salmon, Craig Haffner

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Hazing at oil spills can reduce bird mortalities. This study evaluated the effectiveness of the Firefly Pond Diverter™ (Firefly Diverters LLC, Grantsville, UT), a device that floats on the water and is claimed to use motion, reflectivity, and ultraviolet (UV) and visible light emissions to alert and repel birds. The diverter could be useful at a spill, but little is known about how waterbirds would respond. The objectives of this study were to determine if waterbirds were repelled to a greater degree by the diverter compared to a simple novel object (a life ring), to identify the species that responded …

Trends In Summer Coyote And Wolf Predation On Sheep In Idaho During A Period Of Wolf Recovery, Alegra Galle, Mark Collinge, Richard Engeman

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Before the reintroduction of gray wolves (Canis lupus) to Idaho in 1995-1996, the primary depredation problem for livestock producers in summer was coyote (Canis latrans) predation on sheep and lambs. Since the reintroduction and biological recovery of wolves in Idaho, wolf predation on livestock has become a bigger problem in some areas than coyote predation. We evaluated trends in predation on sheep by coyotes and wolves in Idaho during the summer months, when most sheep are grazed on United States Forest Service (USFS) grazing allotments and are most vulnerable to wolf predation. An analysis of the available …

Hair Identification: The Mammalian Fingerprint, E. Santana

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Microscopic hair identification has been used as an analysis tool in a broad range of biological studies and has diverse applications in the fields of wildlife biology, anthropology, forensics, and natural resource management. Examining differences in cortex patterns, medulla characteristics, cuticular scale anatomy, shape, size, and color can be used to reliably identify mammalian guard hairs. Microscopic hair identification provides a diagnostic tool for identifying mammalian hair and has broad applications in the field of wildlife damage management. Hair collected from scent stations can provide presence confirmation and population density estimates on carnivores and ungulates, while hairs extracted from scats …

Investigations Into Earthworm Control On Airports, T. Seamans, G. Bernhardt, D. Steyer

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Earthworms, though generally considered beneficial for soil conditioning, can become a hazard at airports. When found in large numbers on runways or taxiways after heavy rainfall, they create slippery conditions for aircraft rolling over them. Additionally, earthworms attract birds, especially gulls, thereby increasing the risk of bird strikes to aircraft that are landing or taking off. For example, during a 35-minute period on 3 September 2004 at Calgary International Airport (YYC), a B737 of Westjet and an A319 of Air Canada aborted takeoffs after multiple strikes with gulls attracted to the runways to feed on earthworms. The B737 had strikes …

Removal Of Feral Cat Colonies From John F. Kennedy International Airport: Operational, Biological And Social Challenges, J. Waddell, L. Francoeur, L. Humberg

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Feral cats (Felis catus) have been present at John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) for approximately five years. Feral cats pose several zoonotic health risks, impact native wildlife, and interfere with airport operations. At the request of airport staff, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Animal Plant and Health Inspection Service, Wildlife Services conducted a cat-trapping effort between November 2007 and December 2008. Cats were live-trapped and surrendered to local animal control services where they were vaccinated, micro-chipped, and offered up for adoption. Due to the history of the colony, local cat advocacy groups expressed discontent with the removal efforts. …

Evaluation Of An Electronic Device For Reducing Damage By Pileated Woodpeckers To Wooden Utility Poles, Shelagh K. Tupper, John L. Cummings, William F. Andelt, Richard E. Harness

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Woodpecker damage to utility poles results in significant economic losses to utility companies. Pileated woodpeckers (Dryocopus pileatus), one of the largest woodpeckers in North America, can severely damage utility poles. Many types of repellent techniques have been evaluated for managing pileated woodpecker damage to utility poles. However, each technique has short-comings including cost, difficulty of installation, longevity of the product, or defeat by the woodpeckers. The Sonic Dissuader, a deterrent device, has shown some promise in field testing. We further evaluated the effectiveness of the device for deterring pileated woodpeckers from damaging utility poles in controlled flight pens …

Is America Ready For A Humane Feral Pig Toxicant?, Steven Lapidge, Jason Wishart, Michelle Smith, Linton Staples

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

In 2005 the Invasive Animals Cooperative Research Centre undertook an extensive literature review in an attempt to discover possible pharmacological weaknesses of pigs that could be inherently targeted with specific chemicals. For a chemical to have utility it ideally had to be: safe for human operators, highly toxic to pigs, bait deliverable, target specific, humane, residue-less, reversible, inexpensive, already registered for other purposes, patentable, acceptable to trading partners, and have a well documented toxicological profile. Numerous weaknesses and associated candidate chemicals were discovered, but only one, sodium nitrite, proved appropriate in gavage and bait delivery proof-of-concept pen trials. This paper …

Retrospective Barrier Placements For A Skunk Rabies Epizootic In Nw Wyoming, C. Ramey, K. Mills, R. Mclean, R. Engeman, J. Fischer

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

Striped skunks (Mephitis mephitis) are the most important reservoir of rabies on the Great Plains. In August, 1988 a skunk rabies epizootic proceeded from the "index case" west of Cowley, WY. By 1991, epizootic had reached nearly all areas in the Shoshone River Basin (SRB), and it ended in 1993. This area and the remainder of the SRB had been previously considered rabies-free. The USDA's Wildlife Services (WS) cooperated with state and local officials in a rabies monitoring and control program starting in 1990. Using information from the literature, signs, tracks, and radio-telemetry of normal and rabid skunks, …

An Overview Of The International Beaver Ecology And Management Workshop, Jimmy D. Taylor Ii, David L. Bergman, Dale L. Nolte

Wildlife Damage Management Conference

On 9-12 October 2007, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, Wildlife Services (WS) hosted the International Beaver Ecology and Management Workshop in Chandler, Arizona. The workshop was jointly sponsored by the Multi-City Sub-Regional Operations Group (SROG), Tres Rios Ecosystem Restoration and Flood Control Project and WS. The SROG management is comprised of representatives from the cities of Phoenix, Mesa, Glendale, Scottsdale, and Tempe. The workshop emphasized the management of beaver, their ecology, the part they play as a keystone species, and the issues they cause as an invasive species outside of the United States. The …

Characterizing Subsurface Textural Properties Using Electromagnetic Induction Mapping And Geostatistics, Hiruy Abdu

T.W. "Doc" Daniel Experimental Forest

No abstract provided.

Sagestep News, Spring 2009, No. 9, Sagestep

Newsletters

Seasonal newsletter of SageSTEP.

Utah State University Commencement, 2009 – Main Campus, Utah State University

Commencement Programs

121st Annual Commencement of Utah State University

The Effectiveness Of Institutional Intervention At Minimizing Demographic Inertia And Improving The Representation Of Women Faculty In Higher Education, Amanda V. Bakian

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Across all science and engineering disciplines, women currently receive 46% of the doctoral degrees granted annually. Despite gains in doctoral degrees earned by women over the past 30 years, they remain under-represented among full time tenured /tenure-track science and engineering faculty compared to their presence among degree recipients. The inequality gap is widest among full professors at 4 year research universities where women account for a mere 16% of all S&E full time full professors. Multiple hypothesis have been proposed to account for women's under-representation relative to men including those based on human capital/economic theory, feminist theory, innate biological gender …

Alternative Futures 2030: Ogden Valley, Louis Alan Hurst

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Ogden Valley is a high mountain community located in the northern Wasatch Mountain Range (Figure 1), and is located entirely within Weber County, Utah. Three communities sit within the valley: Huntsville, Eden, and Liberty. Early Mormon settlers established these communities in the mid-1800s; however, only the town of Huntsville is incorporated. The rural valley is in close proximity to the densely populated Wasatch Front, in particular, Ogden City. Ogden Valley is approximately 331 square miles and has an elevation that ranges between 4400 and 9700 feet. This wide range in elevation provides a diverse environment for humans, wildlife , and …

Patterns Of Psychosocial Functioning And Mental Health Service Utilization In Children And Adolescents With Chronic Health Conditions Or Physical Disabilities, Sara M. Hunt

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study was designed to further understand the psychosocial functioning of youth with chronic health conditions or physical disabilities, their need for and use of mental health services, and possible barriers to receiving needed services. Previous research has suggested these youth experience poorer psychosocial functioning compared to peers without special health care needs, and they also underutilize needed mental health services. A mixed-methods design was implemented consisting of a quantitative parent survey and a qualitative semistructured interview with young adults with special health care needs.

Children demonstrating poorer psychosocial adjustment in this study experienced more problems related to social functioning …