Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Commons^™

Conservation Implications Of Winter-Feeding Policies For Mule Deer In Utah, Chris C. Peterson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Policies regulating wildlife winter-feeding programs may have long-term impacts on conservation and future management of both target and non-target species. In 2000, the Utah Wildlife Board, upon reviewing input from a series of public regional meetings, adopted a Utah Big Game Winter-Feeding Policy. The Utah Division of Wildlife Resources used this policy to regulate winter-feeding programs for mule deer in northern Utah, 2001-2005. I monitored the program effects on mule deer biology, activity and migration, and winter browse utilization and productivity.

While feed rations generally compensated for protein and energy deficiencies, they may overlook mineral deficiencies. To determine if mule …

Roosting Ecology Of Rafinesque's Big-Eared Bat, Corynorhinus Rafinesquii, In Southeastern Mississippi, Austin Webb Trousdale Iii

Dissertations

Rafinesque's big-eared bat, Corynorhinus rafinesquii, is considered rare and/or declining throughout its range. Concrete bridges are potentially important roosts for C. rafinesquii, especially in the Gulf Coastal Plain where the species' natural roosts (caves and large hollow trees) are inherently scarce. Successful efforts to monitor and conserve this species must account for its movements among multiple roosts and determine the duration of its roost use (including bridges) at different temporal scales. Therefore, I investigated roosting ecology of C. rafinesquii from 2000-2005 within a mixed hardwood-pine (Pinus spp.) system in southeastern Mississippi. I conducted surveys of concrete bridges to determine phenological …

Detritus Type Alters The Outcome Of Interspecific Competition Between Aedes Aegypti And Aedes Albopictus (Diptera : Culicidae), Ebony G. Murrell, Steven A. Juliano

Faculty Publications – Biological Sciences

Many studies of interspecific competition between Aedes albopictus (Skuse) and Aedes aegypti (L.) (Diptera: Culicidae) larvae show that Ae. albopictus are superior resource competitors to Ae. aegypti. Single-species studies indicate that growth and survival of Ae. albopictus and Ae. aegypti larvae are affected by the type of detritus present in containers, which presumably affects the amount and quality of microorganisms that the mosquito larvae consume. We tested whether different detritus types alter the intensity of larval competition by raising 10 different density/species combinations of Ae. albopictus and Ae. aegypti larvae under standard laboratory conditions, with one of four detritus types …

Granivores And Restoration: Implications Of Invasion And Considerations Of Context-Dependent Seed Removal, Steven M. Ostoja

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Granivores are important components of sagebrush communities in western North America. These same regions are being altered by the invasion of the exotic annual Bromus tectorum (cheatgrass) that alters physical and biological dynamics in ways that appear to promote its persistence. This research directly relates to the restoration of B. tectorum-dominated systems in two inter-related ways. First, because these landscapes have large quantities of seeds applied during restoration, it is important to determine the major granivore communities in intact sagebrush communities and in nearby cheatgrass-dominated communities. Second, it is important to develop an understanding of patterns of seed harvest …

Bat Community Dynamics And Foraging Activity Patterns In Young Regenerating Southern Pine Plantations And Mixed Hardwood Forests, Kathryn Marie Womack

Theses & Honors Papers

Forests of the southeastern U.S. are changing rapidly in species composition and extent of forest cover due to increasing conversion to pine (Pinus sp.) plantations , intensifying management practices, and expanding urbanization and sprawl. Questions related to the impacts of these changes on wild life species are of great conservation interest and management relevance. Highly mobile species with large home ranges and complex habitat requirements , such as bats, may be especially vulnerable to increasing human modification of landscapes. However, the impacts of such modifications on bat species are poorly understood . I sought to evaluate bat community structure and …

Population Dynamics Of Freshwater Invertebrates In Beltrami County, Amanda Johnson

Honors Capstones

Capstone submitted as a graduate requirement for the BSU Honors Program.

Mojave Applied Ecology Notes Spring 2008, Lesley Defalco, E. Cayenne Engel, Scott R. Abella, Jessica E. Spencer, Jill E. Craig

Mojave Applied Ecology Notes

Post-fire restoration, fire chronosequence study, Joint Fire Science update, Weed Sentry program and DNWR surveys

A New Reproductive Mode In The Genus Melanzophryniscus Gallardo, 1961 (Anura: Bufonidae) With Description Of A New Species From The State Of Paraná, Brazil, José A. Langone, Magno V. Segallo, Marcos Bornschein, Rafael O. De Sá

Biology Faculty Publications

A new species of bufonid toad of the genus Melanophryniscus is described from a mountaintop that is part of the Serra do Mar in the northeastern State of Paraná, Brazil. Melanophryniscus alipioi sp. nov. is distinguished from other known species by its uniformly dark brown dorsal color and a unique breeding site. The new species reproduces in bromeliads, a reproductive mode previously unknown for this genus. This species might be susceptible to current habitat lost.

Why Are Incubation Periods Longer In The Tropics? A Common-Garden Experiment With House Wrens Reveals It Is All In The Egg, Given Harper, W. Robinson, John Styrsky, Brian Payne, Charles Thompson

Scholarship

Incubation periods of Neotropical birds are often longer than those of related species at temperate latitudes. We conducted a common-garden experiment to test the hypothesis that longer tropical incubation periods result from longer embryo development times rather than from different patterns of parental incubation behavior. House wrens, one of few species whose geographic range includes tropical equatorial and temperate high latitudes, have incubation periods averaging 1.2 days longer at tropical latitudes. We incubated eggs of house wrens in Illinois and Panama under identical conditions in mechanical incubators. Even after factoring out differences in egg size, tropical house wrens still required …

Tachinid Collecting In Southwest New Mexico And Arizona During The 2007 Nads Field Meeting, John O. Stireman Iii

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

The 2007 field meeting of the North American Dipterists Society (NADS) was held August 13–16 in southwestern New Mexico, centered in Silver City (at Western New Mexico University), and the surrounding Gila National Forest. This was the first NADS meeting that I have been able to attend, and I think I can speak for all in saying it was enjoyable, productive, and interesting; an overall success. A more detailed account and evaluation of this meeting is available in the 2007 Fly Times article (O’Hara 2007).

A Watershed Analysis Of Pattee Pond: Implications For Water Quality And Land Use Management, Problems In Environmental Science Course (Biology 493), Colby College, Colby Environmental Assessment Team, Colby College

Colby College Watershed Study: Pattee Pond (2008, 1992)

The Colby Environmental Assessment Team (CEAT) investigated the impact of land use patterns on the water quality of Pattee Pond in Winslow, Maine, during the summer and fall of 2008. Physical, chemical, and biological characteristics of water quality were analyzed to evaluate the current health of the lake. Data collected were compared with previous studies conducted by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and CEAT to examine changes in water quality and land use over time. Trends in Pattee Pond water quality suggest an improvement since the 1970s. However, the lake is still experiencing algal blooms resulting from phosphorus …

Competitive Abilities Of Native Grasses And Non-Native (Bothriochloa Spp.) Grasses, Cheryl D. Schmidt, Rob Channell Ph.D., Karen R. Hickman, Keith Harmoney, William J. Stark Ph.D.

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Old World Bluestems (OWB), introduced from Europe and Asia in the 1920s, recently have begun to raise concerns in the Great Plains. Despite suggestion in the late 1950s that OWB were weedy and negatively impacted biological diversity, they were widely introduced throughout the Great Plains for agricultural purposes. Anecdotal evidence suggests that OWB exhibit invasive characteristics that promote competitive exclusion of native species. The objective of our study was to quantify the competitive abilities of two OWB species (Caucasian bluestem; Bothriochloa bladhii (Retz.) S. T. Blake (= Bothriochloa caucasica (Trin.) C. E. Hubb.) and yellow bluestem; Bothriochloa ischaemum (L.) Keng) …

Food Webs In Long Island Sound: Review, Synthesis And Potential Applications, Roman Zajac, K. Seals, D. Simpson

Biology and Environmental Science Faculty Publications

Understanding food web structure and dynamics of ecological systems is a key element in the development of more effective environmental assessment and management procedures. Although various components of the Long Island Sound (LIS) ecosystem have been studied in some detail, a framework for food web based research has been lacking. The objectives of this study were to: a) collect and review all pertinent data available in the scientific literature and technical reports on food web components and interactions in different sections of Long Island Sound; b) based on this review, refine initial conceptual food web models and extract pertinent data …

The Dynamic Evolutionary History Of The Bananaquit (Coereba Flaveola) In The Caribbean Revealed By A Multigene Analysis, Eva Bellemain, Eldredge Bermingham, Robert Ricklefs

Biology Department Faculty Works

BackgroundThe bananaquit (Coereba flaveola) is a small nectivorous and frugivorous emberizine bird (order Passeriformes) that is an abundant resident throughout the Caribbean region. We used multi-gene analyses to investigate the evolutionary history of this species throughout its distribution in the West Indies and in South and Middle America. We sequenced six mitochondrial genes (3744 base pairs) and three nuclear genes (2049 base pairs) for forty-four bananaquits and three outgroup species. We infer the ancestral area of the present-day bananaquit populations, report on the species' phylogenetic, biogeographic and evolutionary history, and propose scenarios for its diversification and range expansion.ResultsPhylogenetic concordance between …

Measuring Knowledge Of Natural Selection: A Comparison Of The C.I.N.S., An Open-Response Instrument, And An Oral Interview, Ross Nehm, Irvin Sam Schonfeld

Publications and Research

Growing recognition of the central importance of fostering an in-depth understanding of natural selection has, surprisingly, failed to stimulate work on the development and rigorous evaluation of instruments that measure knowledge of it. We used three different methodological tools, the Conceptual Inventory of Natural Selection (CINS), a modified version of Bishop and Anderson's (Bishop and Anderson [1990] Journal of Research in Science Teaching 27: 415-427) open-response test that we call the Open Response Instrument (ORI), and an oral interview derived from both instruments, to measure biology majors' understanding of and alternative conceptions about natural selection. We explored how these instruments …

Plaster Creek Watershed Management Plan, Fishbeck, Thompson, Carr, & Huber, Inc.

Watershed Reports

The quality of Plaster Creek is influenced by many factors, such as human activities within the Plaster Creek Watershed (Watershed), physical and biological characteristics of the natural resources, and the management of those resources. This document provides an overview of these diverse aspects of the Watershed, including detailed information about the sources and causes of watershed pollution, recommendations needed to address impairments, and steps to implement the recommendations.

Leptodactylus Cunicularius Sazima And Bokermann Rabbit-Burrow Frog, W. R. Heyer, M. M. Heyer, Rafael O. De Sá

Biology Faculty Publications

Adult Leptodactylus cunicularius are moderately small. The head is longer than wide and the hind limbs are long (Table 1; Heyer and Thompson 2000 provided definitions of adult size and leg length categories for Leptodactylus). Male vocal sacs are internal, not externally expanded. The snout is protruding, not sexually dimorphic. Male forearms are not hypertrophied and males lack asperities on the thumbs and chest. The dorsum is variegated with small, often confluent, spots and blotches. There is a very thin interrupted mid-dorsal light stripe (pinstripe). Usually, there is a noticeable light, irregular, elongate, mid-dorsal blotch in the scapular region. …

Is The Amphibian Tree Of Life Really Fatally Flawed?, Darrel R. Frost, Taran Grant, Julian Faivovich, Raoul H. Bain, Alexander Haas, Celio F.B. Haddad, Rafael O. De Sá, Et Al.

Biology Faculty Publications

Wiens (2007, Q. Rev. Biol. 82, 55–56) recently published a severe critique of Frost et al.'s (2006, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist. 297, 1–370) monographic study of amphibian systematics, concluding that it is “a disaster” and recommending that readers “simply ignore this study”. Beyond the hyperbole, Wiens raised four general objections that he regarded as “fatal flaws”: (1) the sampling design was insufficient for the generic changes made and taxonomic changes were made without including all type species; (2) the nuclear gene most commonly used in amphibian phylogenetics, RAG-1, was not included, nor were the morphological characters that had justified …

Mojave Applied Ecology Notes Winter 2008, Scott R. Abella, E. Cayenne Engel, Jill E. Craig

Mojave Applied Ecology Notes

Mojave Desert collaborative projects, fire history in Spring Mountains, Northshore Road rehabilitation, wildfires and invasive plants in American deserts conference, weed sentry surveys

Population Ecology Of The Golden Mouse, Robert K. Rose

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

An understanding of the population dynamics of a species requires knowledge of the major life-history parameters of a population, including age at maturity, distribution of age classes, and lifetime reproductive contribution of the sexes, sex ratio, length of the breeding season, mean litter size, rates of growth and survival, and life span. Because few long-term studies have been conducted with Ochrotomys nuttalli as the focal species of investigation, only fragmentary information is available for many population parameters. As importantly, densities of golden mice often are low, making them difficult to evaluate statistically. Little has been published on age at maturity …

Out Of South America: Multiple Origins Of Non-Native Apple Snails In Asia, Kenneth Hayes

Department of Biology Faculty Publications

Apple snails (Ampullariidae: Pomacea) native to the New World have become agricultural and environmental pests widely in southern and eastern Asia since their introduction in about 1980. Although their impacts have been extensively documented, considerable confusion persists regarding their identities and geographical origins. Efforts to resolve the confusion have suffered from inadequate taxonomic and geographical sampling from both native and introduced ranges. Using phylogenetic and genealogical methods, we analysed 610–655 bp of cytochrome c oxidase subunit I DNA sequences from 783 apple snails from 164 Asian locations and 57 native South American locations. In Asia, we found four species of …

Oviposition Behavior Partitions Aquatic Landscapes Along Predation And Nutrient Gradients, C. A. Binckley, W. J. Resetarits Jr.

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

That individuals attempt to minimize the ratio of mortality risk/growth rate (μ/g) when foraging within individual habitat patches is well established. Do species partition among spatially discrete communities embedded in complex landscapes in a similar manner? We investigated how 3 ovipositing species (2 Hyla treefrogs and a hydrophilid beetle, Tropisternus lateralis) responded to simultaneous gradients of nutrients and predation risk. Species partitioned our experimental metacommunity primarily by reducing oviposition with fish. Tropisternus positively responded to increased nutrients, but the effect decreased with increasing risk, as predicted by μ/g theory. Use of fish habitats by Tropisternus was unrelated to breeding …

Waterhole Dynamics And Chemical Signals Of African Elephants ( Loxodonta Africana ), Stacie Marie Castelda

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

The distribution of mammals in a savanna environment is influenced by abiotic and biotic factors. The African savanna experiences distinct wet and dry seasons. Species become spatially restricted around water resources during the dry season, resulting in increased intraspecies and interspecies resource-based aggregation. A dominate species, such as the African elephant (Loxodonta africana), may influence this aggregation. I examined the influence of wet and dry seasons and ambient temperature on the use of a waterhole by elephants as well as the co-occurrence of elephants and other mammals at the waterhole. Biodiversity scans (October 2004-June 2007) and were performed at a …

Series Activity: Watching Wildlife [Iowa Academy Of Science National Wildlife Audio Series], Iowa Academy Of Science

Open Educational Resources

Observing wildlife can be fun whether you are at one of Iowa’s National Wildlife Refuges, a local park or your own back yard. Make watching wildlife a hobby and you will begin to recognize habits and patterns in the actions of the wildlife around you. You might be able to predict when certain wildlife will come to an area to feed, the sounds a bird makes when attempting to protect its young or what will trigger a rabbit to freeze in place. You’ll also be practicing the skills scientists use to make their observations: comparing and contrasting, measuring, counting and …

Evaluation Of Aerial Cluster Sampling Of Double-Crested Cormorants On Aquaculture Ponds In Mississippi, Brian S. Dorr, Loren W. Burger Jr., Scott C. Barras

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Concern over increasing numbers of double-crested cormorants (Phalacrocorax auritus) and their impacts on channel catfish (Ictalurus punctatus) aquaculture has resulted in increased need for quantitative information to develop and evaluate depredation management efforts. We evaluated aerial surveys in a stratified cluster sampling (SCS) design to estimate and monitor abundance of cormorants on catfish aquaculture ponds in the Yazoo River Basin of Mississippi, USA (hereafter Yazoo Basin). Twice monthly abundance estimates and coefficient of variation during winter averaged 8,128 (n = 29, SE = 1,233) and 33% (n = 29, SE = 0.02), respectively. Counts of cormorants …

Assessment Of Fecal Bacteria Contamination In Sewage And Non-Sewage Impacted Mangrove Ecosystems Along The Coast Of Dar Es Salaam, A. A. Abbu, Thomas J. Tj Lyimo

Tanzania Journal of Science

Microbiological quality of the intertidal pool water was evaluated in sewage impacted (Mtoni Kijichi) and non-sewage impacted (Rasi Dege) mangrove forest sites along the coast of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The Most Probable Number method was used for estimating the total coliform (TC), fecal coliform (FC) and fecal enterococci (ENT) levels. In addition, physicochemical parameters (temperature, pH, salinity and nutrients) were measured. The results for microbial fecal indicators were compared to the World Health Organisation (WHO) and United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) guidelines for marine recreational and shellfish harvesting waters. Fecal bacteria contamination was significantly higher at Mtoni Kijichi …

Species Invasion Shifts The Importance Of Predator Dependence, Blaine D. Griffen, David G. Delaney

Faculty Publications

The strength of interference between foraging individuals can influence per capita consumption rates, with important consequences for predator and prey populations and system stability. Here we demonstrate how the replacement of a previously established invader, the predatory crab Carcinus maenas, by the recently invading predatory crab Hemigrapsus sanguineus shifts predation from a species that experiences strong predator interference (strong predator dependence) to one that experiences weak predator interference (weak predator dependence). We demonstrate using field experiments that differences in the strength of predator dependence persist for these species both when they forage on a single focal prey species only (the …

Occurrence And Biological Effect Of Exogenous Steroids In The Elkhorn River, Nebraska, Usa, Alan S. Kolok, Daniel D. Snow, Satomi Kohno, Marlo K. Sellin, Louis J. Guillette Jr.

Biology Faculty Publications

Recent studies of surface waters in North America, Japan, and Europe have reported the presence of steroidogenic agents as contaminants. The current study has three objectives: 1) to determine if steroidogenic compounds are present in the Elkhorn River, 2) to determine if sediments collected from the Elkhorn River can act as a source of steroidogenic compounds to aquatic organisms, and 3) to determine if site-specific biological effects are apparent in the hepatic gene expression of fathead minnows. Evidence was obtained using three approaches: 1) deployment of polar organic chemical integrative samplers (POCIS), 2) deployment of caged fathead minnows, and 3) …

The Emergence Of Sex, Ursula Goodenough

Biology Faculty Research

Biological traits, the foci of natural selection, are by definition emergent from the genes, proteins, and other “nothing-buts” that constitute them. Moreover, and with the exception of recently emergent “spandrels,” each can be accorded a teleological dimension—each is “for” some purpose conducive to an organism's continuation. Sex, which is “for” the generation of recombinant genomes, may be one of the most ancient and ubiquitous traits in biology. In the course of its evolution, many additional traits, such as gender and nurture, have emerged. Patterns of sexual exchange are the basis for patterns of biological evolution and are central to the …

Prey Naiveté: Evolutionary And Ecological Implications, Jonathan G. Cox

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Despite its ecological importance, the concept of prey naivete has become a biological truism that receives little study. I explored the evolution of naivete and its likely influence on two major ecological patterns: a) the historically greater destructiveness of freshwater predator introductions, and b) the greater strength of aquatic trophic cascades. In a review of the ecological literature, I demonstrate that the conditions for the evolution of naivete (isolation) exist in freshwater habitats at multiple spatial scales. In addition, I show that freshwater prey exhibit naivete which could be responsible for the high impacts of freshwater predator introductions. I then …