Wildlife and Terrestrial Species

The Challenge: The Federal Aviation Administration has long relied on the expertise provided by the Smithsonian Feather Identification Lab for identification of bird remains recovered from bird-aircraft (birdstrike) collisions. Recently, these identifications are increasingly reliant on data from mitochondrial DNA. While generally successful in delimiting species, mitochondrial DNA is not...

The Challenge: Accurate taxonomic delineation of species and subspecies provides the biological and legal foundation for effective conservation action, whether by domestic resource management agencies or by other countries throughout the hemisphere that may be involved through international treaties or common conservation threats. Although birds are among the most well-known groups of organisms...

The Challenge: The Channel Islands, sometimes called “The Galapagos of North America,” consist of 8 islands off the coast of southern California. The islands are managed by a variety of agencies, including the National Park Service, the Nature Conservancy, and the US Navy, as well as private owners, and they have had a wide variety of uses through time, from occupancy by Native American hunter...

The Challenge: Federal and state government agencies, NGOs, scientists, and authors of field guides and other literature need a standardized classification of birds to provide the taxonomic and nomenclatural foundation for bird research, conservation, and education in North America. These public agencies, private individuals, and organizations rely on the latest developments in systematics...

A large number of bat species are considered “species of concern” in the United States and its Territories, and resource managers are increasingly interested in learning more about their distribution, status, and potential management.

Since the mid-1990s, several species of non-native, giant constrictor snakes, such as Burmese pythons and boa constrictors, have surfaced in localities throughout southern Florida. Several are known or suspected to be breeding and appear to be spreading northward. Increasingly, media and other reports of sightings or encounters with these animals have emphasized the dangers they could impose on...

In 1999 and 2000, FORT conducted a survey of bats at El Malpais National Monument and adjacent lands. During this study, several species of bats were documented, including some that are known to use caves or lava-tube formations as roosts. In the winter of 2006–2007, the fungus-caused disease known as “white-nose syndrome” (WNS) began devastating populations of hibernating bat species that use...

Freshwater wetlands provide critical habitat for a diverse array of organisms, including many amphibians. Yet, under the threat of climate change, these habitats are among the most imperiled ecosystems on Earth.

The Keamuku Maneuver Area (KMA) is a 9,227 ha. unit of Army Pohakuloa Training Area (PTA) on Hawai‘i Island. The Army’s mission at KMA is threatened by erosional processes that could make parts of the training area too hazardous or too degraded for sustained use. These processes depend on vegetation dynamics and the nature of the soils underlying KMA. Knowledge of the training area was...

The Laysan teal has the most restricted range of any duck species and is especially vulnerable to extinction because of its small population size and vulnerability to climate change. The species was believed to be endemic to one island until new sub-fossil evidence and ancient DNA-testing revealed Laysan teal were widespread across the Hawaiian archipelago. Despite its previously wide distribution...

USGS and Oregon State University (OSU) have joined forces to support USFWS with research needed help manage and recover the endangered Hawaiian duck, locally known as koloa maoli. Hybridization of koloa with feral Mallards on O‘ahu and Maui is believed to have resulted in complete introgression in those populations (Engilis et al. 2002), and Kaua‘i is the only island that likely supports a viable...

The palila is an endangered species of Hawaiian honeycreeper which exists only in subalpine forests dominated by māmane and naio on Mauna Kea Volcano. The diet of this finch-billed bird is unusually restricted; immature seeds, flowers, and insects found on māmane trees are critical to its existence. Māmane also is the preferred nesting substrate of the palila. Federal court orders have resulted in...