Geology topics

Michael C. Runge

Publications and source records attributed to Michael C. Runge.

At least 91 records · Page 5Linked to original sources

USGS2019

Multi-species duck harvesting using dynamic programming and multi-criteria decision analysis

1.Multiple species are often exposed to a common hunting season, but harvest and population objectives may not be fully achieved if harvest potential varies among species and/or species abundances are not correlated through time. Our goal was to develop an approach for setting a common hunting season that would recognize heterogeneity in species productivity and would select annual hunting seasons conditioned on the status of individual species. 2.We first used stochastic dynamic programming to generate optimal, state‐dependent harvest strategies for 18 candidate regulatory scenarios. We simulated the performance of these strategies, and then used multi‐criteria decision making to identify preferred regulatory scenarios for duck hunting seasons in the Atlantic Flyway of the U.S. 3.Generally, estimates of annual population size were not correlated among species. Mallards had the highest estimated intrinsic rate of growth, green‐winged teal, wood ducks, and ring‐necked ducks had intermediate values, and goldeneyes were the least productive. Estimated carrying capacity was highest for mallards and lowest for green‐winged teal. 4.Managers had greatest interest in maximizing season length (33%) and aggregate duck abundance (28%), and less interest in maximizing aggregate harvest (19%) and the number of years between a change in hunting season regulations (19%). Several regulatory scenarios provided acceptable tradeoffs among these objectives. 5.Synthesis and applications. Separate hunting seasons for various species of game may be untenable, either due to the added cost and regulatory complexity, or because selective harvesting of stocks may be difficult due to problems in species identification. Rather than averaging species‐specific productivities, or basing hunting seasons on the least (or most) productive species, we describe an approach in which productivity and annual population status are considered explicitly for each species. By combining stochastic dynamic programming with multi‐criteria decision analysis, we can identify a regulatory strategy that can address a diverse set of objectives and explicitly recognize the tradeoffs among them. To meet the Atlantic Flyway's objectives as identified by waterfowl managers, our results suggest a regulatory strategy in which the harvest is targeted at 98% of aggregate maximum sustainable yield, most emphasis is placed on accumulating harvests of mallards and wood ducks, and by using a set of regulatory options that are more conservative than those currently in use.

Journal of Applied Ecology↗

USGS2019

Population dynamics of reintroduced Whooping Cranes

Because of the small size and restricted range of the Aransas-Wood Buffalo Population, reintroduction is a prominent element of the recovery effort to ensure persistence of Whooping Cranes ( Grus americana ). A fundamental objective of all Whooping Crane reintroduction efforts is the establishment of a self-sustaining population. Therefore, success of reintroduction efforts will ultimately be determined by demography: births and deaths of Whooping Cranes in the released population. We present a detailed review of the demographic modeling efforts for two reintroduced populations of Whooping Cranes: the Florida Nonmigratory Population and the Eastern Migratory Population. Both of these populations have struggled with poor demographic performance, and the Florida Nonmigratory Population is now nearly extirpated. The focus of our review is on the models used to represent Whooping Crane population dynamics and the major uncertainties that still exist about population dynamics in reintroduced Whooping Cranes. We also discuss the centrality of population models to the management of reintroduced Whooping Cranes, and the use of decision analysis to navigate multiple-objective decisions made under uncertainty. Development of demographic models, and articulation and testing of hypotheses about the causes of poor demographic performance in reintroduced populations, will continue to be research areas of importance in support of Whooping Crane reintroduction.

Book chapter↗

USGS2019

Pathways to strategic communication for biodiversity conservation: Response to “Hearing ourselves (and acting in consequence): A commentary on Bekessy et al. from a bird-handling environmental education perspective”

Central to discussions about the merits of ecosystem services as a communication strategy is the degree to which it represents a strategic and effective approach to advance biodiversity conservation. There is increasing recognition that many conservation communication efforts can be more strategic (e.g. Kusmanoff et al. 2016).

Biological Conservation↗

USGS2019

A draft decision framework for the National Park Service Interior Region 5 bison stewardship strategy

The Department of the Interior Bison Conservation Initiative calls for its bureaus to plan and implement collaborative American bison conservation and to ensure involvement by tribal, state, and local governments and the public in that conservation. Four independently managed and geographically separated National Park Service (NPS) units in Interior Region 5 (IR5) preserve bison and other components of a formerly contiguous Great Plains landscape. Management of bison in IR5 parks has historically been specific to each park, and livestock and range management science informed much of the decision making. In the past two decades, NPS has shifted away from managing bison from this livestock-based perspective towards a wildlife stewardship approach, including ensuring their long-term adaptive potential and considering them as just one part of a complex ecosystem. This shift requires a more holistic and cooperative approach to stewardship that is challenging not only because of limitations in funding and fluctuations in leadership priorities, but also because of the constraints imposed by the parks’ relatively small, fenced areas. The IR5 NPS Bison Stewardship Strategy (“Strategy”) will help the NPS to meet its responsibilities in cooperative stewardship of bison. The Strategy will serve to organize and consolidate the NPS’s legal and policy responsibilities within a framework of collectively defined values and objectives to support the careful and transparent decision-making processes that both guide and transcend park-specific planning. This report describes a preliminary decision framework for the Strategy, including the context, the fundamental objectives, and a range of alternative strategies developed and considered through two workshops and a series of conference calls with NPS personnel, stakeholders, and outside experts with an interest in IR5 NPS bison stewardship. Although not the Strategy itself, this framework serves as the Strategy’s starting point and identifies 14 fundamental objectives, falling in four major themes: Persistence of Wild and Healthy Bison 1. Maximize the long-term persistence of bison in IR5 parks 2. Maximize the long-term adaptive capacity of bison in North America 3. Maximize the wildness of the bison herds 4. Maximize humane treatment of bison, while allowing natural processes to occur Supporting Tribal Buffalo Culture 5. Improve relationships, trust, and communication with Tribes to enhance shared stewardship of bison within and beyond IR5 6. Maximize the number of live, healthy bison that can be transferred to tribal herds Persistence of Native Ecological Communities and Processes 7. Maximize structural and compositional heterogeneity of native prairie plant communities across space and time within each park 8. Maximize the abundance and diversity of animal species of special concern 9. Minimize the loss of native grassland within each park 10. Minimize the abundance of exotic plants in the park landscape 11. Maximize riparian area and wetland integrity Public Outreach 12. Maximize the number of healthy, wild bison that are visible to the public 13. Maximize the safety of visitors 14. Maximize public understanding of the past, present, and future of bison and Native Americans in the Great Plains The terms “minimize” and “maximize” in these objectives describe the desired direction for each individual objective. Finding the right balance among these objectives and any others identified in further work is one of the central challenges in developing the Strategy. To that end, this report also demonstrates and describes potential methods for evaluating how well alternative strategies would achieve each of the fundamental objectives.

Natural Resource Report↗

USGS2018

Allowable take of black vultures in the eastern United States

Black vultures ( Coragyps atratus ) have been increasing in density and expanding their range in the eastern United States since at least the 1960s. In many areas, their densities have increased to the level where they are causing damage to property and livestock and the number of requests for allowable take permits has increased throughout these areas. The United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) requires updated information to help inform the number of take permits that could reduce conflicts while meeting obligations under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. We expanded analyses used to estimate allowable take in Virginia to cover the range of black vultures in the eastern United States. We used the prescribed take level approach, which integrates demographic rates, population size estimates, and management objectives into an estimate of allowable take. We provide estimates of allowable take at 4 different scales: individual states, Bird Conservation Regions, USFWS administrative regions, and flyways. Our updated population time series provides evidence of rapidly increasing black vulture populations in many regions of the eastern United States, with an overall population estimate of approximately 4.26 million in 2015 in the Atlantic and Mississippi Flyways. Estimated allowable take ranged from a few hundred individuals per year in states at the northern end of the species range to approximately 287,000/year over the entire eastern United States. The USFWS has no legal mandate regarding the spatial scale at which take should be managed and we found little biological evidence of subpopulation structure for black vultures in the eastern United States. We suggest that allowable take for the species be implemented at a scale that meets stakeholder objectives (e.g., reducing conflict, and ensuring that black vultures are not extirpated from local areas) and is efficient for administrative and monitoring purposes.

Journal of Wildlife Management↗

USGS2018

A vision for documenting and sharing knowledge in conservation

As editors, we mark the launch of Conservation Science and Practice , a journal of the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB), with the following remarks framing the purpose and aspirations of the journal. Our aim is to share scholarship on and experiences of the practice of conservation. We define conservation practice as the application of conservation principles or theory across conservation issues, from planning and directly managing nature to influencing public policy and private behaviors—at scales from local communities to international governing bodies. We are striving for Conservation Science and Practice to be a forum for sharing lessons learned from research and practice to reciprocally informing and improving both arenas.

Conservation Science and Practice↗

USGS2018

Using the value of information to improve conservation decision making

Conservation decisions are challenging, not only because they often involve difficult conflicts among outcomes that people value, but because our understanding of the natural world and our effects on it is fraught with uncertainty. Value of Information (VoI) methods provide an approach for understanding and managing uncertainty from the standpoint of the decision maker. These methods are commonly used in other fields (e.g., economics, public health) and are increasingly used in biodiversity conservation. This decision analytical approach can identify the best management alternative to select where the effectiveness of interventions is uncertain, and can help to decide when to act and when to delay action until after further research. We review the use of VoI in the environmental domain, reflect on the need for greater uptake of VoI, particularly for strategic conservation planning, and suggest promising areas for new research. We also suggest common reporting standards as a means of increasing the leverage of this powerful tool. The environmental science, ecology and biodiversity categories of the Web of Knowledge were searched using the terms ‘Value of Information,’ ‘Expected Value of Perfect Information,’ and the abbreviation ‘EVPI.’ Google Scholar was searched with the same terms, and additionally the terms decision and biology, biodiversity conservation, fish, or ecology. We identified 1225 papers from these searches. Included studies were limited to those that show an application of VoI in biodiversity conservation rather than simply describing the method. All examples of use of VOI were summarised regarding the application of VoI, the management objectives, the uncertainties, models used, how the objectives were measured, and the type of VoI. While the use of VoI appears to be on the increase in biodiversity conservation, the reporting of results is highly variable, which can make it difficult to understand the decision context and which uncertainties were considered. Moreover, it was unclear if, and how, the papers informed management and policy interventions, which is why we suggest a range of reporting standards that would aid the use of VoI. The use of VoI in conservation settings is at an early stage. There are opportunities for broader applications, not only for species-focussed management problems, but also for setting local or global research priorities for biodiversity conservation, making funding decisions, or designing or improving protected area networks and management. The long-term benefits of applying VoI methods to biodiversity conservation include a more structured and decision-focused allocation of resources to research.

Biological Reviews↗

USGS2018

Real-time decision-making during emergency disease outbreaks

In the event of a new infectious disease outbreak, mathematical and simulation models are commonly used to inform policy by evaluating which control strategies will minimize the impact of the epidemic. In the early stages of such outbreaks, substantial parameter uncertainty may limit the ability of models to provide accurate predictions, and policymakers do not have the luxury of waiting for data to alleviate this state of uncertainty. For policymakers, however, it is the selection of the optimal control intervention in the face of uncertainty, rather than accuracy of model predictions, that is the measure of success that counts. We simulate the process of real-time decision-making by fitting an epidemic model to observed, spatially-explicit, infection data at weekly intervals throughout two historical outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease, UK in 2001 and Miyazaki, Japan in 2010, and compare forward simulations of the impact of switching to an alternative control intervention at the time point in question. These are compared to policy recommendations generated in hindsight using data from the entire outbreak, thereby comparing the best we could have done at the time with the best we could have done in retrospect. Our results show that the control policy that would have been chosen using all the data is also identified from an early stage in an outbreak using only the available data, despite high variability in projections of epidemic size. Critically, we find that it is an improved understanding of the locations of infected farms, rather than improved estimates of transmission parameters, that drives improved prediction of the relative performance of control interventions. However, the ability to estimate undetected infectious premises is a function of uncertainty in the transmission parameters. Here, we demonstrate the need for both real-time model fitting and generating projections to evaluate alternative control interventions throughout an outbreak. Our results highlight the use of using models at outbreak onset to inform policy and the importance of state-dependent interventions that adapt in response to additional information throughout an outbreak.

PLOS Computational Biology↗

USGS2018

Brown trout in the Lees Ferry reach of the Colorado River—Evaluation of causal hypotheses and potential interventions

Over the period 2014–2016, the number of nonnative brown trout (Salmo trutta) captured during routine monitoring in the Lees Ferry reach of the Colorado River, downstream of Glen Canyon Dam, began increasing. Management agencies and stakeholders have questioned whether the increase in brown trout in the Lees Ferry reach represents a threat to the endangered humpback chub (Gila cypha), to the rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) sport fishery, or to other resources of concern. In this report, we evaluate the evidence for the expansion of brown trout in the Lees Ferry reach, consider a range of causal hypotheses for this expansion, examine the likely efficacy of several potential management interventions to reduce brown trout, and analyze the effects of those interventions on other resources of concern. The brown trout population at Lees Ferry historically consisted of a small number of large fish supported by low levels of immigration from downstream reaches. This population is now showing signs of sustained successful reproduction and is on the cusp of recruiting locally hatched fish into the spawning class, based on analysis with a new integrated population model. The proximate causes of this change in status are a large pulse of immigration in the fall of 2014 and higher reproductive rates in 2015–2017. The ultimate causes of this change are not clear. The pulse of immigrants from downstream reaches in fall 2014 may have been induced by three sequential high-flow releases from the dam in November of 2012–2014, but may also have been the result of a unique set of circumstances unrelated to dam operations. The increase in reproduction may have been the result of any number of changes, including an Allee effect, warmer water temperatures, a decrease in competition from rainbow trout, or fall high-flow releases. Correlations over space and time among predictor variables do not allow us to make a clear inference about the cause of the changes. Under a null causal model, and without any changes to management, we predict there is a 36-percent chance the brown trout population at Lees Ferry will not show sustained growth, and will remain around a mean size of 5,800 adults, near its current size; in contrast, we predict there is a 64-percent chance that the population has a positive intrinsic growth rate and will increase 3–10 fold over the next 20 years. A humpback chub population model linked to the brown trout model suggests an increase of brown trout of this magnitude could lead to declines in the minimum adult humpback chub population over the same time period. Forecasts of rainbow trout abundance, however, suggest that increased abundance of brown trout in the Lees Ferry reach does not pose a threat to the rainbow trout fishery there. There are interventions that may be effective in moderating the growth of the brown trout population in the Lees Ferry reach of the Colorado River. Across causal hypotheses, we predict that removal strategies (for example, a concerted electrofishing effort or an incentivized take program targeted at large brown trout) could reduce brown trout abundance by approximately 50 percent relative to status quo management. Reductions in the frequency or a change in the seasonal timing of high-flow releases from Glen Canyon Dam could be even more effective, but only under the causal hypotheses that involve effects of such releases on immigration or reproduction. Brown trout management flows— dam releases designed to strand young fish at a vulnerable stage—may be able to reduce brown trout abundance to some degree, but are not forecast to be the most effective strategy under any causal hypothesis. We predict that the alternative management interventions would have effects on other resource goals as well, and the pattern of these effects differs across causal hypotheses. The removal strategies would incur direct costs (on the order of $7 million over 20 years) and the mechanical removal strategy is unethical from the perspective of several tribes. The strategies that involve reducing the frequency of high-flow releases from Glen Canyon Dam would decrease the ability to transport and store sediment in the ecosystem, potentially undermining goals associated with sandbar building, recreation, and riparian vegetation, but would increase hydropower revenue. Trout management flows would reduce hydropower revenue. From the standpoint of humpback chub, the alternative strategies largely follow the effect on brown trout; when brown trout abundance is reduced, predation pressure decreases, and humpback chub viability is predicted to increase, but the variation in predicted chub viability is not large across strategies or causal hypotheses. To design a response to brown trout, management agencies will need to navigate both the tradeoffs among resources goals and the uncertainty in the causes of the brown trout expansion. Continued monitoring, possibly coupled with new research or experimental management actions that better inform demographic and ecological dynamics, can help to reduce the causal uncertainty.

Arizona↗

USGS2018

Ask not what nature can do for you: A critique of ecosystem services as a communication strategy

Given the urgent need to raise public awareness on biodiversity issues, we review the effectiveness of “ecosystem services” as a frame for promoting biodiversity conservation. Since its inception as a communications tool in the 1970s, the concept of ecosystem services has become pervasive in biodiversity policy. While the goal of securing ecosystem services is absolutely legitimate, we argue that it has had limited success as a vehicle for securing public interest and support for nature, which is crucial to securing long-term social mandates for protection. Emerging evidence suggests that focusing on ecosystem services rather than the intrinsic value of nature is unlikely to be effective in bolstering public support for nature conservation. Theory to guide effective communication about nature is urgently needed. In the mean-time, communicators should reflect on their objectives and intended audience and revisit the way nature is framed to ensure maximum resonance.

Biological Conservation↗

USGS2018

Implicit decision framing as an unrecognized source of confusion in endangered species classification

Legal classification of species requires scientific and values‐based components, and how those components interact depends on how people frame the decision. Is classification a negotiation of trade‐offs, a decision on how to allocate conservation efforts, or simply a comparison of the biological status of a species to a legal standard? The answers to problem‐framing questions such as these influence decision making in species classifications. In our experience, however, decision makers, staff biologists, and stakeholders often have differing perspectives of the decision problem and assume different framings. In addition to differences between individuals, in some cases it appears individuals themselves are unclear about the decision process, which contributes to regulatory paralysis, litigation, and a loss of trust by agency staff and the public. We present 5 framings: putting species in the right bin, doing right by the species over time, saving the most species on a limited budget, weighing extinction risk against other objectives, and strategic classification to advance conservation. These framings are inspired by elements observed in current classification practices. Putting species in the right bin entails comparing a scientific status assessment with policy thresholds and accounting for potential misclassification costs. Doing right by the species adds a time dimension to the classification decision, and saving the most species on a limited budget classifies a suite of species simultaneously. Weighing extinction risk against other objectives would weigh ecological or socioeconomic concerns in classification decisions, and strategic classification to advance conservation would make negotiation a component of classification. We view these framings as a means to generate thought, discussion, and movement toward selection and application of explicit classification framings. Being explicit about the decision framing could lead decision makers toward more efficient and defensible decisions, reduce internal confusion and external conflict, and support better collaboration between scientists and policy makers.

Conservation Biology↗

USGS2018

Endangered species recovery: A resource allocation problem

Many nations have laws to identify and protect imperiled species and their ecosystems. In the United States, actions taken under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) have prevented many extinctions, but few listed species have recovered to the point where they can have the ESA protections removed ( 1 , 2 ). One reason for this [among many ( 3 )] is a shortfall in funding, raising a conundrum for agencies responsible for species recovery: Should resources be allocated toward species facing imminent extinction or species whose long-term survival can most benefit from investment? Some argue that the latter strategy is ethically unsound because it may abandon species with little hope of long-term recovery [for example, ( 4 )], even when science suggests that the former strategy may miss opportunities to prevent species from ever experiencing the risk of imminent extinction ( 2 ). We suggest that framing recovery prioritization as a resource allocation problem provides a structure to facilitate constructive debate about such important questions. We discuss here the merits of an explicit resource allocation framework and introduce a prototype decision tool [( 5 ); see supplementary materials for details] that we developed with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) to facilitate transparent and efficient recovery allocation decisions.

Science↗

USGS2018

Helping decision makers frame, analyze, and implement decisions

All decisions have the same recognizable elements. Context, objectives, alternatives, consequences, and deliberation. Decision makers and analysts familiar with these elements can quickly see the underlying structure of a decision. There are only a small number of classes of decisions. These classes differ in the cognitive and scientific challenge they present to the decision maker; the ability to recognize the class of decision leads a decision maker to tools to aid in the analysis. Sometimes we need more information, sometimes we don’t. The role of science in a decision-making process is to provide the predictions that link the alternative actions to the desired outcomes. Investing in more science is only valuable if it helps to choose a better action. Implementation. The successful integration of decision analysis into environmental decisions requires careful attention to the decision, the people, and the institutions involved.

Decision Point Online↗

USGS2018

Navigating the field of decision analysis

Managers, policy makers, and decision makers with responsibility for environmental decisions have an extraordinarily difficult job. The systems they manage are complex (coupled human-natural systems), with many dimensions and complicated dynamics. Our knowledge of how those systems respond to management actions is often limited, so many of the decisions have to be made in the face of uncertainty. The field of decision analysis provides a comprehensive set of tools for structuring, analyzing, and making decisions. Arising initially as a way to understand and manage risk, the field has expanded in the last 80 years to cover such topics as multipleobjective trade-offs, time-dependent linked decisions, the value of information, and competition among multiple decision makers. At the same time, cognitive psychologists and behavioural economists have studied human decisions to understand when our innate processes work and when they fail. Formal decision analysis is increasingly being used in many sectors, including economic, industrial, manufacturing, agricultural, transportation, and medical sectors, by individuals, corporations, non-profits, and government agencies. Occasional application of decision analysis to environmental decisions began in the mid-1970s, but the environmental science and management world was largely unaware of decision analysis until the late 1990s and early 2000s. (A major aim of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Environmental Decisions – CEED – was to better connect decision analysis and environmental management). Today, the field of environmental decision analysis is coming of age with the maturation of a rich set of tools to help decision makers frame, analyze, and implement decisions. Sometimes the wealth of tools is daunting, but there are core principles that tie decision analysis together. To help the reader navigate this complexity, we summarize the field of decision analysis in four key messages.

Decision Point Online↗

USGS2017

An expert elicitation process to project the frequency and magnitude of Florida manatee mortality events caused by red tide (Karenia brevis)

Red tides (blooms of the harmful alga Karenia brevis ) are one of the major sources of mortality for the Florida manatee ( Trichechus manatus latirostris ), especially in southwest Florida. It has been hypothesized that the frequency and severity of red tides may increase in the future because of global climate change and other factors. To improve our ecological forecast for the effects of red tides on manatee population dynamics and long-term persistence, we conducted a formal expert judgment process to estimate probability distributions for the frequency and relative magnitude of red-tide-related manatee mortality (RTMM) events over a 100-year time horizon in three of the four regions recognized as manatee management units in Florida. This information was used to update a population viability analysis for the Florida manatee (the Core Biological Model). We convened a panel of 12 experts in manatee biology or red-tide ecology; the panel met to frame, conduct, and discuss the elicitation. Each expert provided a best estimate and plausible low and high values (bounding a confidence level of 80 percent) for each parameter in each of three regions (Northwest, Southwest, and Atlantic) of the subspecies’ range (excluding the Upper St. Johns River region) for two time periods (0−40 and 41−100 years from present). We fitted probability distributions for each parameter, time period, and expert by using these three elicited values. We aggregated the parameter estimates elicited from individual experts and fitted a parametric distribution to the aggregated results. Across regions, the experts expected the future frequency of RTMM events to be higher than historical levels, which is consistent with the hypothesis that global climate change (among other factors) may increase the frequency of red-tide blooms. The experts articulated considerable uncertainty, however, about the future frequency of RTMM events. The historical frequency of moderate and intense RTMM (combined) in the Southwest region was 0.35 (80-percent confidence interval [CI]: 0.21−0.52), whereas the forecast probability was 0.48 (80-percent CI: 0.30−0.64) over a 40-year projected time horizon. Moderate and intense RTMM events are expected to continue to be most frequent in the Southwest region, to increase in mean frequency in the Northwest region (historical frequency of moderate and intense RTMM events [combined] in the Northwest region was 0, whereas the forecast probability was 0.12 [80-percent CI: 0.02−0.39] over a 40-year projected time horizon) and in the Atlantic region (historical frequency of moderate and intense RTMM events [combined] in the Atlantic region was 0.05 [80-percent CI: 0.005–0.18], whereas the forecast probability was 0.11 [80-percent CI: 0.03−0.25] over a 40-year projected time horizon), and to remain absent from the Upper St. Johns River region. The impact of red-tide blooms on manatee mortality has been measured for the Southwest region but not for the Northwest and Atlantic regions, where such events have been rare. The expert panel predicted that the median magnitude of RTMM events in the Atlantic and Northwest regions will be much smaller than that in the Southwest; given the large uncertainties, however, they acknowledged the possibility that these events could be larger in their mortality impacts than in the Southwest region. By its nature, forecasting requires expert judgment because it is impossible to have empirical evidence about the future. The large uncertainties in parameter estimates over a 100-year timeframe are to be expected and may also indicate that the training provided to panelists successfully minimized one common pitfall of expert judgment, that of overconfidence. This study has provided useful and needed inputs to the Florida manatee population viability analysis associated with an important and recurrent source of mortality from harmful algal blooms.

Open-File Report↗

USGS2017

The value of information for woodland management: Updating a state–transition model

Value of information (VOI) analyses reveal the expected benefit of reducing uncertainty to a decision maker. Most ecological VOI analyses have focused on population models rarely addressing more complex community models. We performed a VOI analysis for a complex state–transition model of Box-Ironbark Forest and Woodland management. With three management alternatives (limited harvest/firewood removal (HF), ecological thinning (ET), and no management), managing the system optimally (for 150 yr) with the original information would, on average, increase the amount of forest in a desirable state from 19% to 35% (a 16-percentage point increase). Resolving all uncertainty would, on average, increase the final percentage to 42% (a 19-percentage point increase). However, only resolving the uncertainty for a single parameter was worth almost two-thirds the value of resolving all uncertainty. We found the VOI to depend on the number of management options, increasing as the management flexibility increased. Our analyses show it is more cost-effective to monitor low-density regrowth forest than other states and more cost-effective to experiment with the no-management alternative than the other management alternatives. Importantly, the most cost-effective strategies did not include either the most desired forest states or the least understood management strategy, ET. This implies that managers cannot just rely on intuition to tell them where the most VOI will lie, as critical uncertainties in a complex system are sometimes cryptic.

Victoria↗

USGS2017

Implementing the 2012 North American Waterfowl Management Plan revision: Populations, habitat, and people

The North American Waterfowl Management Plan (NAWMP) has established a model for wildlife conservation planning over the last 3 decades. Management at a continental scale, leveraged funding, regional partnerships, and a strong science basis have been notable features. Periodic updates to the NAWMP occurred since implementation in 1986; however, a fundamental revision was accomplished in 2012 after extensive stakeholder engagement. An explicit fundamental goal for waterfowl conservation supporters was added in 2012, complementing existing goals for sustainable populations and sufficient habitat found in previous updates. We present a synopsis of progress toward implementation of the 2012 NAWMP and challenge the waterfowl management community to continue with meaningful steps toward achieving NAWMP goals. Adding goals and objectives for supporters increases potential relevance of NAWMP; however, it also presents a level of complexity that was not entirely anticipated. Additionally, the 2012 NAWMP recognized that traditional support from waterfowl hunters alone will not be sufficient to support waterfowl conservation in the future. Simultaneous consideration of multiple objectives, although implicit before, now is a specific focus for habitat and harvest management affecting hunters and other users of the waterfowl resource. The waterfowl management community is faced with revisiting objectives and management actions related to harvest regulations, landscape priorities, habitat conservation, and public engagement to garner broader support. These persistent management challenges are tangible and relevant candidates for greater integration. Ultimately, the structures and processes supporting waterfowl management also will need to be reconsidered.

Journal of Wildlife Management↗

USGS2017

Strengthening links between waterfowl research and management

Waterfowl monitoring, research, regulation, and adaptive planning are leading the way in supporting science-informed wildlife management. However, increasing societal demands on natural resources have created a greater need for adaptable and successful linkages between waterfowl science and management. We presented a special session at the 2016 North American Duck Symposium, Annapolis, Maryland, USA on the successes and challenges of linking research and management in waterfowl conservation, and we summarize those thoughts in this commentary. North American waterfowl management includes a diversity of actions including management of harvest and habitat. Decisions for waterfowl management are structured using decision analysis by incorporating stakeholder values into formal objectives, identifying research relevant to objectives, integrating scientific knowledge, and choosing an optimal strategy with respect to objectives. Recently, the consideration of the value of information has been proposed as a means to evaluate the utility of research designed to meet objectives. Despite these advances, the ability to conduct waterfowl research with direct management application may be increasingly difficult in research institutions for several reasons including reduced funding for applied research and the lower perceived value of applied versus theoretical research by some university academics. In addition, coordination between researchers and managers may be logistically constrained, and communication may be ineffective between the 2 groups. Strengthening these links would help develop stronger and more coordinated approaches for the conservation of waterfowl and the wetlands upon which they depend.

Journal of Wildlife Management↗