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Aleknagik Bear Project wraps after more than a decade

8/13/2024

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By: Aaron Wirsing

​After more than a decade of research, with field work lasting from 2012-2022 (with a pause in 2020 because of the pandemic), the Aleknagik Bear Project has officially wrapped! The project began as an effort to enumerate the brown bears visiting a collection of six creeks (Happy, Hansen, Eagle, Bear, Yako, Whitefish) draining into Lake Aleknagik (of Bristol Bay, Alaska) during the summer sockeye salmon spawning season. To estimate numbers of bears on each stream during each summer (mid-July through late August), we relied on a non-invasive approach: stringing barbed wires across each stream at a couple of locations to snag hair from passing bears for later genetic analysis, which furnishes individual IDs (genotypes). The wires were a huge success: all told, we collected nearly 2,500 hair samples that, following collaborative analysis with Jen Adams and Lisette Waits of the Laboratory for Ecological, Evolutionary and Conservation Genetics at the University of Idaho, yielded 845 detections of 229 bears (118 females, 105 males, and 6 bears of unknown sex). As mentioned earlier in this blog, we used these detections to estimate that, during a given summer, each of these small streams could be visited by as many as 40 different bears, all seeking to nourish themselves on salmon that are key to a successful hibernation. 

Over the years, the project has expanded in exciting ways, yielding 11 papers thus far (including 2 with UW undergraduates as lead authors) and spawning a  number of investigations that are still underway. On such project, a first-of-its-kind led by former SEFS undergraduate Natalee Bozzi, used video recordings of bears detected near our barbed wires to document and explore the drivers of 8 different foraging tactics that these bruins use to exploit salmon. The video to the right depicts a sow and her cubs engaged in one such tactic: passive foraging, where the bears park themselves in a stream and wait for the fish to come to them. Natalee's paper is currently under review by the Journal of Mammalogy.

As we work up the data from this longitudinal study, we also want to look back and those who made it possible, first and foremost PEL collaborator and SAFS emeritus professor Tom Quinn, who was gracious enough to invite me to join the Alaska Salmon Program and work on bears with him, as well as Chris Boatright and Jackie Carter, for coordinating everything at the Aleknagik field camp, and our many (and awesome) field research technicians. 

Please stay tuned for more updates on this project!
Picture
Aaron Wirsing and Tom Quinn on the Alaskan tundra near Hansen Creek.
Sockeye salmon team at the mouth of Hansen Creek. Ultimately, they will make their way into the stream to spawn, or be eaten by bears first! Note how shallow the water is - this a perilous journey, bears or no bears. For Tom Q, I'll mention that some of these fish even fall prey to gulls (which he adores) while making their way upstream.
Bears (here a sow and her cubs) passively (sit and wait) foraging for salmon on the aptly named Bear Creek (near wire set #2).
Picture
View from the mouth of Whitefish Creek. A great example of what we deem "everyday Alaska".
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2019 Sees an Uptick in Aleknagik Bear Activity

7/29/2019

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By: Aaron Wirsing
This year, we returned to Bristol Bay, Alaska for our 8th year (!) of non-invasive brown bear population sampling. 2017 and 2018 had been slow years, with relatively little bear activity, but so far 2019 has been busy. During our first foray up 
Happy Creek, for example, we felt as if bears were all around us, as evidenced by high numbers of fresh salmon carcasses, prints, and 'kitchens' (areas along the creek bank where bears have flattened down the vegetation for easy access to the fish). The picture below features a a particularly impressive kitchen, where it seemed a bear (or bears) had been using a ramp to slide into a pool full of sockeye salmon. We'll soon be putting this idea to the test with a camera trap. 
Stream with salmon in natural area
We've weathered a bit after eight years (photo by Liz Landefeld).
Aaron Wirsing and friend standing near stream in natural area
Just what we're looking for as far as a bear-wire encounter! Here, a bear that is very likely to deposit hair on our first Eagle Creek wire.
Trail camera photo of bears fishing for salmon in river
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Aleknagik Bear Project enters its 7th year

7/26/2018

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By: Aaron Wirsing
Since 2012, we have been sampling brown bear hair with barbed wires strung across sockeye salmon spawning streams feeding into Lake Aleknagik (Bristol Bay, AK) for the purpose of generating noninvasive genetic population estimates. So far this year, the bear activity has been a tad slow (not much hair snagged on the wires), but this wire deployed on the aptly named Bear Creek was recently visited by an immature bald eagle (see below)!

As usual, sampling will run through the end of August, after which we'll send our hair specimens to the lab at the University of Idaho for analysis, hoping for lots of individual IDs (genotypes).
Trail camera photo of bird of prey at stream in natural area
Every so often, when our barbed wires and motion-activated cameras work in perfect harmony, we get a moment like this one (on upper Hansen Creek).
Trail camera photo of two bears at stream in natural area
Trail camera photo of bear at stream in natural area
Trail camera photo of two bears at stream in natural area
     ​Also, our daily Hansen walks are catching on...
Trail camera photo of bird of prey at stream in natural area
Trail camera photo of bear with two bear cubs at stream in natural area
Cubs! (Upper Eagle Creek)
Trail camera photo of bear at stream in natural area
Bear meets wire (on Eagle Creek).
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Update from the snow leopard project

5/2/2018

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By: Aaron Wirsing (for Shannon Kachel)
PhD student Shannon Kachel is back in Central Asia, where his groundbreaking research on interactions between snow leopards, wolves, and their scared prey in Kyrgyzstan is beginning to wind down. Shannon's study is the first ever to examine the ecological consequences of shared predation risk from these two top carnivores for prey decision making. He recently chronicled his progress in a blog for Panthera that can be found here. Nice work, Shannon - we are green with envy!
Photo of herd of argali in open dry area
Stream flowing through valley in mountainous area
Herd of argali (photo by Sebastian Kennerknecht)
​Sarychat-Ertash, Kyrgyzstan (photo by Sebastian Kennerknecht)
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John Day Dam Wildlife Survey: Year 1

10/9/2017

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By: Aaron Wirsing
This past summer, we partnered with the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), professor Josh Lawler (UW), and Dr. Michael Case (UW), to initiate a wildlife survey targeting the lands around the John Day Dam known as the John Day / Willow Creek Property. Using a combination of camera and live-trapping, our technicians Erin Morrison and Emily Schafsteck braved the heat and spent three months (June-August) sampling the project lands for mammals, reptiles, and amphibians. Their hard work really paid off, for it resulted in a number of interesting detections, including a black-tailed jackrabbit (Lepus californicus, below)! 
Trail camera photo of black-tailed jackrabbit standing on its hind legs
​I joined them in August to try my hand at some small mammal handling, and before I left made sure to visit nearby Hermiston, OR to pick up one of their legendary watermelons. The survey continues next spring!
Photo of watermelon stand in Hermiston, OR
Photo of Erin Morrison and Emily Schafsteck standing in dry sunny area with sagebrush
Erin Morrison (left) and Emily Schafsteck (right), after a great day of small mammal trapping.
We are grateful to Tim Darland and the USACE for this exciting research opportunity, and look forward to 2018!
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Alumni Update: Dr. Linda Uyeda

6/28/2017

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By Linda Uyeda and Aaron Wirsing
One of the great joys of running a research lab is getting to check in on former graduate students. Here, we catch up with alumna Linda Uyeda (’15), the first PEL student to earn a PhD. As a doctoral student, Linda explored the relationship between water monitor lizards (Varanus salvator) and humans in Indonesia. As you'll see below, she has now shifted her attention to one of North America's most iconic species.

​Linda is currently living in southern California and has been working with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) California Condor Recovery Program since 2015. She first began with the Recovery Program as a Great Basin Institute Research Associate/Monitoring Technician, and was later hired on as a Condor Biologist with the Santa Barbara Zoo, in partnership with USFWS.  Earlier this year, Linda transitioned to a USFWS Wildlife Biologist position within the Recovery Program, based out of the Hopper Mountain National Wildlife Refuge Complex in Ventura, California.
Linda Uyeda holding a California condor in outdoor area
Photo Credit: Nadya Seal Faith, Santa Barbara Zoo
The California condor (Gymnogyps californianus) is listed federally as an endangered species. With a 9.5 foot wingspan, and weighing up to 25 pounds, it is the largest land bird in North America. ​California condors are carrion feeders, with common food sources including carcasses of large mammals such as deer and cattle. Challenges to the condors’ survival in the wild include habitat loss, complications resulting from the ingestion of microtrash, and electrocution from power poles, but lead poisoning from consumption of lead-contaminated carcasses remains as the greatest obstacle to overall population recovery. 
 
The primary aim of the Recovery Program, a multi-organization collaborative effort led by the USFWS, is the recovery of the California condor to a self-sustaining, free-flying population. There are many partners involved in the California condor recovery effort, with some organizations focused on captive populations, and others tasked with management of the free flying population throughout the species’ range. The USFWS Hopper Mountain National Wildlife Refuge complex based in Ventura, California, is responsible for the management of the southern California population of California condors.  Management activities include monitoring wild condor nests to assess chick development and to remove microtrash, tracking day-to-day condor activity, and conducting biannual health checks of the entire free-flying flock to monitor for lead exposure. Captive-bred individuals are also introduced to the free-flying population each year, and are monitored to ensure their successful integration into the flock. 
 
Since 1982, when there were only 23 California condors worldwide, recovery efforts have increased the population to over 450 birds, including over 250 flying free in the wild! Of this total population, the free-flying southern California condor flock with which Linda works currently numbers ~80 individuals.
 
After spending multiple seasons tracking and handling water monitor lizards in the dense tropical forests of Indonesia, learning the proper handling and management of California condors has been a fun new challenge for Linda. These days, she spends a lot of time tracking and observing condors in the open grasslands, steep canyons, and rocky cliff areas that this species calls home. “It’s great to play even a small part in the recovery of the California condor, and to contribute to such a longstanding and successful recovery program.”
Three California condor flying in sky
     Photo Credit: Linda Uyeda, USFWS
California condor sitting in dead tree
Photo Credit: Linda Uyeda, USFWS
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Tips for Analyzing Trail Camera Photos

4/17/2017

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Content by Michael Havrda, edited by Apryle Craig

An increasing number of researchers are using trail cameras as a non-invasive method to study wildlife. Trail cameras are easily deployed by citizen scientists and collect data round-the-clock, giving them an edge on direct observation studies. It's easy to end up with thousands of photos, but don't be overwhelmed. Here are a few tips to organize and analyze your trail camera photos:
Researcher attaching trail camera to tree
  • Record detailed site data: Keep track of how long cameras were deployed, GPS coordinates for them, and any site covariates you may want later (I keep all of this in an Excel sheet) - things such as deployment duration are critical for occupancy analysis, etc. Here is a basic datasheet for trail cameras.
  • Get organized: Save the photos into separate folders for each deployment (i.e. CameraSite1, CameraSite2, etc.). I name my folders after whatever sample unit the camera was in.
  • Never delete ANY photos, even if they're blanks/misfires, etc. You can always exclude them from analysis later, but always keep the data in its rawest form. 
  • Back up your data: Save them to your computer, an external hard drive, a second external hard drive, a cloud, a second cloud...okay, mainly joking here, but build redundancy into your system! The worst thing that can happen is you only save your data to one place. I personally save them to my laptop, a personal external drive, and an external drive I keep at UW. My techs also usually download the photos from the cameras they manage onto their own computers.
  • Choosing software: There are lots of programs you can download onto your computer to catalog your photos (note that usually you'll need a second software program for analysis, such as R). I use eMammal which is not free. Carolyn uses CPW Photo Warehouse (which is free) and works great. There is also a newer R package (CamTrapR) but I have no experience with it.
  • Auto-ID or image recognition? Currently, there are no packages that can look through the photos and ID animals  This is something a lot of people would love, and some of the technology is in the works, but as far as we know, nothing has been released yet.
  • Think ahead before you commit: Have an idea of what type of analysis you want to do and what program you're going to use before you start cataloging and organizing photos - sometimes different analysis types (or programs) want the data in different formats.

Do you have any additional tips? Feel free to email them to Apryle at uw [dot] edu and I will review them and add them as time permits. 
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Pursuing Snow Leopards at the Top of the World

9/28/2016

5 Comments

 
By Aaron Wirsing (with Shannon Kachel)
Earlier this month, I joined Shannon Kachel in Kyrgyzstan for a couple of weeks of field research. Working in collaboration with Panthera and the local managers of the Sarychat-Ertash Reserve in the Tian Chan Mountains, Shannon is exploring interactions between snow leopards, wolves, and their shared prey (Argali and Ibex). During my stay, we did not capture and collar any snow leopards, which are notoriously elusive, but I was left with indelible memories of the region's beautiful alpine scenery, not to mention the bumps and bruises to show for some truly challenging field work at 3000 m (10,000 feet).
Photo of the Tian Chan Mountains with blue sky background
Aaron Wirsing standing in Tian Chan Mountains
Top: Winded after trekking up to a snow leopard trapping site (roughly 11000 ft). Right: Shannon puts the finishing touches on a snare.
Shannon Kachel taking research samples in mountains
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The PEL teams up with the Doris Duke Conservation Scholars Program at UW

8/12/2016

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By Aaron Wirsing (with Clint Robins)
This summer, the PEL, led by PhD student Clint Robins, teamed up with the Doris Duke Conservation Scholars Program (DDCSP) at the University of Washington. The DDCSP seeks to increase diversity and inclusion in conservation and the natural sciences. To that end, the program at UW, which is housed in the College of the Environment, recruits undergraduates from unrepresented groups and diverse backgrounds to spend two summers as scholars; during the second summer, the scholars partner with tribal, university, and/or government conservation efforts as interns. Clint mentored two second-year interns, Niki Love and Kyle Mabie, who assisted with investigation of cougar kill sites along the urban-to-wildland gradient than runs from Seattle to the Cascade foothills and then completed their own research projects using data  they had collected. We are grateful to Niki and Kyle for choosing to spend time with us this summer, and wish them the best of luck as they move on from the DDCSP to complete their degrees at Cornell and Colorado State, respectively.
group of students and vehicles in Washington forested area
Dr. Brian Kertson, of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, talks to the first-year DDCSP cohort about radio-telemetry and his research on cougars in Seattle's back yard.
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Alaska Bear Project in its 5th year

7/29/2016

2 Comments

 
By Aaron Wirsing
Now in its 5th year, and counting, our Alaska Bear Project continues to build momentum. Working in collaboration with Professor Tom Quinn (SAFS), I've just returned from Bristol Bay, where we've been non-invasively studying bears hunting along six sockeye salmon spawning streams (alliteration!) since 2012. Thus far, we've collected over 2000 hair samples for genetic analysis using barbed wires strung across the streams and detected 121 bears. 
Sockeye salmon swimming upriver in Happy Creek
Sockeye salmon make the push into Happy Creek.
Aaron and Tom on the tundra of Alaska with trees and hills in the background
​​Tom and I on the tundra near one of our bear wires on Whitefish Creek (Photo by Blakeley Adkins). Yep, Bristol Bay is a tough place to work.
Two researchers attaching trail camera to tree in natural area
Anne Hilborn (PhD student, Virginia Tech) and Blakeley Adkins (our bear research technician for the 2016 season) check one of the motion-activated video cameras for new bear footage. Here, on Eagle Creek, the camera is paired with a hair snagging wire, letting us match footage with deposited hairs to determine, for example, if the sample was left by a lone individual or a mother with cubs.
​This year, for the first time, we've been collecting video using motion-activated trail cameras deployed in conjunction with the wires, and elsewhere, on each stream. We'll be analyzing the videos to explore bear behavioral responses to the wires (e.g., do they learn to avoid them?), and to track the timing and location of different bear behaviors including foraging and traveling. Working with Anne Hilborn, a PhD student in Marcella Kelly's lab at Virginia Tech, we're also using the videos as a means to better communicate our work and findings to the public. Below, two videos provide good examples of the kinds of footage we collect: a mother passing by with two cubs, and one of the many curious bears attracted (presumably) to the sound of the cameras.
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