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The USGS Ecosystems Mission Area provides science to understand wildlife diseases, including avian influenza (AI). Avian influenza viruses occur naturally in wild birds such as ducks, geese, swans, and gulls. These viruses generally do not cause illness in wild birds but they can be highly pathogenic and cause illness and death in poultry and wildlife. Learn more with this geonarrative.

Collection of Cooperative Research Units Program (USGS Ecosystems Mission Area) year in review reports and abstracts. We provide graduate education in fisheries and wildlife sciences and partner with natural resource agencies and universities on topics of mutual concern. Today, there are 42 Units in 40 States, with a national program office in Reston, Virginia.

By Land, Air, and Water – USGS Science Supporting Fish and Wildlife Migrations Throughout North America!

The USGS is the research arm of the U.S. Department of the Interior and has established a series of strategic goals that focus its efforts on serving the American people. Within the USGS, the Ecosystems Mission Area is responsible for conducting and sponsoring research that addresses overarching goal "Science that Supports Wild and Urban Spaces, and the Landscapes In-Between."

In 2016, researchers in Wyoming discovered the world's longest migration of mule deer. A doe fitted with a GPS tracking collar migrated 242 miles one way. She is known as Deer 255. Each summer, she lives in the heart of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, but travels far into Wyoming's sagebrush sea and high desert ecosystem for winter.

One of the three pillars of the CRU mission is to lead research that provides science solutions for the management needs of our State and Federal agency cooperators—research that informs decision making. The CRU program with its Federal, State, and university partners are proactively working together to conduct science at transboundary landscape levels to meet the needs of all stakeholders.

Our Program is a unique cooperative partnership among State fish and wildlife agencies, universities, the Wildlife Management Institute, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. This story highlights the activities and accomplishments of the program and its cooperators for calendar year 2020.