Ecology and Conservation of Lesser Prairie-Chickens

Ecology and Conservation of Lesser Prairie-Chickens
Author: David A. Haukos
Publisher: CRC Press
Total Pages: 376
Release: 2016-02-22
Genre: Nature
ISBN: 1482240238

Shortlisted for the 2018 TWS Wildlife Publication Awards in the edited book categoryLesser Prairie-Chickens have experienced substantial declines in terms of population and the extent of area that they occupy. While they are an elusive species, making it difficult at times to monitor them, current evidence indicates that they have been persistently

Assessment of Lesser Prairie-chicken Translocation Through Survival, Space Use, and Resource Selection

Assessment of Lesser Prairie-chicken Translocation Through Survival, Space Use, and Resource Selection
Author: Elisabeth Caroline Teige
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2021
Genre:
ISBN:

Translocation is defined as the deliberate movement of organisms from one site to another where the main objective is a conservation benefit. Translocations are used frequently as a management tool to restore or augment wildlife populations but generally have varying degrees of success. The lesser prairie-chicken (Tympanuchus pallidicinctus) is found in the southwestern Great Plains of the United States and currently occurs in four distinct ecoregions (Short-Grass Prairie/CRP Mosaic, Mixed-Grass Prairie, Sand Sagebrush Prairie, and Sand Shinnery Oak Prairie) across five states (Kansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico, USA). Recent estimates suggest the lesser prairie-chicken currently occupies only 15% of their estimated historical range. Within the current occupied range, lesser prairie-chicken populations have been experiencing moderate to severe population declines. Since a contemporary peak of an estimated 150,000 birds in the mid-1980s, lesser prairie-chicken populations have declined to an estimated abundance of 34,408 in 2020. The largest contemporary decline in population abundance and occupied range is occurring in the Sand Sagebrush Prairie Ecoregion. Historically, the Sand Sagebrush Prairie Ecoregion was the epicenter of the lesser prairie-chicken population despite a large area of vegetation in the ecoregion being decimated during the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. In 2020, only 171 birds were estimated for the ecoregion. In response to the extreme population decline and elevated extinction risk for the lesser prairie-chicken population in the Sand Sagebrush Prairie Ecoregion, myself, along with the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks, Colorado Parks and Wildlife, and U.S. Forest Service translocated lesser prairie-chickens from the Short-Grass Prairie/CRP Mosaic Ecoregion in northwest Kansas, where lesser prairie-chickens are currently most abundant, to release sites in sand sagebrush prairie landscapes on the U.S. Forest Service, Cimarron and Comanche National Grasslands in southwestern Kansas and southeastern Colorado, respectively. I captured, marked, translocated, and monitored 411 lesser prairie chickens during spring 2016-2019 to understand how translocation affects demographic rates, space use, and habitat selection for assessing translocation as a conservation tool for this declining prairie-grouse. My objectives were to estimate lek counts, nest success, reproductive success, adult survival, home range establishment and land cover composition, and selection of habitat vegetation characteristics at local and broad scales to assess lesser prairie-chickens response to translocation in a novel landscape. Within two weeks of release, 22.8% of birds either died or were never located. I used known-fate and nest survival models in Program MARK to determine adult survival and nest success of lesser prairie-chickens. I estimated breeding season survival for both males and females to be 0.44 ± 0.02 (SE) and nest success as 0.37 ± 0.04 (SE) but with a declining trend for the entire study period (2017-2020). Overall, vital rates were average to low and male high counts on established lek started to decline in 2021, two years following active translocation. Habitat availability in a novel environment may become an increasing concern as translocated lesser prairie-chickens have consistently larger home ranges than their native counterparts. Home ranges of translocated birds was comprised of greater area of Conservation Reserve Program land than any other cover type on the landscape. Lastly, on a local scale (300 m), I found little selection for vegetation at used locations, but lesser prairie-chickens used thicker and taller cover for nest sites. This vegetation use was expected and conveys the importance of the vegetation structure needed at a translocation release site. My results highlight the importance of land management conservation and its role in the conservation of lesser prairie-chicken populations. The translocation may have some short-term success but current vital rates of lesser prairie chickens may not be enough to overcome inherent limiting factors of the ecoregion for the population to become self-sustaining and the translocation to be deemed a long-term success.

Lesser Prairie-chicken Demography, Resource Selection, and Habitat Response Following Megafire in the Mixed-grass Prairie

Lesser Prairie-chicken Demography, Resource Selection, and Habitat Response Following Megafire in the Mixed-grass Prairie
Author: Nicholas James Parker
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2021
Genre:
ISBN:

Fire is an ecological driver that historically interacted with grazing and periodic drought throughout large portions of the Great Plains to maintain grasslands used by several wildlife species. More recently, fire suppression, coupled with changing climate and landscapes, has led to altered grassland ecosystems that may be more likely to experience massive wildfire events known as megafires. Megafires (>40,000 ha) have extreme socioeconomic impacts and may also affect grassland-dependent wildlife including lesser prairie-chickens (Tympanuchus pallidicintus). The lesser prairie-chicken is a grouse species of the southern Great Plains that has experienced population declines since the 1980s, primarily as a result of grassland habitat degradation and loss. While fire has long functioned as an ecological driver to shape grassland habitat, knowledge about the influence of megafires on lesser prairie-chickens and their habitat is lacking. To better understand how remaining grasslands and lesser prairie-chickens may be impacted by megafire, I hierarchically evaluated lesser prairie-chicken survival, reproduction, resource selection, and habitat response to a 2017 megafire at a site inhabited by lesser prairie-chickens in the mixed-grass prairie of Kansas, USA (Starbuck fire, ~254,000 ha). I captured lesser prairie-chickens on leks during the spring before (2014-2015) and after (2018-2019) the fire, attached VHF radio and GPS satellite transmitters, and tracked individuals to evaluate survival, reproduction, and habitat selection. To estimate population trends, I conducted counts of male attendance on leks before and after the fire. There was a 67% decline in the number of attending males on leks post-fire and a 46% decline in the number of occupied leks post-fire. Despite the population decline indicated by lek counts, female breeding season adult survival remained similar before (0.63 ± 0.08) and after the fire (0.64 ± 0.08), as did chick survival (before: 0.27 ± 0.03; after: 0.32 ± 0.11), while nest survival trended lower post-fire (before: 0.42 ± 0.06; after: 0.27 ± 0.07). Individual space use was evaluated using 95% isopleth Brownian Bridge home ranges, and did not differ before (828 ± 110 ha) and after (719 ± 101 ha) the fire. However, home ranges included 5 times more percent cover of Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) fields after the fire compared to before, suggesting CRP/cropland landscapes with disjointed fire fuel availability can provide refugia during extreme events. An analysis of lek attendance corroborated home range results, with greatest male lek attendance in areas with more surrounding cropland post-fire, opposite of trends seen before the fire and lesser prairie-chicken literature. Step selection revealed lesser prairie-chickens strongly avoided wooded areas before and after the fire, indicating that although I did see mortality of woody species, burned woodlands did not become available for use by lesser prairie-chickens. Furthermore, lesser prairie-chickens avoided burned areas post-fire, suggesting limited habitat availability up to 3 years post-fire and emigration from the study site. My analysis of fine-scale habitat and grassland vegetation characteristics response supported a decrease in available cover, with a 32% decrease in 100% visual obstruction, 17% decrease in litter depth, and a 16% increase in bare ground. Based on vegetation criteria, abundance of nest habitat decreased 34% one year post-fire; however, nest habitat and many vegetation characteristics returned to pre-fire levels within two years post-fire, thanks in part to substantial growing season precipitation received in the years following the fire (>70 cm/year). The large size and intense nature of the fire affected lek attendance, habitat abundance, and nest survival, but had no lasting (>2 year) detrimental impacts for grasslands or lesser prairie-chicken habitat. Post-fire recovery of grasslands did not correspond with a rebounding population and it will likely take>3 years for lesser prairie-chickens to fully recolonize burned grasslands. My results indicate that multiple management strategies (e.g., CRP enrollment, post-fire removal of snags, prescribed fire) are needed to manage lesser prairie-chicken habitat and limit future megafires.

Current Ornithology Volume 17

Current Ornithology Volume 17
Author: Charles F. Thompson
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 201
Release: 2010-09-09
Genre: Science
ISBN: 1441964215

Current Ornithology publishes authoritative, up-to-date, scholarly reviews of topics selected from the full range of current research in avian biology. Topics cover the spectrum from the molecular level of organization to population biology and community ecology. The series seeks especially to review (1) fields in which an abundant recent literature will benefit from synthesis and organization, or (2) newly emerging fields that are gaining recognition as the result of recent discoveries or shifts in perspective, or (3) fields in which students of vertebrates may benefit from comparisons of birds with other classes. All chapters are invited, and authors are chosen for their leadership in the subjects under review.

Ecology and Conservation of Great Plains Vertebrates

Ecology and Conservation of Great Plains Vertebrates
Author: Fritz L. Knopf
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 329
Release: 2013-04-17
Genre: Science
ISBN: 1475727038

The frontier images of America embrace endless horizons, majestic herds of native ungulates, and romanticized life-styles of nomadie peoples. The images were mere reflections of vertebrates living in harmony in an ecosystem driven by the unpre dictable local and regional effects of drought, frre, and grazing. Those effects, often referred to as ecological "disturbanees," are rather the driving forces on which species depended to create the spatial and temporal heterogeneity that favored ecological prerequisites for survival. Alandscape viewed by European descendants as monotony interrupted only by extremes in weather and commonly referred to as the "Great American Desert," this country was to be rushed through and cursed, a barrier that hindered access to the deep soils of the Oregon country, the rich minerals of California and Colorado, and the religious freedom sought in Utah. Those who stayed (for lack of resources or stamina) spent a century trying to moderate the ecological dynamics of Great Plains prairies by suppressing fires, planting trees and exotic grasses, poisoning rodents, diverting waters, and homogenizing the dynamies of grazing with endless fences-all creating bound an otherwise boundless vista. aries in Historically, travelers and settlers referred to the area of tallgrasses along the western edge of the deciduous forest and extending midway across Kansas as the "True Prairie. " The grasses thlnned and became shorter to the west, an area known then as the Great Plains.

Wildlife and Recreationists

Wildlife and Recreationists
Author: Richard L. Knight
Publisher: Island Press
Total Pages: 392
Release: 2013-04-22
Genre: Nature
ISBN: 1610911202

Wildlife and Recreationists defines and clarifies the issues surrounding the conflict between outdoor recreation and the health and well-being of wildlife and ecosystems. Contributors to the volume consider both direct and indirect effects of widlife-recreationist interactions, including: wildlife responses to disturbance, and the origins of these responses how specific recreational activities affect diverse types of wildlife the human dimensions of managing recreationists the economic importance of outdoor recreation how wildlife and recreationists might be able to coexist The book is a useful synthesis of what is known concerning wildlife and recreation. More important, it addresses both research needs and management options to minimize conflicts.