Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Commons^™

The Genetic Basis Of Two Reproductive Traits In Monkeyflowers: Stigma Closure And Corolla Carotenoids, Rachel Anne Halperin

Undergraduate Theses, Professional Papers, and Capstone Artifacts

Abstract

The interactions between pollinators and flowers have long been a driving force for the evolution of many physical floral traits. Traits such as flower shape, size, color, and smell are just some of these traits that evolve because of these interactions. This evolution does not only occur in the more obvious morphological floral traits, however, but also in more subtle traits like touch sensitive stigma closure. In hundreds of Lamiales species, the bilobed stigma, the organ that receives pollen from pollinators, closes rapidly upon touch. Theory and experiments show that this novel dynamic reproductive trait increases pollen export and …

Interdisciplinary Learning: How Different Ways Of Thinking Can Fuel Passion And Expand Understanding., Allison Amy Peschek

Undergraduate Theses, Professional Papers, and Capstone Artifacts

This Capstone project was created to show the profound experience resulting from an extended range of interdisciplinary learning, and how different methods, when paired together, can enhance a learning experience. This was a personal project of exploration into those different angles, and primarily focused on avenues of logical and creating learning, respectively. These methods have been implemented by this author often in the past, but this capstone will explore this concept further, as there is a lot of potential in combining these different methods and biases in learning, to both further passion and understanding as a learner, but to also …

Restoration Is Repairing Relationships: Bridging Indigenous And Western Sciences To Assess The Socio-Ecological Restoration Of Wild Rice (Zizania Palustris) On Keweenaw Bay Indian Community Homelands, Cassandra M. Reed-Vandam

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Manoomin (wild rice, Zizania palustris) is an ecologically and culturally significant plant relative for the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community (KBIC). Historically, manoomin was present across much of the Great Lakes, however, their presence has declined since the early 1900s and, by 1990, virtually disappeared within KBIC homelands. Employing ethnography, surveys, focus groups, and conversations with Ojibwa knowledge holders, this research defined successful manoomin restoration for KBIC and developed socio-ecological attributes and indicators to assess restoration presented in the Medicine Wheel Framework for Manoomin Restoration. Surface water, sediment, and pore water samples at six different manoomin sites were analyzed to …

Colombia´S National Mountain Peatland Map: Peatland Distribution, Condition And Carbon Stocks, Patrick Nicolas Skillings-Neira

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

In this research, I explore the distribution, condition, and carbon stocks of peatlands in the Colombian Andes. High mountain peatlands in Colombia, usually found within the páramos, face significant ecological challenges. Although Law 1930 (2018) mandates sustainable páramo management, it does not prohibit peatland disturbance. Undisturbed peatlands act as long-term carbon sinks, but their degradation can convert them into greenhouse gas sources. The lack of comprehensive national peatland mapping hampers effective environmental management and policy formulation. I aim to create a national-scale peatland map, assess peatland distribution, quantify degraded pasture peatlands, and report preliminary soil carbon stocks. Additionally, I compared …

Animating Animal Tracking Data In A Geospatial Context, Bruno V. Pinheiro

Honors Undergraduate Theses

In the field of ecology, animal tracking is core to understanding an animal’s behavior, space-use requirements, and suitable habitat. Utilizing the software created by this project, it is possible to visualize tracking data in its spatial and temporal context. The source code is written in R and leverages the Continuous-Time Movement Modeling (CTMM) package for statistical analysis. Utilizing CTMM, predicted or simulated movement paths can be generated with the user only needing to input their data. The Keyhole Markup Language (KML) is used to write a file containing all the animation parameters the user desires, such as the number of …

Biology And Ecology Of Neonectria Magnoliae And Neonectria Punicea, Two Understudied Neonectria Species In West Virginia, Hannah Marie Petronek

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The family Nectriaceae includes numerous phytopathogenic fungi that cause canker diseases on both angiosperm and conifer hosts worldwide. Numerous Neonectria spp. cause cankers on hardwoods and conifers in North America, but their roles in contributing to tree decline and mortality outside of beech bark disease are largely understudied. One such pathogen, Neonectria magnoliae, causes perennial cankers on two native hosts in central Appalachia: Fraser magnolia (Magnolia fraseri) and tulip-poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera). We also recently confirmed N. magnoliae from non-native star magnolia (Magnolia stellata) in West Virginia. Both native hosts occur in the central …

Effects Of Land Cover Changes And Hydropower Development On Fish Communities In Amazonian Floodplain Rivers, Samuel Baron Grinstead Hessburg

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

In Amazonian River systems, diverse fish communities depend on the floodplains for providing feeding opportunities and critical spawning habitat during the seasonal flood pulse, which annually submerges floodplain forests. In the Amazon, large-scale deforestation and hydroelectric dam construction can have profound impacts on entire ecosystems by altering river-floodplain connectivity. This study attempts to improve understanding of Amazonian fish responses to these two stressors. The first chapter aims to understand how deforestation impacts floating meadow fish assemblages. For this study, we surveyed fish in floodplain lakes along the lower Amazon River, recording their abundance in relation to forest cover and local …

A Balancing Act: Microrna Mediated Insect-Bacterial Homeostasis And The Tsetse Fly, Mason Hubbard Lee

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Microbial symbioses are ubiquitous across all kingdoms of life with broad and diverse impacts on the evolution of species. The sum of all microbes living in, on, or otherwise in close association with a host form the microbiota. In some cases, the development of a stable microbial association seems to have been necessary for the specialization of diet, as can be observed in numerous insect species, especially wood-eating, sap-feeding, and blood-feeding organisms. For the medically and economically tsetse fly (family Glossinidae), the mutualistic bacteria Wigglesworthia glossinidia is required for proper reproduction and supplementation of nutrients that the fly does not …

Movement Behavior And Metapopulation Connectivity Of Stream Salamanders In Response To Disturbance Events, Kathryn M. Greene

Theses and Dissertations--Biology

Metapopulations are shaped by the dispersal between populations in a landscape. Disturbance events can disrupt this connectivity resulting in local population extinction. For my dissertation, I used a combination of empirical and theoretical techniques to examine dispersal in response to disturbance and assessed it’s population-level consequences. My research used capture-mark-recapture sampling techniques to evaluate stream salamander movement in response to (1) a supraseasonal drought and (2) mountaintop-removal-mining (MTR) and valley-filling (VF) and (3) agent-based simulation modeling to evaluate population extinction risk in response to varying dispersal and mortality rates.

First, I evaluated the effects of a supraseasonal drought, a severe …

Co-Divergence Of Lemur Hosts And Gut Microbiomes Across Multiple Evolutionary Scales, Mariah E. Donohue

Theses and Dissertations--Biology

This dissertation bridges micro- and macroevolutionary approaches to understand the co-diversification of animal hosts and their gut microbiomes at different evolutionary timescales. I examined these dynamics using wild lemurs, a diverse Primate clade endemic to the island of Madagascar.

First, I tested the relative effects of host phylogenetic relationships, diet, and habitat in shaping the gut microbiome through deep evolutionary time and across distinct microbial kingdoms. I designed a natural experiment sampling feces from rainforest and dry forest lemur communities with similar phylogenetic assemblages and considerable variation in dietary strategy. Then, I amplified and sequenced two metabarcoding genes, the V4 …

The Evolution Of The Metazoan Circadian Molecular Mechanism And The Conservation Of Canonical Circadian Elements, Olivia Waldridge

Theses and Dissertations--Biology

The temporal organization of biological activities through circadian rhythms is pivotal for the survival of organisms. Significant progress has been made in understanding the molecular foundations of animal circadian clocks through the characterization of key components such as Clock, Bmal1/Cycle(Cyc), Period (Per), Timeless, and Cryptochrome (Cry) in several model organisms. To determine the universality of this conservation, we investigated the sequences of these genes and their paralogs across 46 animal species that encompass multiple phyla in the metazoan kingdom to resolve the relative timing of duplication and loss events that have diversified core clock components in the metazoan kingdom. Using …

Reproductive Isolation And Gene Flow Across Space, Time And Genomes In Neodiprion Lecontei And N. Pinetum, Ashleigh Nicole Glover

Theses and Dissertations--Biology

To explain biodiversity, evolutionary biologists must understand how independent lineages arise via the evolution of reproductive isolation during the speciation process. Hybridizing taxa provide an excellent opportunity to investigate the evolution of reproductive isolating barriers and genomic divergence, thereby enhancing our understanding of speciation. However, hybridization between diverging taxa can vary across geographic space, the genome, and time. Thus, understanding the factors that promote or inhibit hybridization can provide insight into the biotic, environmental, and genetic causes of divergence and gene flow. Importantly, the mechanisms responsible for generating variation in hybridization dynamics and the consequences of such hybridization remains unknown …

Steps Towards Operationalizing One Health Approaches, Kim M. Pepin, Keith M. Carlisle, Dean Anderson, Michael G. Baker, Richard B. Chipman, Jackie Benschop, Nigel P. French, Suzie Greenhalgh, Scott Mcdougall, Petra Muellner, Emil Murphy, Dion R. J. Neale, Michael J. Plank, David T. S. Hayman

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

One Health recognizes the health of humans, agriculture, wildlife, and the environment are interrelated. The concept has been embraced by international health and environmental authorities such as WHO, WOAH, FAO, and UNEP, but One Health approaches have been more practiced by researchers than national or international authorities. To identify priorities for operationalizing One Health beyond research contexts, we conducted 41 semi-structured interviews with professionals across One Health sectors (public health, environment, agriculture, wildlife) and institutional contexts, who focus on national-scale and international applications. We identify important challenges, solutions, and priorities for delivering the One Health agenda through government action. Participants …

Changing Fire Regimes And Nuanced Impacts On A Critically Imperiled Species, Jeremy T. Rockweit, Katie M. Dugger, Damon B. Lesmeister, Raymond J. Davis, Alan B. Franklin, J. Mark Higley

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Wildfire activity throughout western North America is increasing which can have important consequences for species persistence. Native species have evolved disturbance-adapted traits that confer resilience to natural disturbance provided disturbances operate within their historical range of variability. This resilience can erode as disturbance regimes change and begin operating outside this range. We assessed wildfire impacts during 1987–2018 on the northern spotted owl, an imperiled species with complex relationships with late and early seral forest in the Pacific Northwest, USA. We analyzed population- and individual-level wildfire impacts across the frequent-fire portion of the owl’s geographic range at two spatial scales and …

Heating Decoys To Mimic Thermal Signatures Of Live Animals For Drones, Landon R. Jones, Cerise Mensah, Jared S. Elmore, Kristine O. Evans, Morgan B. Pfeiffer, Brad F. Blackwell, Raymond B. Iglay

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Method name

Heating animal decoys to mimic thermal signatures for drones

Abstract

Thermal sensors mounted on drones (unoccupied aircraft systems) are popular and effective tools for monitoring cryptic animal species, although few studies have quantified sampling error of ani- mal counts from thermal images. Using decoys is one effective strategy to quantify bias and count accuracy; however, plastic decoys do not mimic thermal signatures of representative species. Our objective was to produce heat signatures in animal decoys to realistically match thermal images of live animals obtained from a drone-based sensor. We tested commercially available methods to heat plastic decoys of …

Competitive Behaviors Between Black Vultures (Coragyps Atratus) And Turkey Vultures (Cathartes Aura) During Scavenging / Comportamientos Competitivos Entre Coragyps Atratus Y Cathartes Aura Durante El Carroñeo, Amanda M. Herbert, Patrick A. Zollner, Landon R. Jones, Marian L. Wahl, Grant N. Burcham, Bryan M. Kluever, Lee A. Humberg, Brandon M. Quinby

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Abstract

Interference competition occurs when an individual prohibits another’s access to a resource through antagonistic interactions. Despite considerable research on scavenger interactions at carrion, the limited evidence for competitive interactions between black vultures (Coragyps atratus) and turkey vultures (Cathartes aura) relies upon the frequency of antagonistic interactions without considering other forms of competition. Using remote cameras, we recorded the duration of aggression, scavenging, and vigilance behaviors exhibited by individual black vultures and turkey vultures scavenging stillborn domestic cattle carcasses within flocks composed of one or both vulture species. We tested for differences of durations of each …

The Texas Feral Swine Eradication And Control Pilot Program, David R. Pipkin, Bruce R. Leland, Katherine Garwood, Linda Tschirhart-Hejl, Michael J. Bodenchuk, John M. Tomecek

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

The United States Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 (the 2018 Farm Bill) established the Feral Swine Eradication and Control Pilot Program. The program funded US$75M for 5 years, split evenly between the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS), both programs within the United States Department of Agriculture. The agencies solicited joint programs from states with high densities of feral swine in two phases. In Texas, NRCS and APHIS submitted three multi-county project areas along watersheds for Phase I funding and one eradication effort along with two crop protection projects in Phase II. …

Spatiotemporal Partitioning Of Two Invasive Ungulates In Guam [Abstract], Kelly J. Koriakin, Kurt C. Vercauteren, Nathan P. Snow, D. Buck Jolley

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Interspecific interactions are crucial in shaping ecosystem dynamics (Connell 1983, Tilman 1987, Barbosa and Castellanos 2005). Non-native ungulates have been introduced across the globe (Ferretti and Lovari 2014, Volery et al. 2021) and in environments where multiple invasives thrive, these co-occurring sympatric species may shift spatiotemporal patterns to minimize interspecific competition (Schoener 1974, Chesson 2000). Spatiotemporal shifts can lead to cascading effects to the native flora and fauna (Simberloff and Von Holle 1999). Given the potential negative impacts, understanding these interactions is vital for effective management of these ecosystems.

Two invasive ungulates, the wild pig (Sus scrofa) and …

Complex Dynamics Of Coral Gene Expression Responses To Low Ph Across Species, Veronica Z. Radice, Ana Martinez, Adina Paytan, Donald C. Potts, Daniel J. Barshis

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Coral capacity to tolerate low pH affects coral community composition and, ultimately, reef ecosystem function. Low pH submarine discharges (‘Ojo’; Yucatán, México) represent a natural laboratory to study plasticity and acclimatization to low pH in relation to ocean acidification. A previous >2‐year coral transplant experiment to ambient and low pH common garden sites revealed differential survivorship across species and sites, providing a framework to compare mechanistic responses to differential pH exposures. Here, we examined gene expression responses of transplants of three species of reef‐building corals (Porites astreoides, Porites porites and Siderastrea siderea) and their algal endosymbiont communities …

Effects Of Climate Change On Seed Germination May Contribute To Habitat Homogenization In Freshwater Forested Wetlands, Kori Carr, Xavier Ozowara, Taylor M. Sloey

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

Climate changes in temperate regions are expected to result in warmer, shorter winters in temperate latitudes. These changes may have consequences for germination of plant species that require a period of physiological dormancy. The effect of cold duration on seed germination has been investigated in a number of plant taxa, but has not been well studied in wetland and bottomland forest tree species, an ecosystem that is threatened by habitat homogenization. Our work sought to test the role of changing winter temperatures on seed germination in specialist (Nyssa aquatica and Taxodium distichum) and generalist (Acer rubrum and Liquidambar styraciflua) tree …

Cover, Editorial Staff, Journal Information

Human–Wildlife Interactions

This includes the cover, editorial staff, and journal information.

Table Of Contents

Human–Wildlife Interactions

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New Associate Editors, S. Nicole Frey

Human–Wildlife Interactions

New associate editors include Breanna Martinico, Shannon Skalos, Paula Pebsworth, and Donna J. Perry.

Grazing Management For Livestock, Free-Roaming Horses And Burros, And Resilience, Sherman R. Swanson

Human–Wildlife Interactions

Grazing management avoids overgrazing by allocating forage for livestock on the basis of animal unit months and managing wild and free-roaming horses (Equus caballus) and burros (E. asinus) to achieve and maintain an appropriate management level (AML) for each herd. Riparian green forage and water attracts cattle (Bos taurus) and equids when upland forage is brown. Key species that focus management for resilience to weather variation, fire, and floods are preferred forage plants for cattle and horses. They include riparian stabilizers such as densely rooted sedges and deep-rooted perennial grasses in sagebrush (Artemisia …

Special Topic: Pest And Beneficial Bird Management, Breanna Martinico, Shannon Skalos

Human–Wildlife Interactions

This is the call for papers for the special issue on Pest and Beneficial Bird Management.

Preparing For Publication: An Inside Look At Production Processes And Recommendations For Authors Of Human–Wildlife Interactions, Rosanna M. Vail

Human–Wildlife Interactions

This segment of The Back Page provides a transparent look at the journal's article production tasks, including pre-production, copyediting, layout, proofs, pre-publication, and publication, as well as recommendations for authors to reduce time to publication.

Cover, Editorial Staff, Journal Information

Human–Wildlife Interactions

This includes the cover caption, editorial staff, and journal information.

Table Of Contents

Human–Wildlife Interactions

This is the table of contents.

New Associate Editors, S. Nicole Frey

Human–Wildlife Interactions

New associate editors include Brian S. Dorr and Jorge Tobajas.

Exploring The Consistency Of Flow Regimes Within And Among Ecoregions Of The Southeastern United States, Frank Paul Braun Iv

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

Human manipulation of river systems has long been a known contributor to the loss of freshwater biodiversity. By accounting for environmental causes of hydrologic variation among rivers, we can better understand how ecoregion mediates flow regimes and forecast species that may be at risk. Presumably, natural variation associated with ecoregion boundaries exerts strong influence on flow regimes, and may mediate relationships between other features (e.g., land use, dam operations) and hydrology. However, such between-ecoregion variation is poorly investigated, particularly at fine spatial and temporal scales. I characterized 10 hydrologic metrics, representing the five key dimensions of the flow regime (magnitude, …