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Full-Text Articles in Animal Sciences
Vertebrate Scavenger Diversity And Ecosystem Services Along An Elevational Gradient In Central Nepal, Aishwarya Bhattacharjee
Vertebrate Scavenger Diversity And Ecosystem Services Along An Elevational Gradient In Central Nepal, Aishwarya Bhattacharjee
Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
A growing number of studies recognize the ecological significance of vertebrate scavengers, and several species belonging to this diverse, functional guild are of high conservation importance around the globe. Studies on taxonomic and functional components of biodiversity often use elevation gradients to comprehensively examine patterns and drivers across multiple spatial scales. Yet, there are relatively few elevational studies on large vertebrates or multi-taxa guilds, and the related variation of their ecosystem services. In particular, scavenger research has largely focused on local-scale studies or regional/global comparisons of local-scale investigations. Moreover, these studies primarily consider taxonomic community characteristics and the patterns of …
Environmental Controls On The Spatial Distribution Of Greenfin Darters And Biodiversity In The Blue Ridge Mountains, Dri Tattersfield
Environmental Controls On The Spatial Distribution Of Greenfin Darters And Biodiversity In The Blue Ridge Mountains, Dri Tattersfield
CMC Senior Theses
Disproportionate concentrations of biodiversity in mountains worldwide suggest linkages between geologic processes and biodiversity that are not yet well understood. The Tennessee River Basin in the Blue Ridge Mountains of the southeastern U.S. is a global hotspot for freshwater fish biodiversity. To investigate drivers of biodiversity in the Tennessee River Basin, and explore links to geologic processes, I study the Greenfin Darter (Nothonotus chlorobranchius), a small fish endemic to the upper Tennessee River Basin. I use generalized linear models (GLMs) to evaluate the influence of topography, lithology, climate and land use on the distribution of the Greenfin Darter, …
Mammal Species Inventory Using Various Trapping Methods In Zone 4 Of Billy Barquedier National Park, Belize During Rainy Season, Mersady Redding
Mammal Species Inventory Using Various Trapping Methods In Zone 4 Of Billy Barquedier National Park, Belize During Rainy Season, Mersady Redding
Animal Science Undergraduate Honors Theses
Belize is a small country, but it is extremely ecologically diverse. Based on the few studies conducted in Belize, the abundance of mammals is low but diversity is high. Particular findings note the number and identity of species differed between four sites in the Maya Mountains of Belize, indicating that a data set from a single site is not representative of the Neotropical region. Insufficient data is available to estimate current species richness of many areas in Belize, including Billy Barquedier National Park (BBNP). The objective of this study was to explore trapping and documentation methods of terrestrial mammals in …
Where Birds Chill: An Assessment Of The Habitat Preferences Of Birds Overwintering In Hudson Valley Forests, Elizabeth Claire Axley
Where Birds Chill: An Assessment Of The Habitat Preferences Of Birds Overwintering In Hudson Valley Forests, Elizabeth Claire Axley
Senior Projects Spring 2019
Many avian species overwinter in eastern North America; however, studies on bird populations are rarely undertaken during this critical survival time, and little is known as to their habitat preferences and foraging behavior. In this observational study, we performed a survey of birds overwintering in the Hudson Valley’s temperate, primarily-deciduous forests, assessing avian populations’ habitat preferences through the vegetative structural variables surrounding overwintering birds as they forage. Our results suggest that high canopy cover is critically important to predicting overwintering bird occupancy on a microhabitat scale. Moreover, overwintering birds preferentially occupy forest plots not dominated by sugar maples, in spite …
The Bee Fauna Of The Horse Mountain And Grouse Mountain Region, Humboldt County, California, Carrie Lopez
The Bee Fauna Of The Horse Mountain And Grouse Mountain Region, Humboldt County, California, Carrie Lopez
Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects
Recent concerns about the ecological well-being of bee communities in California and elsewhere have increased the need for monitoring programs and studies that evaluate the impact of habitat loss and alteration on bee diversity and abundance. Such studies depend critically on the expertise of people trained in taxonomy, but their numbers have declined in recent years. My primary goal was to gain a comprehensive first-hand experience with bee identification by documenting the fauna of a previously unstudied area in the mountains of northwestern California and by writing an identification key, intended for dedicated non-specialists, to the area’s 35 species of …
Integrating, Developing, And Testing Methods To Generate More Cohesive Approaches To Biogeographic Inference, Mallory Elizabeth Eckstut
Integrating, Developing, And Testing Methods To Generate More Cohesive Approaches To Biogeographic Inference, Mallory Elizabeth Eckstut
UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones
As a fundamental component of the developing discipline of conservation biogeography, broadscale analyses of biotic assembly and disassembly across multiple temporal and spatial scales provide an enhanced understanding of how geologic transformations and climate oscillations have shaped extant patterns of biodiversity. As with any scientific field, there are limitations in the case of biogeographic historical reconstructions. Historical reconstructions are only as robust as the theoretical underpinnings of the methods of reconstruction (including data collection, quality, analysis, and interpretation). Nevertheless, historical reconstructions of species distributions can help inform our understanding of how species respond to environmental change.
My dissertation takes a …