Research within the Co-op focuses on a variety of disciplines including habitat conservation
and management, threatened and endangered species preservation, invasive species,
and best management practices for public and private lands. The unit works with many
taxa, including birds, reptiles, freshwater fish, crayfish, mammals, and insects.
Projects conducted by the unit, established by students and cooperators, work to support
common goals.
Co-op News & Updates:
May
Society for Freshwater Science:
Several members of Dr. Magoulicks lab traveled to Spokane, WA to attend SFS!
April
Congratulations to Kearstin for successfully defending her dissertation titled: “Searching
Harder for the Darter: Evaluating Endangered Yellowcheek Darter (Nothonotus moorei) Status and Drought Responses". You rock!
Congratulations to Andrew for receiving an NSF grant to explore glade plant communitites,
what an amazing achievement!
March
Annual Meeting of The Wildlife Society, Arkansas State Chapter:
Myia and Caleb presented a poster titled, “Developing a Bioacoustic Classifier for
Automated Detection of Priority Avian Species in the Lower Mississippi Valley Region”
Lauren presented a poster titled, “Quail-ity Habitat: Quantifying Response of Bird
Communities to Pine Savanna Restoration on Private Lands”
Paul presented a talk titled, “Toward Improving Early Detection of Invasive Plants:
Testing an Integrated Species Distribution Model to Predict Imperata Cylindrica (Cogongrass) Occurrence”
Michael presented a talk titled “Modeling Avian Community Response to Forest Management
Across Wildlife Management Areas”
Anne received second place for student oral presentations for her talk, “Exploring
nest success, home range, and movement patterns of King rail (Rallus elegans) in southeastern Arkansas”
Anne was invited to present a poster on “Exploring nest success, home range, and movement
patterns of King rail (Rallus elegans) in southeastern Arkansas to inform emergent wetland management”
Southern Division of The American Fisheries Society:
Kearstin was awarded the best student poster at the conference! Her poster was titled,
“Underwater camera surveys of endangered Yellowcheek Darter (Nothonotus moorei) and associated species in the Little Red River, Arkansas
Josh presented a poster titled, “Seasonal and Hydrologic Variability Influences Habitat
and Functional Structure of Stream Fish Assemblages”
Lindsey presented a poster titled, “Customizing the Ecological Risk Screening Summary
(ERSS) Workflow to Identify Candidate Species for Aquatic Nuisance Species Watchlists”
February
Society of Rangeland Management:
Several members of the Roberts lab traveled to Monterey, California for the Society
of Rangeland Management conference. They had a great time networking and exploring
the area!
Dr. Roberts, Evan, Paul, and Michael presented talks. Lauren presented a poster.
Arkansas American Fisheries Society Meeting:
Lindsey attended the annual AFS meeting to present a talk titled: “The First Implementation
of an Environmental DNA Metabarcoding Sampling Protocol Across the Major Rivers of
Arkansas”
Lindsey also received the Natural State Fisheries Scholarship, congrats!
Josh was awarded with Outstanding Subunit Member for the University of Arkansas, Student
Chapter!
January
New Faces:
We welcomed Gracie to the Living Landscapes Lab as a Master’s student! Her project
focuses on the wild turkey! Wild turkeys are one of the most widely recognized birds
in the United States, but their populations have been declining. Using game cameras
and ARU's, our goal is to assess the status of eastern wild turkeys in the Gulf Coastal
Plains region of Arkansas. We aim to use information gathered to support these birds
and their habitat.
