Download or read book Carryover Effects of Winter Feeding on Migration Habitat Selection and Foraging Ecology of Elk in Western Wyoming written by Jennifer D. Jones and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 80 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Resource distribution on ungulate seasonal ranges is commonly altered without consideration of potential carryover effects on year-round foraging strategies. Supplemental feeding of temperate ungulates is a widespread management practice that manipulates forage resources and has potential to enhance nutritional condition and influence behavior. We tested the hypothesis that winter feeding enhances the nutritional condition of migratory elk, with carryover effects that influence migration and summer foraging strategies. We used global positioning system location data and behavioral observations of 230 adult, female elk (Cervus elaphus) that used feedgrounds (n=151) or native winter range (n=79) in western Wyoming. Attendance at feedgrounds slightly enhanced the nutritional condition of fed elk, with an average of 1.22% more body fat than unfed elk. Migration behavior differed with fed elk arriving on summer range later and leaving earlier, resulting in 26 fewer days on summer range. Fed elk occupied summer ranges that were 75% smaller than unfed elk, and while resource selection was similar, fed elk showed less selection for foraging habitats and displayed a weaker fluctuation in their hourly use of forest than unfed elk. In contrast to differences found at broad scale habitat use, winter feeding did not carryover to influence fine scale time budgets of fed and unfed elk. Our findings suggest that alteration of resources, including anthropogenic manipulations, can be strong and consistent enough to generate carryover effects on the migration behavior and year-round foraging strategies of temperate, migratory ungulates with implications for management actions.
Download or read book Habitat Use and Migration Ecology of Mule Deer in Developing Gas Fields of Western Wyoming written by Hall Sawyer and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 108 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Increased levels of energy development across the intermountain West have created a variety of wildlife and habitat management concerns. Because many of the energy resources in the region occur in shrub-dominated basins (e.g., Powder River, Piceance, Great Divide, and Green River basins), management concerns have focused on native shrub communities and associated species, including mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus). Two of the more pressing concerns are how mule deer respond when critical habitats (e.g., winter range) are impacted by development and how their migration routes can be identified and prioritized for conservation. To address the first, I examined how three types of natural gas well pads with varying levels of vehicle traffic influenced the winter habitat selection patterns of mule deer in western Wyoming. My results showed that mule deer avoided all types of well pads and selected areas further from well pads that received high levels of traffic. Accordingly, impacts to mule deer could likely be reduced through technology and planning that minimizes the number of well pads and amount of human activity associated with them. To address the migration concerns, I developed a quantitative framework that uses global positioning system (GPS) data and the Brownian bridge movement model (BBMM) to: (1) provide a probabilistic estimate of the migration routes of a sampled population, (2) distinguish between route segments that function as stopover sites versus those used primarily as movement corridors, and (3) prioritize routes for conservation based upon the proportion of the sampled population that uses them. Mule deer migration routes were characterized by a series of stopover sites where deer spent most of their time, connected by movement corridors through which deer moved quickly. These findings suggest management strategies that differentiate between stopover sites and movement corridors may be warranted. Because some migration routes were used by more mule deer than others, proportional level of use may provide a reasonable metric by which routes can be prioritized for conservation. Although stopovers appeared to be a prominent feature of mule deer migration routes, the explicit study of stopovers (i.e., stopover ecology) has been limited to avian species. To assess whether stopover ecology was relevant to mule deer, I again used fine-scale GPS data and BBMMs to quantify a suite of stopover characteristics and examine the ecological role of stopovers in the seasonal migrations of mule deer. Mule deer utilized a series of stopover sites in both spring and fall migrations, across a range of migration distances (18-144 km). Overall, mule deer used 1.9 and 1.5 stopovers for every 10 km increase in migration distance during spring and fall migrations, respectively. Stopovers had higher quality forage compared to movement corridors, and forage quality increased with elevation, presumably because of delayed phenology along the altitudinal migration route. Stopovers likely play a key role in the migration strategy of mule deer by allowing them to migrate in concert with vegetative phenology and optimize their foraging during migration. My results suggest stopovers were a critical component in the altitudinal migrations of mule deer and that conservation of stopover sites may improve efforts aimed at sustaining migratory mule deer populations.
Download or read book Elk Winter Habitat Selection and Movements in the Buffalo Valley of Wyoming with Respect to Habitat Treatments and Supplemental Feeding written by Francis Drew Henry and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 57 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Influence of Large Carnivore Recovery and Summer Conditions on the Migratory Elk of Wyoming s Absaroka Mountains written by Arthur Dehon Middleton and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: I studied the Clarks Fork elk herd, a population of 4,000 elk whose migratory individuals winter in outlying areas of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE), and summer in core areas of Yellowstone National Park (YNP). I first evaluated the long-term ecological context of the Clarks Fork herd's changing demography. Migratory have elk experienced a 21-year, 70% reduction in recruitment and a 4-year, 19% depression in the pregnancy rate, caused largely by infrequent reproduction of females that were young or lactating. Over the same period, resident elk have experienced increasing recruitment and a high pregnancy rate. Large-scale changes in predation and habitat quality appear responsible for the declining productivity of migratory elk. Migrants are now exposed to four times as many grizzly bears and wolves as residents. Both predators consume migratory elk calves at high rates in the Yellowstone wilderness, but occur less frequently in the year-round habitats of resident elk, due to lethal management and human disturbance. Migratory elk have also recently experienced a shorter spring green-up, consistent with recent drying and warming trends in the region. These findings suggest that large carnivore recovery and drought, operating simultaneously along an elevation gradient, have disproportionately influenced the demography of migratory elk. Next, I evaluated the hypothesis that the risk of wolf predation is contributing to the low productivity of migratory elk, via changes in winter behavior that reduce individual females' nutrition and pregnancy probability. Although such 'non-consumptive' effects (NCEs) of predators have been studied extensively in small-scale, experimental systems, NCEs have never been comprehensively evaluated among wide-ranging large mammals. I found that during the 24 h after wolves approached within 1 km, elk increased their rates of movement, displacement, and vigilance, but did not reduce their feeding rates or change their habitat use. The late-winter body fat and pregnancy probability of elk were not related to wolf predation risk, and were instead a function of autumn body fat and age. These findings suggest that wolves influence elk demography through direct killing, not NCEs. One of my observations - that migratory elk experienced 1-km wolf encounters only once every 9 days - suggests that the current conceptualization of risk effects, developed in smaller-scale study systems, obscures important effects of spatiotemporal scale. Next, I further explored the context-dependency of predation risk effects, evaluating the limiting role of prey body condition. Population- and community-level risk effects hinge on strong antipredator behaviors expressed by individual prey animals, but these behaviors might be limited by the countervailing influence of hunger and starvation, which can result from many biological and ecological processes that operate independently of predation risk. In a synthesis of the literature, I found that in 96% (44/46) of behavioral studies - including experiments conducted with mammals, birds, insects, fish, reptiles, and amphibians - prey body condition mediated the strength of antipredator behavior. This suggests that a predictive theory of predation risk effects can be improved by integrating the important role of individual prey condition, alongside other factors identified by prior work - such as prey social behavior, predator hunting strategy, and spatial scale. Finally, I considered the influence of human-caused ecological changes on the predation rates of the dominant elk calf predator in the GYE, the grizzly bear. Over the past two decades, the availability of key grizzly bear diet items has declined. In particular, an invasion of non-native lake trout has driven a dramatic decline of native cutthroat trout that migrate up the shallow tributaries of Yellowstone Lake to spawn each spring. I explored whether this decline has amplified the effect of the omnivorous grizzly bear on populations of migratory elk that summer inside YNP. My synthesis of research conducted over three decades on grizzly diets and elk populations, including recent study of four elk migrations, indicates that the invasion by lake trout has contributed to increased predation by grizzly bears on the calves of migratory elk. Additionally, a demographic model that incorporates two independent estimates of this increase in predation suggests that its magnitude has been sufficient to reduce the calf recruitment (4-16%) and population growth (2-11%) of migratory elk. The disruption of this important aquatic-terrestrial linkage may hinder the restoration of historic species interactions in YNP, highlighting the urgency of efforts to suppress lake trout in Yellowstone Lake and the importance of preventing such invasions elsewhere. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
Download or read book Winter Feeding of Elk in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and Its Effects on Disease Dynamics written by Gavin G. Cotterill and published by . This book was released on 2018 with total page 9 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Providing food to wildlife during periods when natural food is limited results in aggregations that may facilitate disease transmission. This is exemplified in western Wyoming where institutional feeding over the past century has aimed to mitigate wildlife?livestock conflict and minimize winter mortality of elk (Cervus canadensis). Here we review research across 23 winter feedgrounds where the most studied disease is brucellosis, caused by the bacterium Brucella abortus. Traditional veterinary practices (vaccination, test-and-slaughter) have thus far been unable to control this disease in elk, which can spill over to cattle. Current disease-reduction efforts are being guided by ecological research on elk movement and density, reproduction, stress, co-infections and scavengers. Given the right tools, feedgrounds could provide opportunities for adaptive management of brucellosis through regular animal testing and populationlevel manipulations. Our analyses of several such manipulations highlight the value of a research?management partnership guided by hypothesis testing, despite the constraints of the sociopolitical environment. However, brucellosis is now spreading in unfed elk herds, while other diseases (e.g. chronic wasting disease) are of increasing concern at feedgrounds. Therefore experimental closures of feedgrounds, reduced feeding and lower elk populations merit consideration. This article is part of the theme issue ?Anthropogenic resource subsidies and host ?parasite dynamics in wildlife?.
Download or read book Habitat effectiveness Index for Elk on Blue Mountain Winter Ranges written by and published by . This book was released on 1988 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Where Elk Roam written by Bruce Smith and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2011-11-08 with total page 275 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An inside look at working with the majestic elk—and the controversies surrounding their conservation.
Download or read book Winter Habitat Selection and Use by a Western Montana Elk Herd written by Robert C. Beall and published by . This book was released on 1974 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author evaluated winter habitat selection by a western Montana Rocky Mountain elk herd in the Sapphire Mountains from June 1969 to March 1973 in order to determine interactions between elk activities with their winter environment. The author makes conclusions regarding snow, meteorological conditions, radiation conditions, ambient air temperature, and logging on elk response.
Download or read book Winter Feeding Ecology and Browse Effects of Mule Deer Elk White tailed Deer and Cattle on the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Ranch written by Scott A. Hemmer and published by . This book was released on 2004 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Ecology of Elk Parturition Across Winter Feeding Opportunities in the Brucellosis Endemic Area of Wyoming written by Andrea Ellen Barbknecht and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Assessing Community Composition and Nutrition of Forage Plants in Prime Elk Summer Habitat in the Absaroka Range Wyoming written by Sara Frances Beaver and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 92 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Traditionally, the Clarks Fork elk herd (Cervus elaphus) has migrated seasonally from Cody, Wyoming, through the Absaroka Range to the high mountains surrounding the Lamar River Valley of eastern Yellowstone National Park. About 50% of elk in the Clarks Fork herd reside the entire year closer to Cody. Whereas the average pregnancy rate for Rocky Mountain elk is about 90%, recent surveys of the herd have detected nonmigratory Clarks Fork population pregnancy rates well within the normal range at 84-94%, while the migratory population ranges only from 59-76%. Because nutritional limitations can lower pregnancy rates within elk herds, the reduction in productivity in the migratory subpopulation may be linked to limitations in the availability of nutritious forage on the migratory summer range. Vegetation sampling was conducted on resident and migratory elk summer ranges to characterize the species composition of both ranges as well as to estimate biomass available of key forage types. Fecal samples were collected on both summer ranges to estimate elk diets and calculate selection ratios based on diet and forage availability. I used Timmer diagrams with vector analysis to make graphical comparisons of the nutritional status of the migratory and resident summer ranges, to look specifically for nutritional deficiency on the migratory range. Summer ranges of migratory and resident Clarks Fork elk contain distinct vegetation types, regardless of which summer range is considered. The summer ranges are also different from one another regardless of vegetation type. Although absolute and relative biomass of plant groups differed between migratory and resident summer ranges, elk selection of forage plants was the same between migratory and resident elk. Elk selected plant groups in the same proportions on each summer range, but ingested different amounts of plant material. Sedges constituted a greater percentage of migratory elk diets, and were more available on the migratory range. Similarly, on the resident range, legumes occurred much more frequently than on the migratory range. Resident elk have more highly desirable forage available on their summer range, including grasses and legumes. The migratory summer range of Clarks Fork elk is more nutritious with respect to both crude protein and digestible energy than the resident summer range. There were differences in the crude protein and digestible energy contents of some analogous vegetation types, often with the plants from the migratory range containing higher nutrient content than the plants sampled from the resident range. I found no nutrient deficiencies in protein or energy on the migratory range. Agricultural areas available on the resident range have much greater amounts of nutritious biomass available per land area than either the resident range in general or the migratory range. These results quantify the benefit of migration to elk through the nutritional quality of forage. However, other studies indicate that the length of time this nutritious forage is available to migratory elk is shrinking, which could lessen the benefit of migration and cause the depression of pregnancy rates seen in the migratory Clarks Fork elk.
Download or read book The Jackson Elk Herd written by Mark S. Boyce and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2009-04-30 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The management of the elk population at Jackson Hole, Wyoming, has been the subject of a long-standing controversy among wildlife biologists, with critics of the winter feeding program predicting that such intervention would result in overpopulation, habitat destruction, disease and chaos. After more than 75 years in which hay has been provided during the winter months in most years, the elk population is flourishing and is for good measure one of the most intensively studied and managed wildlife populations in North America. This detailed study of migration, population dynamics, harvesting strategies, winter feeding programs and range relationships in the Jackson elk herd provides a classic study in wildlife management. As such it will have wide appeal to professionals and students in wildlife biology, resource management and applied ecology.
Download or read book Winter Habitat Selection by Elk in Northwestern Montana written by Milo Burcham and published by . This book was released on 1990 with total page 92 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Effects of Feeding on the Winter Elk Population of the National Elk Refuge at Jackson Wyoming written by Dixie R. Smith and published by . This book was released on 1957 with total page 4 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Influence of Migratory and Resident Elk Movements on Seasonal Wolf Habitat Selection and Depredation Patterns written by Abigail A. Nelson and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 74 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Human conflict is a unique and persistent driver of management and conservation of large mammalian carnivores. Understanding these conflicts in space and time can assist in appropriate decision-making as managers seek to balance the population viability of carnivore species with management that curbs carnivore impacts on human livelihoods. The patchy distribution of prey-rich habitat across landscapes influences abundance and movements of wolves; however, many ungulate populations are partially migratory, and it is unclear how wolves respond behaviorally to the seasonal movements of migratory versus nonmigratory prey. In this context, wolf selection for prey-rich habitat can influence seasonal encounter rates and thus depredation rates on domestic livestock. In this study, conducted in northwest Wyoming, USA, we use three years of fine-scale wolf (n = 14) and elk (n = 70) movement information to evaluate the influence of elk distribution and other landscape features on wolf habitat selection and patterns of depredation on domestic livestock.
Download or read book Winter Feeding of Elk in Sublette County Wyoming written by Steve Scheldt and published by . This book was released on 1967 with total page 3 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Habitat Selection Foraging Behavior and Dietary Nutrition of Elk in Burned Vs Unburned Aspen Forest written by Stephen Kemble Canon and published by . This book was released on 1985 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
