Publications

Exploring trends in species richness and the distribution of individual species over time as well as the factors affecting these trends informs conservation priorities in protecting species and ecosystems as a whole. We used data from 41 park-wide line transect surveys in 2009 and 2014 and multi-season occupancy models with multi-species data to explore trends in species richness and...

In theory parameters of dynamic N-mixture models can be estimated with multiple years of data without the robust design under the assumption of constant detection probability. However, such an assumption can rarely be met in long-term studies, and the consequences of violating this assumption in the inferences of dynamic N-mixture models have not been assessed. In this study we used...

Southern New England provides key wintering habitat for White-winged Scoters (Melanitta fusca). This area has also pioneered the development of offshore wind energy in North America and the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has established nine Wind Energy Area (WEA) lease blocks along the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf in areas that may provide important staging and...

Large‐scale citizen‐science projects, such as atlases of species distribution, are an important source of data for macroecological research, for understanding the effects of climate change and other drivers on biodiversity, and for more applied conservation tasks, such as early‐warning systems for biodiversity loss.However, citizen‐science data are challenging to analyse because the...

Despite conservation efforts, large mammals such as tigers (Panthera tigris) and their main prey, gaur (Bos gaurus), banteng (Bos javanicus), and sambar (Rusa unicolor), are highly threatened and declining across their entire range. The only large viable source population of tigers in mainland Southeast Asia occurs in Thailand's Western Forest Complex (WEFCOM), an approximately 19,000 km...

As is sometimes the case, field research does not always go according to plan. This is especially true when the research involves free-ranging animals. We recently conducted a preliminary field study that involved placing a beehive in a tent and individually releasing marked honey bees (Apis mellifera) outdoors to study their ability to locate sugar water rewards by following olfactory...

For species that exist at low abundance or are otherwise difficult to study, it is challenging to estimate vital rates such as survival and fecundity and common to assume that survival rates are constant across ages and sexes. Population assessments based on overly simplistic vital rates can lead to erroneous conclusions. We estimated sex and length-based annual apparent survival rates...

As editors, we mark the launch of Conservation Science and Practice, a journal of the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB), with the following remarks framing the purpose and aspirations of the journal. Our aim is to share scholarship on and experiences of the practice of conservation. We define conservation practice as the application of conservation principles or theory across...

While leaf litter, wood, and other plant remnants are known to play a central role in lotic ecosystems, animal remains (carcasses, bones, shells) have received less attention. We propose a simple classification scheme for animal remains in rivers based on origin (authochthonous vs. allochthonous) and frequency (pulsed vs continuous). We then present case studies in which we estimate the...

Understanding the relative impact of climate change and land cover change on changes in avian distribution has implications for the future course of avian distributions and appropriate management strategies. Due to the dynamic nature of climate change, our goal was to investigate the processes that shape species distributions, rather than the current distributional patterns. To this end...

Buffer zones, calculated by flight‐initiation distance (FID), are often used to reduce anthropogenic disturbances to wildlife, but FID can vary significantly across life‐history stages. We examined the behavioral effect of potential natural (gulls and shorebirds) and anthropogenic (pedestrians) disturbance sources to staging roseate (Sterna dougallii) and common tern (S. hirundo) flocks...

Black vultures (Coragyps atratus) have been increasing in density and expanding their range in the eastern United States since at least the 1960s. In many areas, their densities have increased to the level where they are causing damage to property and livestock and the number of requests for allowable take permits has increased throughout these areas. The United States Fish and Wildlife...