Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit, Chesapeak Watershed CESU

archived

The US Geological Survey, Fort Collins Science Center, is offering a funding opportunity to conduct research to answer questions about broad-scale drivers of amphibian decline. Researchers will examine alterations in timing and availability of surface-water habitat (driven principally by climate change) as first order variables that control the probabilities of breeding, successful metamorphosis, and return rates of amphibians. Data sets will be assembled from Canada, the US, and Mexico and evaluated using a hierarchical approach to account for the nested structure of the available data. Results will be used for selection of climate-related mechanisms (incorporated as covariates in dynamic occupancy models) and identification of how these covariates influence observed changes (i.e., extinction and colonization) in occupancy.

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