Wildlife from multiple perspectives
Post by 2022 student Grace Martin
To wrap up the Clemson Montana Prairie Ecology course, we lastly had to examine the wildlife in the area. During the time period of the class we had placed and conducted different wildlife monitoring systems to get an idea of the activity in each plot. This included putting out acoustic detectors to monitor bat activity, placing drift fences and trail cameras to monitor the small animals and herps, creating exclosures for long term observation, and cavity bird surveys. The exclourses will offer us a look into how the plot will grow in a year without being disturbed by the wildlife. Cameras were placed in the center at the exclourses which will document the larger wildlife activity over the course of the year. It will be very interesting to see how the vegetation diversity and cover changes over the year and if the wildlife in each plot varies based on the treatment of the plot.
Examining the data we have already collected offered lots of interesting insight to the plots. One weird thing we noticed was there were no recordings of the bat calls in any of the plots however, it showed the acoustic detectors did turn on every night. We also conducted cavity surveys, but I personally was not very involved with this portion of the project. With the few surveys I did, I noticed there were more cavities in the plots that had more burned and dead trees. On the drift fence trail cameras, we saw mice, squirrels, rabbits, mule deer, horses, cattle, and a bobcat! Although we recorded a decent amount of diversity, based on what Terry and Pat have said, it is not as plentiful as what we would have seen prior to the fire. This project will allow us to see if the wildlife will continue to come back to the area and restore their populations.
We met with a wildlife biologist in the Cody, Wyoming area, Tony. He spent a lot of time discussing the interaction between humans and wildlife in Cody. Yellowstone is known for its harsh winters therefore many of the animals within Yellowstone migrate out, such as the elk and mule deer. Since Cody borders Yellowstone, it is a prime spot for the migrating animals. Cody is starting to deal with more subdividing of land, which is increasing the amount of fencing and housing, and is pushing the wildlife out of grazing areas. A large part of what Tony does is educating the people on the effects of subdividing and what an increase the human population in these areas of Cody can do to the wildlife. Another topic he touched on briefly was brucellosis between cattle and bison. The spread of brucellosis is a big concern for ranch owners and bison are typically the first to target for this. However, there has been no case reported of bison spreading brucellosis to cattle. It was very interesting to listen to the management perspective of wildlife biology and it brought issues to my attention I had never recognized before.
We also had the opportunity to speak with Rebecca from the Bureau of Land Management. We met with her during the Spring semester and she helped with creating a layout for how we would want to do the sampling in the plots. Similar to Tony, Rebecca emphasized how humans are now a part of the ecosystem and learning how to coexist is a key part of their jobs.
During this project, we had the opportunity to learn about wildlife from multiple different perspectives. We saw how the populations were affected by the Bobcat fire, how the ranch owners view wildlife, and how the wildlife biologists work to manage the wildlife. Although I personally will not be coming out to the ranch to collect data again, I am excited to be a part of setting up the initial data collection and to see what the future students are able to discover!
