Formalizing Internship Experiences for Wildlife and Fisheries Undergraduates at Mississippi State University

Our department recognizes internships as a form of experiential learning that helps students integrate knowledge and practice, build professional networks and clarify career goals. We have pursued formal internship agreements with state and federal agencies (e.g., Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries & Parks, US Fish & Wildlife Service, USDA APHIS Wildlife Services, Weyerhaeuser Company) to benefit our students and help agencies build pools of prospective employees. Students in our curriculum may earn up to 3 credit hours for internship as a professional elective, but it is not currently required. As a faculty, we have debated what types of professional experience qualify as a true internship (e.g., paid vs. non-paid, agency vs. university, etc.). We currently approve a broad range of professional experiences as internships following criteria established by the National Association of Colleges and Employers. To receive internship credit, the opportunity must not “simply be work that a regular employee would routinely perform,” and there must be “clearly defined learning objectives” or professional development activities that are approved by the internship coordinator. Assessment of internees indicates that students feel they learn about agencies, increase their technical knowledge and increase their employability. Three of 7 internees last year received job offers directly out of the internship experience. Still, internees perceive technical expertise as the greatest benefit from internships. We will discuss plans to change this perception which include increasing formal internship agreements, changing student perceptions, better promoting internships to undergraduate students and soliciting input from employers regarding necessary skills our graduates need

Broad-Scale Relations between Conservation Reserve Program and Grassland Birds: Do Cover Type, Configuration and Contract Age Matter?

The Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) is a voluntary cropland set-aside program where environmentally-sensitive cropland is retired to a conservation practice. Grassland birds should benefit because most CRP is grass habitat and because amount of land in CRP is highest in agriculture-dominated areas of the United States where grassland habitat has been most impacted. We used the Breeding Bird Survey and Common Land Unit (CLU) data (spatially-explicit data of farm field boundaries and land cover) to identify relations between types and configurations of CRP and grassland bird abundance in 3 Midwestern states. All 13 species we studied were related to at least one aspect of CRP habitat - specific conservation practices (e.g., native vs. exotic grass), CRP habitat configuration, or habitat age. Treating all types of CRP as a single habitat type would have obscured bird-CRP relations. Based on our results, creating a mosaic of large and small set-aside patches could benefit both area-sensitive and edge-associated grassland birds. Additionally, northern bobwhite and other birds that use early successional grasslands would benefit from periodic disturbances. CRP, agrienvironment schemes, and other government-sponsored set-aside programs may be most successful when administered as part of a targeted, regional conservation plan

Peninsula Effects on Birds in a Coastal Landscape: Are Coves More Species Rich than Lobes?

Peninsula effects - decreasing richness with increasing distance along peninsula lobes - have been identified for many taxa on large peninsulas. Peninsula effects are caused by differences in colonization and extinction predicted by island biogeography or by environmental gradients along the peninsula. We compared species-area regressions for cove patches (i.e., mainland) to regressions for lobe patches (i.e., on peninsula tips) for wet meadow birds along a highly interdigitated shoreline (northern Lake Huron, USA). We conducted analysis both with and without accounting for variation in habitat and landscape characteristics (i.e., environmental gradients) of wet meadows. Species-area regressions for coves did not differ from lobes, nor did these results differ when we accounted for gradients. Similarly, few species were more abundant in coves. Peninsula effects may have been lacking because lobe patches were located ≈ 800 m on average from the mainland, and birds are highly mobile and can easily sample patches over these distances. One important caveat was that wet meadow patches > 5 ha were located in coves, so coves would still be important considerations in conservation plans because of the contribution of large patches to reproductive success, dispersal and population dynamics

Effects of the Conservation Reserve Program on Northern Bobwhite and Grassland Birds

The Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) has converted just over 36 million acres of cropland into potential wildlife habitat, primarily grassland. Thus, the CRP should benefit grassland songbirds, a group of species that is declining across the United States and is of conservation concern. Additionally, the CRP is an important part of multi-agency, regional efforts to restore northern bobwhite populations. However, comprehensive assessments of the wildlife benefits of CRP at regional scales are lacking. We used Breeding Bird Survey and National Resources Inventory data to assess the potential for the CRP to benefit northern bobwhite and other grassland birds with overlapping ranges and similar habitat associations. We built regression models for 15 species in seven different ecological regions. Forty-nine of 108 total models contained significant CRP effects (P \u3c 0.05), and 48 of the 49 contained positive effects. Responses to CRP varied across ecological regions. Only eastern meadowlark was positively-related to CRP in all the ecological regions, and western meadowlark was the only species never related to CRP. CRP was a strong predictor of bird abundance compared to other land cover types. The potential for CRP habitat as a regional conservation tool to benefit declining grassland bird populations should continue to be assessed at a variety of spatial scales. We caution that bird-CRP relations varied from region to region and among species. Because the NRI provides relatively coarse resolution information on CRP, more detailed information about CRP habitats (spatial arrangement, age of the habitat (time since planting), specific conservation practices used) should be included in future assessments to fully understand where and to what extent CRP can benefit grassland birds

Data Repository - Influence of Disturbance on Avian Communities in Agricultural Conservation Buffers in Mississippi, USA, The Open Ornithology Journal

Abstract: Introduction: Periodic disturbance of agricultural conservation buffers is required to maintain early successional plant communities for grassland birds. However, a disturbance may temporarily reduce the availability of vegetation cover, food, and nesting sites in a buffer. Objective: Our objective was to determine how the type of disturbance (i.e., prescribed burning, light disking) and time since the last disturbance event in agricultural conservation buffers influence the grassland bird community. Methods: Data collected during line-transect surveys conducted in 46 agricultural conservation buffers in northeast Mississippi during the 2007-2009 breeding seasons (May-early August) demonstrate periodic disturbance through prescribed burning and light disking does not influence breeding bird diversity or density in the buffers. Results: Density of Dickcissels (Spiza americana), Red-winged Blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus), and Indigo Buntings (Passerina cyanea) did not differ in the buffers regardless of the type of or time since disturbance. Conclusion: Large effect sizes, however, indicate a potential type two error resulting from this conclusion. Thus, based on relative effect sizes, avian density in undisturbed buffers may be greater than in buffers during their first growing season post-disturbance. Relative effect sizes among estimates also indicate disturbance, namely prescribed burning, may lead to greater densities of breeding birds in agricultural conservation buffers. Though disturbance may initially reduce avian density, it is necessary to maintain long-term early-successional herbaceous habitat in agricultural conservation buffers

Data from: Nest survival modeling using a multi-species approach in forests managed for timber and biofuel feedstock

1. Switchgrass (Panicum virgatum) intercropping is a novel forest management practice for biomass production intended to generate cellulosic feedstocks within intensively managed loblolly pine-dominated landscapes. These pine plantations are important for early-successional bird species, as short rotation times continually maintain early successional habitat. We tested the efficacy of using community models compared to individual surrogate species models in understanding influences on nest survival. We analysed nest data to test for differences in habitat use for 14 bird species in plots managed for switchgrass intercropping and controls within loblolly pine (Pinus taeda) plantations in Mississippi, USA. 2. We adapted hierarchical models using hyper-parameters to incorporate information from both common and rare species to understand community-level nest survival. This approach incorporates rare species that are often discarded due to low sample sizes, but can inform community-level demographic parameter estimates. We illustrate use of this approach in generating both species-level and community-wide estimates of daily survival rates for songbird nests. We were able to include rare species with low sample size (minimum n = 5) to inform a hyper-prior, allowing us to estimate effects of covariates on daily survival at the community level, then compare this with a single-species approach using surrogate species. Using single species models, we were unable to generate estimates below a sample size of 21 nests per species. 3. Community model species-level survival and parameter estimates were similar to those generated by five single species models, with improved precision in community model parameters. 4. Covariates of nest placement indicated that switchgrass at the nest site (< 4 m) reduced daily nest survival, although intercropping at the forest stand level increased daily nest survival. 5. Synthesis and applications. Community models represent a viable method for estimating community nest survival rates and effects of covariates while incorporating limited data for rarely detected species. Intercropping switchgrass in loblolly pine plantations slightly increased daily nest survival at the research plot scale (0.1 km2), although at a local scale (50 m2) switchgrass negatively influenced nest survival. A likely explanation supported by previous research is intercropping shifted community composition, favouring species with greater disturbance tolerance

encounter_histories_and_independent_variables

This is an R workspace that includes independent varibles "indep_variables" and nest encounter histories "ehdata" for songbird nests found and monitored in switchgrass intercropping biofuel experimental plots and control plots in Scooba Mississippi, 2011-2013