Publications

Tuberculosis, caused by Mycobacterium bovis, was first diagnosed in African buffalo in South Africa's Kruger National Park in 1990. Over the past 15 years the disease has spread northwards leaving only the most northern buffalo herds unaffected. Evidence suggests that 10 other small and large mammalian species, including large predators, are spillover hosts. Wildlife tuberculosis has...

Despite the widespread use of redd counts to monitor trends in salmonid populations, few studies have evaluated the uncertainties in observed counts. We assessed the variability in redd counts for migratory bull trout Salvelinus confluentus among experienced observers in Lion and Goat creeks, which are tributaries to the Swan River, Montana. We documented substantially lower observer...

The 22,743-hectare Mount Haggin Wildlife Management Area was purchased in 1976, in part for moose (Alces alces) winter range. Observed moose populations climbed from a low of 7 in 1976 to a high of 56 in 2000. A 4-step management program was initiated in 2000 consisting of definition of management objective, monitoring to determine if the objective was attained, developing a management...

Abstract has not been submitted

A recent trend of enhancing freshwater emergent wetlands for waterfowl and other wildlife has raised concern about the effects of such measures on juvenile salmonids. We undertook this study to quantify the degree and extent of juvenile Pacific salmon Oncorhynchus spp. utilization of enhanced and unenhanced emergent wetlands within the floodplain of the lower Chehalis River, Washington...

The U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) allows listing of subspecies and other groupings below the rank of species. This provides the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service with a means to target the most critical unit in need of conservation. Although roughly one-quarter of listed taxa are subspecies, these management agencies are hindered by...

T HE CHANCE TO SEE a wild grizzly bear is often the first or second reason people give for visiting Yellow - stone National Park. Public interest in bears is closely coupled with a desire to perpetuate this wild symbol of the American West. Grizzly bears have long been described as a wilderness species requiring large tracts of undisturbed habitat. However, in today’s world, most grizzly...

Bovine tuberculosis (BTB) is an exotic disease invading the buffalo population (Syncerus caffer) of the Kruger National Park (KNP), South Africa. We used a sex and age-structured epidemiological model to assess the effectiveness of a vaccination program and define important research directions. The model allows for dispersal between a focal herd and background population and was...

No abstract available.

Wildfire is a potential threat to many species with narrow environmental tolerances like the Rocky Mountain tailed frog (Ascaphus montanus Mittleman and Myers, 1949), which inhabits a region where the frequency and intensity of wildfires are expected to increase. We compared pre- and post-fire counts of tadpoles in eight streams in northwestern Montana to determine the effects of...

Disturbances and ecosystem recovery from disturbance both involve numerous processes that operate on multiple spatial and temporal scales. Few studies have investigated how gradients of disturbance intensity and ecosystem responses are distributed across multiple spatial resolutions and also how this relationship changes through time during recovery. We investigated how cover of non...

For the past decade, our U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) research team has rummaged through Glacier National Park’s archives looking for records of snow avalanches. Our searches have paid off. We have found photographs that show snow avalanches blocking progress during the annual spring opening of the famed Going-to-the-Sun Road, ranger logs that describe cabins and telephone lines...