Wildlife Techniques Final- New

• Remains viable for long time in environment
• caused by toxin, limber neck in birds (drowns waterfowl)
• outbreaks occur in certain conditions (declining water levels, high pH, warm water, reduced O2)
• Maggots eat dead waterfowl, birds eat infected maggots/flies
• Controls: fluctuating water levels, diminish fly population, remove animal carcasses

• common in
• rodents and rabbits, bacterial (Francesella
• tularensis).  Look for lesions on
• liver, inflammation of organs. 
• Transmitted by fleas and ticks. 
• Humans can contract, can be life threatening if left unthreatened.

• found in
• elk, bison, caribou, and reindeer. 
• Bacterial disease (Brucella
• ssp.).  Transmission by accidental
• ingestion of bacteria that are shed by aborting animals.  Concern over transmission from wildlife to cattle.

found primarily in red foxes and coyotes; parasitic arthropod disease caused by mite Scarcoptes scabiei.  Erratic behavior in advanced stages.  Loss of hair and thick, crusty skin.  Tend to have outbreaks in 20 year cycles.

all mammals susceptible to rabies.  High risk species include raccoons, foxes, skunks, and bats. Viral disease caused by rhabdovirus.  Dumb rabies vs. furious rabies.

• fungus
• can kill turkeys and other seed eating birds

• Rice breast
• common in waterfowl
• protozoan parasites
• highly visible cysts on breasts
• does not affect birds or humans

• common in waterfowl and raptors
• ingestion of lead shot and sinkers
• experience starvation prior to death (hatchet breast)
• Toxoicosis: gizzard will get compacted, green cloaca

• bacterial, highly infection
• non-native (from Asia)
• Source from poultry farm carcasses
• will kill populations rapidly
• birds look healthy until necropsy, when lesion on liver and heart.
• Controls: early detection, removal of carcasses, habitat management (flood area to dilute cholera)

• Viral
• mammalian

• viral
• mammalian

• Parasitic nematode
• mammalian (avian eye worm)

• Bacterial disease
• mammalian

Advantages: thoroughly sample patchy habitats.  Known distances can be flagged.  Easier to represent all habitat types.

Disadvantages: may disrupt target species, less efficient, may miss rare species.

Advantages: better spatial and temporal coverage, more efficient 

Disadvantages: "requires" perpendicular distance, may under-sample certain habitat types, and many biases associated with road transects.

• 1) Probability of detecting animal on transect is 1
• 2) Distances measured without error
• 3) Populations are closed during surveys
• 4) No responsive mvt prior to detection

• -distance and # of birds
• -priori covariates (influence detection/density)
• -UTM's for density surface modeling

• -easy user interface
• -robust, empiracal, unbiased parameter estimates
• -goodness of fit
• -free

• 1) Space: point of occupancy modeling is to provide inferences for areas that are too large to sample.
• 2) Detectability: few animals 100% detected

• - distribution studies
• - meta-population studies
• - monitoring and management performance

• -sites are assumed to be closed
• -species are correctly identified 
• -probability of detecting a species at one site is independent of other sites

a technology that allows for remote measurement and reporting of information

• -most commonly used
• -wide ranges of sizes
• -considerations: weights, battery size/type, power, antenna type, frequency.

• -combo of GPS and satellite
• -highest accuracy but very expensive
• -heavier
• -can be solar powered
• -allows for more data collection

• -moderate accuracy, expensive
• -lighter than GPS combo
• -use PTT
• -processing centers deliver results to users
• -Argo satellites

• relatively inexpensive, but
• inaccurate.  Uses sunrise and
• sunset.  Requires recapture.

body implants, esophageal implants, external mounted, external saddle-mount.

body implant, collars, tail tag.

• backpack, glue-on, belly band, leg band, necklace, prong-suture, subcutaneous implants,
• tail-mount, tarsal-jess, patagial, body implant.

body implant, glue-on, subcutaneous implant

templetag (more for ID, tag with electronic code), head-mount, back mount.

• -mortality switch
• -temperature sensor
• -wet/dry (used on aquatic mammals to determine when in/out of water)
• -depth sensor
• -pressure sensor
• -activity sensor

• antenna type
• most common, easy to use
• very directional
• back signal can occur if signals bounce around terrain

• not as powerful
• directionality can be a problem with them
• good in dense vegetation, small

• Antenna type; omni-directional
• good for large study areas
• need additional antenna for homing

• antenna type used for lower frequencies
• lower frequencies travel further

• cheapest
• few channels (like 50)

• Up to 4,000 channels
• Data logger function can be used at a stationary site where it logs locations at regular intervals

allows for 25-100 unique individual codes per channel/frequency

• no data logger
• no coding
• cost effective

• Stationary, records data at regular intervals
• generates survival or presence/absence data
• can get info by email on modern ones
• satellite

biologists assume that data from the set of observed individuals are representative of patterns of the overall target populations

• age, gender, time of day, season
• spatial scale of sampling
• When do you want your locations and how often?

• set clear study objectives
• have a priori questions
• plan a pilot
• animal selection (maximize inferential bounds)
• biological considerations
• get data from different times of day
• may have to have aerial flights to locate dispersed birds

30-50 locations

• Non-direction- presence absence 
• direct tracking
• triangulation
• global positioning system units 
• platform terminal transmitters 
• global location sensing units

• typically done with automated receivers
• not precise
• detection distance is error rate
• presence/absence or survival; not for detailed habitat use or behavior

• homing; directly approach the signal
• not good for animals that flee or change behavior when approached
• required for tag retrieval
• should be no error if animal or tag is seen
• useful for knowing exact location of animal

• can be done with 2 locations, more preferable and more accurate
• take a bearing with compass, use landmark to pinpoint azimuth.
• program LOCATE

the difference between magnetic north and true north

• determine location based on time
• must retrieve system or get near enough (at least 5-10 km) to remotely download (now can be done to cells)
• 20-200 m accuracy

• uses satellites and the Doppler principle to create ellipsoid of potential locations
• difficulty detecting signals in areas with high electromagnetic interference
• ARGOS commercially operates the satellites and provides quality rankings for data points

• geolocators 
• longitude estimated by local noon or midnight
• error averages 200-400 km

• radio-marked animals may impact animal behavior
• terrain, vegetation, and weather can increase error
• observer effects
• seek to minimize bias through detailed planning

• must consider autocorrelation
• survival analysis
• resource use and selection
• home range estimates: minimum convex polygon vs kernel estimates

• metric based version of
• latitude/longitude.  Northings (lat) and
• Eastings (long).

separates food into 6 chemical constituents (water, ether extract/crude fat, crude fiber/digestible carbohydrate, crude protein, and ash/minerals).

• estimates gross energy of
• food (through complete oxidation)

a food is digested with a strong acid to release nitrogen.  Amount of protein is calculated from the nitrogen concentrations of the food.

• ether extraction of dried,
• homogenized carcasses to determine fat composition.

break down of fiber

• used as an index for protein
• nutrition of mammals (however, starved animals can have higher blood urea
• because they’re breaking down their own muscle).

• Total body electrical conductivity
• can use electrical conductivity to determine percent water (inversely correlated with fat)
• could overestimate due to inability to remove fat from GI tract

• counting these in the ovary gives an
• idea of ovulation rate
• involves collecting a cross section of ovary and
• examining it.

pink marking on ovary to estimate how many young the doe has produced

placental scares are pigmented areas of uterine tissue marking sites of previous placental attachment

average percent of food item for each species.

based on the number of individuals that fed on the food divided by the total number of individuals collected; frequency occurrence of food item among the population

• -Should be sensitive to slight changes in nutritional status
• -should be specific in its indications
• -should involve collection of tissues or measurements easily obtained from live or dead by relatively unskilled personnel
• should
• -should measure condition of different age groups and sexes at different times of the year and not be affected by the stress of collection
• -should be objective and reproductible

• -whole body fat (soxhlet method)
• -skeletal measurements and weights (e.g. femur: hind foot ratio)
• -Kidney fat index (highest in late summer, low in march for deer)
• -marrow fat (white means depleted)
• -blood parameters (corticosterone, blood urea)

• Subcutaneous fat (rump and saddle)
• abdominal
• bone marrow fat

• Body weight (40-60% of overall condition); compare with wing chord
• Discrete fat deposits
• Percent water (TOBEC)
• Protein Index: primarily used for waterfowl to determine fate of protein during reproduction.  Grind up bird.  Do study early spring.
• Bone marrow fat (uncommon)

• Abdominal
• Subcutaneous
• Muscle/proteins