Animal Sciences Commons^™

Evaluation Of Water Sanitation Options For Poultry Production, Pramir Maharjan

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

An evaluation of poultry farm water supplies was conducted to determine the value and impact of water system sanitation practices in commercial broiler houses on microbial levels. Water line cleaning between flocks using concentrated disinfectant solution before placing chicks reduced biofilms retained in the lines to a safe level. Occasional microbial surges were noticed during different points of flock grow-out period even when daily water sanitation was present indicating water is highly susceptible to microbial contamination. However, the daily water sanitation practice controlled the occasional microbial surges in water from sustaining and kept drinking water to a microbiologically acceptable level. …

Experimental Confirmation That Avian Plumage Traits Function As Multiple Status Signals In Winter Contests, Alexis S. Chaine, Allison M. Roth, Daizaburo Shizuka, Bruce E. Lyon

School of Biological Sciences: Faculty Publications

Status signals are thought to reduce costs of overt conflict over resources by advertising social status or an individual’s ability to win contests. While most studies have focused on single badges of status, recent empirical work has shown that multiple status signals may exist. To provide robust evidence for multiple badges of status, an experimental manipulation is required to decouple signals from one another and from other traits linked to fighting ability. Such experimental evidence is lacking for most studies of multiple status signals to date. We previously found that two plumage traits in golden-crowned sparrows, Zonotrichia atricapilla, were correlated …

Oral Presentation Abstracts By Day And Symposium From The 11th International Mammalogical Congress (Belfast, Northern Ireland : August 11-16, 2013), International Mammalogical Congress

University of Nebraska State Museum: Mammalogy Papers

About IMC

IMC returns to Europe after 24 years at a time when IUCN has identified 25% mammal species as at risk. As a venue to share concerns, concepts and techniques among professional mammalogists, IMC has never been more relevant. IMC11 Organising Committee hopes to welcome colleagues with diverse interests in the biology, conservation and management of mammals from throughout the world. IMC11 will encourage active participation in the Congress program by maximising time for spoken papers and posters offered by delegates.

Queen's University Belfast is the venue and are pleased to host the 11th International Mammalogical Congress on behalf …

Exploitation Of Channel Catfish In Nebraska Flood-Control Reservoirs, Christopher Lee Wiley

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Channel catfish Ictalurus punctatus, is a popular sportfish in North America, and is the third most-sought fish species in Nebraska. Exploitation rates of channel catfish populations have been estimated to be substantial in states neighboring Nebraska. Despite the popularity of channel catfish, little is known about the exploitation of channel catfish populations in Nebraska. The objectives of this study were to estimate the exploitation rates of channel catfish populations, identify the length bias of angling for channel catfish, and identify the self-imposed length limits for channel catfish at flood-control reservoirs of Nebraska. The software package Program Mark was used to …

Real-Time Bioacoustics Monitoring And Automated Species Identification, T. Mitchell Aide, Carlos Corrada-Bravo, Marconi Campos-Cerqueira, Carlos Milan, Giovany Vega, Rafael Alvarez

Bioacoustics Collection

Traditionally, animal species diversity and abundance is assessed using a variety of methods that are generally costly, limited in space and time, and most importantly, they rarely include a permanent record. Given the urgency of climate change and the loss of habitat, it is vital that we use new technologies to improve and expand global biodiversity monitoring to thousands of sites around the world. In this article, we describe the acoustical component of the Automated Remote Biodiversity Monitoring Network (ARBIMON), a novel combination of hardware and software for automating data acquisition, data management, and species identification based on audio recordings. …

James’S Rule And Causes And Consequences Of A Latitudinal Cline In The Demography Of John’S Snapper (Lutjanus Johnii) In Coastal Waters Of Australia, Mike Cappo, Ross J. Marriott, Stephen J. Newman

Fisheries Research Articles

Demographic parameters were derived from sectioned otoliths of John’s Snapper (Lutjanus johnii) from 4 regions across 9° of latitude and 23° of longitude in northern Australia. Latitudinal variation in size and growth rates of this species greatly exceeded longitudinal variation. Populations of John’s Snapper farthest from the equator had the largest body sizes, in line with James’s rule, and the fastest growth rates, contrary to the temperature size rule for ectotherms. A maximum age of 28.6 years, nearly 3 times previous estimates, was recorded and the largest individual was 990 mm in fork length. Females grew to a larger mean …

Factors Underlying Invasive Grass Fire Regimes In The Mojave Desert And Its Consequences On Plant And Animal Communities, Kevin J. Horn

Theses and Dissertations

Climate change and exotic plant invasions are significant anthropogenic threats to desert community structure and resilience . In the Mojave Desert, the invasive grass red brome (Bromusrubens L) is increasing fire frequency and extent in response to climatic factors. The resilience of this ecosystem will be affected by how plant and animal communities respond to fire. To better understand these dynamics, we studied the environmental factors underlying changes in invasive grass fire regimes in the Mojave Desert and its structural and functional effects on plant and animal communities. Following fire, reestablishment of native vegetation can be preempted by repeated burning …

The Birds Of Nebraska, Revised Edition 2013, Paul A. Johnsgard

Zea E-Books Collection

This summary of the birds of Nebraska has been restricted to those species that have been convincingly reported at least once in Nebraska from historic time to the present. It has also been modified in its current revision to conform very closely in that regard to the most recent Nebraska Ornithologists’ Union’s “Official List of the Birds of Nebraska” (Brogie, 2010; NOU Records Committee, 2011 and annual updates). The N.O.U.’s official state list of birds (455 species as of 2013, including 329 “regular” species, 42 of “casual” occurrence, 68 accidentals, and six extinct or extirpated species) is based on actual …

Storage Technique Preserves Citrus, Kills Pathogens, Gayle Volk, Jan Suszkiw

Agricultural Research Magazine

Americans consume about 84 pounds of fresh and processed citrus per person each year, with oranges topping the list at 61 pounds annually. The availability of these favored fruits in grocery stores, fresh markets, and other consumer outlets is a testament to growers’ success in managing the ever-present threat of pests and diseases to the nation’s $3.4 billion citrus crop (2011-12), most of which is produced in Florida and California.

A major threat is citrus greening disease, also known as “Huanglongbing.” First detected in Florida in August 2005, citrus greening today is the target of a multifaceted effort by federal, …

Detecting Deadly Colonies Of E. Coli, Rosalie Marion Bliss

Agricultural Research Magazine

Shiga-toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) serogroup O157:H7 has long been associated with severe forms of foodborne illnesses. But these bacterial bad guys have many cousins, and six other STEC groups have also been linked to serious illnesses and outbreaks of disease.

In 2011, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) announced a regulation that, as of June 2012, certain beef products that test positive for any of these six groups, nicknamed the “Big Six,” would be banned from being sold for public consumption. As USDA’s regulatory arm, FSIS employs inspectors who collect meat samples on the front …

Current Challenges Can Help Fuel Future Opportunities, Jeffrey J. Steiner

Agricultural Research Magazine

Native juniper trees and invasive plants pose an expanding threat to the survival of the sagebrush ecosystem in arid western rangelands. As the trees mature, they compete with other native plants that are valuable food sources for wildlife and cattle. After these plants die back, the bare patches of soil that remain are vulnerable to erosion and encroachment from other species like cheatgrass, an invasive nonnative annual that fuels wildfires.

Wildfires threaten livestock ranches, are suppressed in large part by efforts funded with taxpayer dollars, and increase the probability that invasive plants will spread and thrive in the postfire landscape. …

Better French Fries: Technique Helps Lower Fat, Zhongli Pan, Marcia Wood

Agricultural Research Magazine

No doubt about it. Americans love French fries.

But fries soak up a lot of oil while they’re turning a perfect golden brown in the deep-fat fryer.

Agricultural Research Service scientist Zhongli Pan and colleagues have tackled the challenge of lowering some of the fat from this favorite side order without skimping on the fries’ delicious taste and texture or their pleasing appearance and aroma. Their idea? After potatoes are peeled and sliced into strips, and just before the raw strips are dunked in the fryer, prep them with 3 minutes of infrared (IR) heat—just like that created in home …

Fungi Can Be Friends Or Foes, Amy Rossman, Jo Anne Crouch, Shannon Dominick, Sharon Durham

Agricultural Research Magazine

Fungi are a large and diverse group of organisms. Some fungi, like mushrooms, are edible and considered crops. Others, however, can cause serious diseases of crop and forest plants, and those diseases can have negative effects on local and international economies as well as on the supply of food and other materials that agriculture provides.

The Agricultural Research Service maintains a unique resource—the U.S. National Fungus Collections—for helpful and detailed information about fungi. Accurate knowledge of fungi is critical for controlling the diseases they cause.

North America’s Largest Fungarium

In 1869, the Smithsonian Institution transferred its fungal collection to the …

Measuring The Feeding Behavior Of Livestock, T. M. Brown-Brandl, Roger A. Eigenberg, Sandra Avant

Agricultural Research Magazine

Determining how much time animals spend eating could help animal caretakers identify sick livestock, improve management, and establish genetic differences within a herd. But first, a system is needed to monitor animal feeding behavior.

Scientists at the Agricultural Research Service’s Roman L. Hruska U.S. Meat Animal Research Center in Clay Center, Nebraska, have developed a new system to monitor feeding behavior of feedlot cattle and grow-finish swine in a livestock industry setting.

The system, created by agricultural engineers Tami Brown-Brandl and Roger Eigenberg in the center’s Environmental Management Research Unit, uses standard radio-frequency identification technology designed around a commercial reader. …

Agricultural Research Magazine, July 2013

Agricultural Research Magazine

Table of Contents

4 Turning Trees Into Fighter Fuels

8 Tools for Tracking Troublesome Trees

10 Better Maps Mean Better Rangeland Management

12 New, Improved Codling Moth Lures Available

13 New Strawberry Species Found in Oregon

14 Measuring the Feeding Behavior of Livestock

15 Savvy Seed Sorter Gains New Fans

16 Fungi Can Be Friends or Foes

18 Detecting Deadly Colonies of E. coli

20 Storage Technique Preserves Citrus, Kills Pathogens

22 Better French Fries: Technique Helps Lower Fat

23 Locations Featured in This Magazine Issue

July 2013- Locations Featured In This Magazine Issue

Agricultural Research Magazine

The Agricultural Research Service has about 100 labs all over the country.

Locations Featured in This Magazine Issue

Albany, California 9 research units ■ 241 employees

Corvallis, Oregon 3 research units ■ 127 employees

Great Basin Rangelands Research Unit, Reno, Nevada 1 research unit ■ 19 employees

U.S. Salinity Laboratory, Riverside, California 2 research units ■ 39 employees

Yakima Agricultural Research Laboratory, Wapato, Washington 1 research unit ■ 57 employees

Eastern Oregon Agricultural Research Center, Burns, Oregon 1 research unit ■ 27 employees

Northwest Watershed Research Center, Boise, Idaho 1 research unit ■ 18 employees

Tucson, Arizona 2 research units …

New, Improved Codling Moth Lures Available, David Nicholson, Jan Suszkiw

Agricultural Research Magazine

New lures that entice codling moths with the scent of food and a possible mate are available for use in monitoring this orchard pest and controlling it with carefully timed applications of insecticide. The research related to the development and use of the lures involved scientists Alan Knight and Peter Landolt at the Agricultural Research Service’s Yakima Agricultural Research Laboratory in Wapato, Washington, and Douglas Light at the ARS Western Regional Research Center in Albany, California.

As larvae, codling moths are major pests of apples, pears, and walnuts. Historically, growers have sprayed their orchards with insecticide to prevent the pinkish-white, …

Better Maps Mean Better Rangeland Management, Brandon Bestelmeyer, Ann Perry

Agricultural Research Magazine

Land managers are always hoping for the next best thing to help them figure out where they should spend their time and money restoring and maintaining healthy rangelands. Now Agricultural Research Service rangeland ecologist Brandon Bestelmeyer has one of the answers—an ecological-state map that identifies where rangeland is holding its own, where it could respond to restoration efforts, or where it’s already past the point of no return.

“We wanted to find a way to turn existing field-level rangeland assessments into broader tools for comprehensively managing larger landscapes,” says Bestelmeyer, who works at the ARS Jornada Experimental Range in Las …

New Strawberry Species Found In Oregon, Kim E. Hummer, Sharon Durham

Agricultural Research Magazine

A recently discovered wild strawberry species provides new genetic material for plant research and, in the future, might also provide a new class of commercial strawberries.

Agricultural Research Service scientist Kim Hummer, with the USDA-ARS National Clonal Germplasm Repository at Corvallis, Oregon, found the new species during several plant collection expeditions in the high peaks of Oregon’s Cascade Mountains. She named it Fragaria cascadensis.

The find was reported in the Journal of the Botanical Research Institute of Texas.

The new strawberry is endemic to the Oregon Cascades, hence its specific name, F. cascadensis. It is perennial, with …

Turning Trees Into Fighter Fuels, Ann Perry

Agricultural Research Magazine

In western U.S. rangelands, native juniper and pinyon pine trees are spreading beyond their historical ecological niches and disrupting the environmental balance of their expanded range. Meanwhile, Agricultural Research Service scientists are teaming with university and industry colleagues to turn this problem into a source of fuel for U.S. Navy fighter jets.

“Juniper competes with grass and forbs for water and nutrients, and this leaves bare soil that is vulnerable to erosion,” says ARS scientist Mark Weltz, who works at the Great Basin Rangelands Research Unit in Reno, Nevada. “We have also lost habitat for sage grouse and mule deer, …

Tools For Tracking Troublesome Trees, Kirk Davies, Matt Madsen, Ann Perry

Agricultural Research Magazine

In Oregon, western juniper trees are expanding their range, pushing out other plant species, reducing sagebrush habitat and livestock forage, and at times fueling catastrophic wildfires. During some of these conflagrations, fires burn even hotter because more wood is available to feed the flames—a cause-and-effect that in turn lengthens the time that temperatures remain elevated at fire-stricken sites.

To help streamline efforts to manage invasive trees, Agricultural Research Service rangeland scientists Kirk Davies and Matt Madsen are investigating ways of combining aerial photography and computer programs to quickly identify and measure affected areas. These tools could save time and money …

Climate Change And Plant Demography In The Sagebrush Steppe, Aldo Compagnoni

Green Canyon Environmental Research Area, Logan Utah

No abstract provided.

Decades-Long Social Memory In Bottlenose Dolphins, Jason N. Bruck

Faculty Publications

Long-term social memory is important, because it is an ecologically relevant test of cognitive capacity, it helps us understand which social relationships are remembered and it relates two seemingly disparate disciplines: cognition and sociality. For dolphins, long-term memory for conspecifics could help assess social threats as well as potential social or hunting alliances in a very fluid and complex fission-fusion social system, yet we have no idea how long dolphins can remember each other. Through a playback study conducted within a multi-institution dolphin breeding consortium (where animals are moved between different facilities), recognition of unfamiliar versus familiar signature whistles of …

Effect Of Adding Salt During The Diafiltration Step Of Milk Protein Concentrate Powder Manufacture On Mineral And Soluble Protein Composition, Vandna Sikand, Phillip S. Tong, John Walker

Dairy Science

Milk protein concentrate (MPC) powders offer a great potential for use in an array of food applications because of their nutritional and functional values. However, MPC powders with protein content ≥80% (MPC80) exhibit poor solubility and hence restrict their potential use. The objective of this study was to determine the impact of adding salt during the diafiltration stage of MPC80 manufacture on solubility, turbidity, and to compare minerals and protein content of supernatants of ultracentrifuged samples with control sample. Three types of samples were produced: MPC80-C (control) with or without salt treatment, MPC80-Na (150 mM NaCl), and MPC80-K (150 mM …

West Coast Demersal Scalefish Allocation Report., Integrated Fisheries Allocation Advisory Committee.

Fisheries Management Papers

Integrated Fisheries Management (IFM) is an initiative aimed at addressing the issue of how fish resources in WesternAustralia can be best shared between competing users within the broad context of “Ecologically Sustainable Development”, or ESD, so that they can be managed on a sustainable basis.

The Minister for Fisheries established the Integrated Fisheries Management Allocation Advisory Committee (the Allocation Committee), under Section 42 of the Fish Resources Management Act 1994 (FRMA), in 2004 to investigate IFM resource allocation issues and make recommendations to him on optimal resource use.

Policy On Restocking And Stock Enhancement In Western Australia, Department Of Fisheries Western Australia.

Fisheries Management Papers

The practice of releasing hatchery-reared fish into existing populations to augment fishing (stock enhancement) or restore depleted spawning biomass (restocking) has occurred around the world for decades with varying degrees of success. The underpinning concept is to produce and release fish into wild populations to increase their abundance, catch rates and/or fishery yields

If restocking and stock enhancement activities are to be successful, they should have clear objectives and be well planned and targeted at situations where there is a reasonable expectation of having a beneficial effect.

Savvy Seed Sorter Gains New Fans, Thomas C. Pearson, Marcia Wood

Agricultural Research Magazine

Simple, swift, and comparatively inexpensive, a color-image-based seed sorter is helping plant breeders and others separate the seeds they want from those they don’t—with an impressive degree of accuracy.

Agricultural Research Service agricultural engineer Thomas C. Pearson, based at the agency’s Center for Grain and Animal Health Research in Manhattan, Kansas, developed the sorter in collaboration with National Manufacturing in Lincoln, Nebraska. The company has marketed the device to customers in the United States and abroad since 2010.

In tests, the compact, portable sorter— a simpler and faster version of other machine-vision equipment that Pearson developed in 2009—speedily differentiated kernels …

In-Water Hull Cleaning And Filtration System: In-Water Cleaning Trials, Department Of Fisheries

Fisheries Occasional Publications

No abstract provided.

In-Water Hull Cleaning System Cost & Cost Benefit Analysis, Department Of Fisheries

Fisheries Occasional Publications

No abstract provided.

Guidance Statement For Oil And Gas Industry Consultation With The Department Of Fisheries, Department Of Fisheries

Fisheries Occasional Publications

No abstract provided.