Max Post van der Burg
Biography
Max Post van der Burg works as a Branch Chief and Research Ecologist with the USGS Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center. Max received his Ph.D. in Applied Ecology from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. His research interests include the population ecology of vertebrate and invertebrate species and developing quantitative analytical tools to understand patterns in ecological systems. Max’s work as a decision analyst focuses on helping management partners make more strategic decisions, while dealing with tradeoffs and uncertainty.
Science and Products
Science Team about Energy and Plains and Potholes Environments (STEPPE)
Brine Contamination to Plains and Potholes Environments from Energy Development in the Williston Basin
Decision analysis and support
Natural resource decision makers face numerous challenges in terms of making choices to solve complex management problems. Many of these challenges stem from being overwhelmed by too many choices, uncertain or delayed outcomes, and multiple stakeholders with conflicting desires. Decision analysis (a.k.a. structured decision making) is set of qualitative and quantitative tools for structuring...
Science support for Landscape Conservation Cooperatives
Conservation practitioners have begun to realize that the many of the land management challenges of the 21st century require a broad scale problem solving approach. Landscape Conservation Cooperatives (LCC) work to implement such an approach by serving as a venue for multiple conservation partners to work together (e.g. federal and state agencies), identify common problems and...
Potential effects of energy development on environmental resources of the Williston Basin in Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota
Federal resource managers in the Williston Basin need to understand how the recent expansion of oil and gas development is affecting a range of natural resources. The Bakken Federal Executive Group (BFEG), a group of representatives from over a dozen federal and tribal agencies, called for a report that synthesizes existing information about the potential impacts from energy development. The...
Spatiotemporal dynamics of grassland songbird populations in response to energy development in an agricultural landscape
The recent expansion of unconventional oil and gas development in the Williston Basin of North America has raised concerns among managers about potential negative effects of such development on grassland birds. Others, however, have argued that agricultural land use in the region has had a much larger impact and that energy development may be a comparatively small stressor for grassland birds...
Monitoring and modeling wetland chloride concentrations in relationship to oil and gas development
Extraction of oil and gas via unconventional methods is becoming an important aspect of energy production worldwide. Studying the effects of this development in countries where these technologies are being widely used may provide managers in other oil producing parts of the world with some insight in terms of concerns associated with development. Rapid increases in energy development in North...
Developing a sampling and modeling framework to support Dakota skipper management decisions
The presence or absence of an endangered species on the landscape can have significant policy implications for public land managers and private landowners. The Dakota Skipper, a grassland dependent butterfly, was recently listed as a threatened species under The Endangered Species Act in 2014. This listing has created controversy in the states of North and South Dakota because of the potential...
Enhancing Coastal Adaptation Planning at Gulf Islands National Seashore
Barrier islands are exposed to a range of natural and human-caused changes, including hurricanes, sea-level rise, and dredging. These changes have the potential to influence the ability of barrier islands to serve as a first-line of defense for the mainland during storm events. Gulf Islands National Seashore, a National Park Service unit in the northern Gulf of Mexico between Florida and...
Protecting Cultural Resources in the Face of Climate Change
Climate change doesn’t just threaten our natural resources—it threatens our cultural resources, too. Cultural resources represent evidence of past human activity, such as archeological sites, or are of significance to a group of people traditionally associated with the resource, such as Native American ceremonial sites. Climate change is challenging the long-term persistence of many cultural...
Bringing Together Scientists and Resource Managers to Assess Science Needs and Address Questions Related to Conservation in a Changing Climate
Climate scientists need more and better information about the needs of decision-makers and managers, while decision-makers need better information about how a changing climate may affect their management and conservation objectives. The goal of this project was to build connections between the Plains and Prairie Potholes Landscape Conservation Cooperative (PPP-LCC), the North Central Climate...
SERAP: Decision Support for Stakeholders and Managers
The USGS and South Atlantic LCC worked with stakeholders and managers across the Southeast to identify and assess landscape-level strategies for conserving multiple species. These strategies incorporated predictions from downscaled climate models, sea level rise, and changes to aquatic and terrestrial habitats.
Southeast Regional Assessment Project (SERAP): Assessing Global Change Impacts on Natural and Human Systems in the Southeast
The Southeastern United States spans a broad range of physiographic settings and maintains exceptionally high levels of faunal diversity. Unfortunately, many of these ecosystems are increasingly under threat due to rapid human development, and management agencies are increasingly aware of the potential effects that climate change will have on these ecosystems. Natural resource managers and...
Optimizing preservation for multiple types of historic structures under climate change
Cultural resources in coastal parks and recreation areas are vulnerable to climate change. The US National Park Service (NPS) is facing the challenge of insufficient budget allocations for both maintenance and climate adaptation of historic structures. Research on adaptation planning for cultural resources has predominately focused on...
Xiao, Xiao; Seekamp, Erin; Lu, Junyu; Eaton, Mitchell; van der Burg, Max Post
Decision analysis of barrier placement and targeted removal to control invasive carp in the Tennessee River Basin
Controlling range expansion of invasive carp (specifically Hypophthalmichthys spp.) on the Tennessee River is important to conserve the ecological and economic benefits provided by the river. We collaborated with State and Federal agencies (the stakeholder group) to develop a decision framework and decision support model to evaluate strategies to...
van der Burg, Max Post; Smith, David R.; Cupp, Aaron R.; Rogers, Mark W.; Chapman, Duane C. A new decision support tool for collaborative adaptive vegetation management in northern Great Plains national parks
National Park Service (NPS) units in the northern Great Plains (NGP) were established to preserve and interpret the history of America, protect and showcase unusual geology and paleontology, and provide a home for vanishing large wildlife. A unifying feature among these national parks, monuments, and historic sites is mixed-grass prairie, which...
Ashton, Isabel W.; Symstad, Amy; Baldwin, Heather; Post van der Burg, Max; Bekedam, Steven; Borgman, Erin; Haar, Milton; Hogan, Terri; Rockwood, Stephanie; Swanson, Daniel J; Thomson, Carmen; Wienk, Cody Capturing spatiotemporal patterns in presence-absence data to inform monitoring and sampling designs for the threatened Dakota skipper (Lepidoptera: Hesperiidae) in the Great Plains of the United States
Declines among species of insect pollinators, especially butterflies, has garnered attention from scientists and managers. Often these declines have spurred governments to declare some species as threatened or endangered. We used existing presence–absence data from surveys for the threatened Dakota skipper Hesperia dacotae (Skinner) to...
Post van der Burg, Max; Austin, Jane E.; Wiltermuth, Mark; Newton, Wesley E.; Macdonald, Garrett John Energy Development and Production in the Great Plains: Implications and Restoration Opportunities
Energy is an integral part of society. The major US energy sources of fossil fuels (coal, oil, natural gas); biofuels (ethanol); and wind are concentrated in grassland ecosystems of the Great Plains. As energy demand continues to increase, mounting pressures will be placed on North American grassland systems. In this review, we present the...
Ott, Jacqueline P.; Hanberry, Brice B.; Khalil, Mona; Paschke, Mark W.; Post van der Burg, Max; Prenni, Anthony J.
Optimizing historical preservation under climate change—An overview of the optimal preservation model and pilot testing at Cape Lookout National Seashore
Adapting cultural resources to climate-change effects challenges traditional cultural resource decision making because some adaptation strategies can negatively affect the integrity of cultural resources. Yet, the inevitability of climate-change effects—even given the uncertain timing of those effects—necessitates that managers begin prioritizing...
Seekamp, Erin; Post van der Burg, Max; Fatorić, Sandra; Eaton, Mitchell J.; Xiao, Xiao; McCreary, Allie Optimizing historic preservation under climate change: Decision support for cultural resource adaptation planning in national parks
Climate change poses great challenges for cultural resource management, particularly in coastal areas. Cultural resources, such as historic buildings, in coastal areas are vulnerable to climate impacts including inundation, deterioration, and destruction from sea-level rise and storm-related flooding...
Xiao, Xiao; Seekamp, Erin; Post van der Burg, Max; Eaton, Mitchell; Fatorić, Sandra; McCreary, Allie
Potential effects of energy development on environmental resources of the Williston Basin in Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota—Species of conservation concern: Chapter D in Potential effects of energy development on environmental resources of the Williston Basin in Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota
The ecosystems of the Williston Basin provide direct and indirect benefits to society. These benefits include carbon sequestration, flood control, nutrient rich soils for agricultural productivity, and habitat for wildlife. This chapter’s main focus is on the effects of energy development on species that occupy the ecosystems in the Williston...
Post van der Burg, Max; Symstad, Amy J.; Igl, Lawrence D.; Mushet, David M.; Larson, Diane L.; Sargeant, Glen A.; Harper, David D.; Farag, Aïda M.; Tangen, Brian A.; Anteau, Michael J.
Potential effects of energy development on environmental resources of the Williston Basin in Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota
The Williston Basin, which includes parts of Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota in the United States, has been a leading domestic oil and gas producing area. To better understand the potential effects of energy development on environmental resources in the Williston Basin, the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Bureau of...
Post van der Burg, Max; Vining, Kevin C.; Frankforter, Jill D. Book review: Estimation of parameters for animal populations: A primer for the rest of us
No abstract available.Estimation of Parameters for Animal Populations: A Primer for the Rest of Us. Larkin A. Powell and George A. Gale. 2015. Caught Napping Publications, Lincoln, Nebraska, USA. 239 pages. (http://larkinpowell.wixsite.com/larkinpowell/estimationof-parameters-for-animal-pop). ISBN: 978-329-06151-4.
Post van der Burg, Max Prerequisites for understanding climate-change impacts on northern prairie wetlands
The Prairie Pothole Region (PPR) contains ecosystems that are typified by an extensive matrix of grasslands and depressional wetlands, which provide numerous ecosystem services. Over the past 150 years the PPR has experienced numerous landscape modifications resulting in agricultural conversion of 75–99 % of native prairie uplands and drainage of...
Anteau, Michael J.; Wiltermuth, Mark; Post van der Burg, Max; Pearse, Aaron T. A Bayesian approach for temporally scaling climate for modeling ecological systems
With climate change becoming more of concern, many ecologists are including climate variables in their system and statistical models. The Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI) is a drought index that has potential advantages in modeling ecological response variables, including a flexible computation of the index over different...
Post van der Burg, Max; Anteau, Michael J.; McCauley, Lisa A.; Wiltermuth, Mark