Publications

Little is known about the post-nesting migration and foraging areas of hawksbill turtles (Eretmochelys imbricata) nesting on St. Kitts and Nevis, an important nesting site for hawksbills in the eastern Caribbean. To elucidate internesting, migration and foraging patterns of hawksbills from Nevis, we satellite tagged 28 post-nesting turtles between 2006 and 2022. Internesting, migrating...

Objective Successful conservation and management of fishes require an understanding of their age and growth. However, methods for estimating the age and growth of long-lived fish species are difficult to validate. The Kootenai River basin has a decades-long mark–recapture program for endangered White Sturgeon Acipenser transmontanus. The mark–recapture history information for White...

Myotis septentrionalis (Northern Long-eared Bat) has recently suffered a >90% decline in population size in North America due to white-nose syndrome (WNS). We assessed genetic diversity, population structure, current effective population size, and demographic history of M. septentrionalis distributed across the United States to determine baseline levels pre-WNS. We analyzed RADseq data...

Climate change is having a disproportionate impact on the Arctic. For Arctic breeding birds, basic knowledge of their annual cycle, specifically the timing, route, and movement behavior of migration, is needed to understand when and where populations may experience threats. We used a combination of geolocators and stable isotope analysis to identify route and timing of migration in Smith...

Throughout Hawai'i, fishponds are considered by their local communities as important cultural touchstones, a source of local, sustainably produced food, and an important component to the development of community-based management for nearshore fisheries. Within Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historical Park, the restoration of Kaloko Fishpond for traditional aquaculture management is a goal of...

Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a fatal prion disease of cervids that has spread across much of North America. Although gold standard CWD diagnostics involve postmortem testing of medial retropharyngeal lymph nodes or obex (brain stem), a key tissue sample for antemortem testing is rectoanal mucosa–associated lymphoid tissue (RAMALT). However, collection of an adequate sample (i.e...

Background Movement plays a key role in allowing animal species to adapt to sudden environmental shifts. Anthropogenic climate and land use change have accelerated the frequency of some of these extreme disturbances, including megafire. These megafires dramatically alter ecosystems and challenge the capacity of several species to adjust to a rapidly changing landscape. Ungulates and...

Background Unfettered movement among habitats is crucial for fish to access patchily distributed resources and complete their life cycle, but many riverscapes in the American Southwest are fragmented by dams. The federally endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow (Hybognathus amarus, RGSM) persists in a fragmented remnant of its former range (ca. 95% range reduction), and its movement...

The slender chub (Erimystax cahni) is a federally threatened fish native to and geographically restricted to eastern North America. More specifically, the Powell, Clinch, and lower Holston Rivers in Tennessee were historical collection areas. Habitat degradation from multiple sources, including surface mining, agriculture, dams, and urbanization, is associated with the decline of this...

Silver Carp (Hypophthalmichthys molitrix) populations have established and expanded throughout the lower Mississippi River basin (LMRB). Information pertaining to Silver Carp population mixing among rivers within the LMRB is lacking. Documented relations between Silver Carp otolith and river water barium (Ba) and strontium (Sr) microchemical signatures may enable estimation of origins of...

Natal dispersal is a key demographic trait that affects population dynamics, and intraspecific variation in dispersal affects gene flow among populations and source-sink dynamics. However, relatively little is known about the selective pressures and trade-offs that animals face when departing their natal area due to the logistical difficulties associated with monitoring animals during...

Population genomics can reveal cryptic biological diversity that may impact fitness while simultaneously serving to delineate relevant conservation units. Here, we leverage the power of whole-genome resequencing for conservation by studying 433 individual lesser prairie-chicken (Tympanuchus pallidicinctus; LEPC, a federally endangered species of conservation concern in the United States)...