Welcome to the USGS Wildlife: Terrestrial and Endangered Resources Program
USGS scientists supported by the Wildlife: Terrestrial and Endangered Resources Program (Wildlife Program) conduct research on diverse natural resource topics involving migratory wildlife, marine mammals, threatened and endangered species, wildlife disease, terrestrial plants, and amphibians.
These activities focus primarily on the information needs of Department of the Interior partners, although we also collaborate with State governments, tribes, and nongovernmental organizations. The Wildlife Program supports the development of new information and tools for the management of wildlife on Federally managed lands such as National Parks, National Wildlife Refuges, and Bureau of Land Management areas.
Predictive modeling of red knots and horseshoe crabs: an intertwined relationship
Red knot (Calidris canutus rufa).
Photo credit: USFWS
Delaware Bay supports the second largest population of migrating shorebirds in North America and is critical
to Western Hemispheric populations of red knots (Calidris canutus rufa). Each spring, this shorebird departs from wintering sites as far south as Tierra del Fuego in South America and migrates to its nesting grounds in the Arctic. En route, the birds stopover in South America and the Eastern Seaboard of North America to feed and gain weight. The most important stopover is in Delaware Bay where the red knots fuel up for the final 3,000 km flight to the Arctic by eating the high-energy and easily-digestible eggs of spawning horseshoe crabs (Limulus polyphemus). However, the high commercial harvest of horseshoe crabs into the late 1990s decreased the availability of these eggs, and populations of red knots started declining dramatically.
Since 2000, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) has restricted harvest of horseshoe crabs. As part of the effort to manage harvest, ASMFC and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recently established an Adaptive Resource Management work group to determine horseshoe crab harvest levels that will support recovery of the red knot population. An adaptive management framework can provide the sound scientific basis for making decisions on horseshoe crab harvest and red knot endangered species status. The work group is chaired by Jim Nichols (Patuxent Wildlife Research Center) and David Smith (Leetown Science Center). Some of the data models for adaptive management comes from research on population estimates of horseshoe crabs by David Smith and red knot stopover ecology by Mike Haramis (Patuxent Wildlife Research Center). The intriguing relationship between horseshoe crabs and red knots was recently chronicled by the documentary program NATURE.
Disease Emergence and Resurgence: The Wildlife-Human Connection - The USGS National Wildlife Health Center is pleased to announce the publication of Circular 1285 -- Disease Emergence and Resurgence: The Wildlife-Human Connection. This book was prepared in cooperation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Major funding support was provided by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Division of Federal Assistance, Administrative Grant No. AP95-017. The book is available for download in Adobe pdf format. The complete book as a single zipped PDF is now available, (26MB download, right-click on the link and select "Save Target As..."/"Save Link As..." to save to your computer).
The Wildlife Disease Information Nodeof the National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII) provides access to a variety of data on wildlife diseases, mortality
events, and other critical information contributed by partners from Federal and State agencies, as well as national, international, academic, research, and nongovernmental organizations.
U.S. Department of the Interior |
U.S. Geological Survey
The