Pika Monitoring Projects
Noninvasive genetic sampling
Noninvasive genetic sampling (NGS) describes a technique of collecting genetic material such as hair, feces or other DNA sources to collect data about natural populations without interaction with individual animals. The outer surface of fecal samples bear sloughed intestinal epithelial cells that are used as the DNA source for subsequent amplification. By collecting DNA samples using fecal matter, for example, it is possible to obtain genetic ID tags (multilocus genotypes from microsatellites) for each individual that can be applied in capture-mark-recapture (CMR) models using program MARK. There are numerous potential benefits to genetic tagging including increasing the number of observations or recaptures which improves estimates as well as reducing stress and mortality to vulnerable animal populations.
Noninvasive microclimate monitoring
Our primary goal is to determine whether predictions from macroclimate species distribution models, which suggest range wide population losses for this species, are consistent with empirical observations of local variation in talus microclimates that may create thermal refugia and maintain habitat quality. In other words, this will allow us to explore the relationship between changes in broad-scale and fine-scale climate with changes in pika movement patterns and the distribution of genetic variation over time. Such analyses will help refine persistence-extinction predictions for a wild montane species which has been called “the canary in the coal mine” for global climate change in alpine environments of the American west.
UMass Wildlife Camera Project
Anoninvasive wildlife monitoring project with 40 camera traps located in habitat types that span the wildland-urban interface in the Town of Amherst, started in 2016 to understand wildlife diversity and urban habitat use with data collected and managed by undergraduate researchers and students enrolled in NRC 211 and NRC 564