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Current research 

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Fisher demography

Fisher (Pekania pennanti) occupy northern forests, ranging coast-to-coast across North America.  Their populations are rebounding in some areas (e.g, southern portions of their historic range), while others are showing long-term decline.  Our team is investigating population vital rates and factors limiting fisher across NY State to inform effective conservation actions.

Collaborators:  NY DEC furbearer management team
Graduate student:  Stephanie Cunningham

Photo credit:  Tim Watson
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Rodenticide poisoning

Ingestion of anticoagulant rodenticides is alarmingly widespread among our forest carnivores.  Our team is investigating the degree to which AR toxicity may lead to reductions in productivity, survival, or population growth for a suite of native meso-carnivores across northeastern US forests.

Collaborators:  Aaron Facka (PA Game Commission), Scott Smith (NY DEC), Lisa Murphy and Julie Ellis (Penn Vet), Beth Buckles and Krysten Schuler (Cornell Wildlife Health Lab), and David Needle (New Hampshire Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory)
Graduate student:  Georgianna Silveira (starting fall 2021)
Photo credit:  Tim Pyszczynski (NYS DEC)
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Moose survival

Having recolonized the Adirondack Park in recent decades, moose now face a warming climate that threatens their continued persistence along their southern range margin.  Our team is assessing the current status of the Adirondack moose population, tracking population trend, and identifying factors limiting population growth.

Collaborators:  Krysten Schuler and Angela Fuller (Cornell University), Jeremy Hurst, Jim Stickles, Steve Heerkins, and David Kramer (NYS-DEC),  Heidi Kretzer (Wildlife Conservation Society)
Current graduate student:  Jen Grauer (Cornell)

Photo credit:  Ben Tabor (NYS DEC)
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Scaling issues in large cat conservation

Identifying effective solutions for large carnivore conservation and conflict resolution requires better understanding of the drivers of habitat use and resource conflict.  Our team is examining how sensitive research insights may be to the spatio-temporal dimensions of our observations.  

Collaborators:  Lisanne Petracca (U. Washington) and Luke Hunter (WCS)
Graduate student:  Sandy Slovikosky
Photo credit:  Dina Mathiukina

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Jaguar conservation
​in Peru

Maintaining robust populations of large carnivores like jaguar remains a major conservation challenge.   Our team is mapping habitat suitability for jaguar across Peru, assessing habitat  connectivity among protected areas, and identifying critical pinch-points in connectivity to help guide conservation action.

Graduate student:  Daisy de Fatima Sanchez Mosqueda
Photo credit:  Allison Devlin

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Forest cat conservation

As forest cover is lost, typically so are large forest-dependent mammals. Loss of top predators can trigger a cascade of changes at lower trophic levels, diminishing the ecological integrity of forest systems.  Our team is assessing the degree to which puma and other wild cats use Atlantic forest remnants, so as to better understand trophic dynamics in ever-diminishing tropical forests. 

​Collaborator:  Ronaldo Morato (ICM-Bio, Brazil)
Graduate student:  Lilian Bonjorne de Almeida
​Photo credit:  Allison Devlin

Past projects

Visit the publications page to see published products from our completed research projects.  For work not yet in publication form, graduate theses. progress reports and other relevant links are provided below.
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Protected Areas and Biodiversity Conservation

Despite billions of dollars being invested in the global network of protected areas as a primary vehicle for biodiversity conservation, the value of protected areas in stemming local species losses or facilitating species range shifts over time is little known.  Our team investigated the effect of protected areas on local colonization and extinction rates for 97 avian species across 20 years of climate and land use change across New York and Pennsylvania.
peach_dissertation.pdf
File Size: 7394 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

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Photo credit:  Silvia Saldivar Bellassai

Chacoan Peccary

Chacoan peccary are endemic to the 
Dry Chaco ecoregion, where they are endangered by habitat loss (deforestation) and overharvest.  Our team investigated these threats to Chacoan peccary persistence, as well as assessed the status of their populations, in and around the Defensores Del Chaco National Park, Paraguay. See the results of this study in the M.S. thesis below.
ssb_thesis_2014.pdf
File Size: 2455 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

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​Photo credit:  Bob Nixon

Amur tiger & leopard

The Amur leopard numbered as few as 40 individuals in the wild in recent history. The work investigated the forces limiting Amur leopard today, from poaching to competition with Amur tiger, in the Land of the Leopard National Park in Primorsky Krai, Russia to help ensure the persistence of this majestic predator.  
dina_matiukhina_msc_thesis.pdf
File Size: 2988 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

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Photo credit:  Scott Smith

Coyotes

Coyotes colonized NY State in the 1920s and today are the largest and most widespread canine predator around, potentially exerting a large influence on competitor and prey populations.  Our team has been investigating coyote foraging ecology, in particular coyote predation on deer and dietary overlap with native mesocarnivores.  
low_ms_thesis_20180430.pdf
File Size: 1275 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

Chee Peng's thesis investigated the role of coyotes in structuring mesopredator communities in human-dominated landscapes on Fort Drum, NY, using camera traps and GPS-collar data.
sh_thesis_2013.pdf
File Size: 2670 kb
File Type: pdf
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Sara Hansen's thesis provided an estimate of the number of coyotes in NY State derived from vocalization surveys linked with distance sampling and sound-spread modeling.
cb_thesis_2009.pdf
File Size: 1401 kb
File Type: pdf
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Christina Boser's thesis documented coyote diets and movement patterns in the Agricultural-forest matrix of central NY State.
sw_thesis_2012.pdf
File Size: 1073 kb
File Type: pdf
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Scott Warsen's thesis documented the historical trend in coyote diets in the Adirondack Park and provided a comparison of dietary overlap with all other carnivores in the region.
coyote_progress_report_2014.pdf
File Size: 1175 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

This report provides a comprehensive, cross-study comparison of coyote ecology in NY
Watch "Top Dog" by Jacqueline Frair, 2017 Dale Travis Lecture Series at ESF

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Photo credit:  Allison Devlin

Jaguar

Persistence of top predators, like the jaguar in Central and South America, is increasingly threatened by expanding human populations and changes in land use.  To help guide conservation efforts, our team has been studying the spatial and population ecology of jaguar across a gradient of protected areas to cattle ranches in the Brazilian Pantanal and across multiple use landscapes spanning Central America.
final_thesis_apcq.pdf
File Size: 1753 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

devlin_dissertation_21nov2019.pdf
File Size: 4635 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

Ana Patricia's thesis focused on assessing effectiveness of putative corridors for jaguar in Guatemala.
Allison Devlin's dissertation focused on the activity, movements, and density of jaguar in the Brazilian Pantanal.

River otter

River otter are elusive, slippery, and impossible to tell apart -- so getting a handle on their population status can be tricky.  Our team is modeling otter habitat, conducting winter track surveys, and deploying field cameras to provide the first comprehensive assessment of otter populations statewide, providing key data for a developing otter management plan.  
powerskelly_m.s._thesis.pdf
File Size: 1135 kb
File Type: pdf
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otter_survey_report_2019.pdf
File Size: 1143 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

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​Photo credit:  Elaina Burns
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  • The Frair Lab
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