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College of William and Mary

This presentation aired as part of the Great Basin LCC webinar series on October 11, 2017. Speakers included Erica Fleishman, U.C. Davis, and Jimi Gragg, Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.Description: As the distribution and abundance of non-native cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum) in the Great Basin has increased, the extent and frequency of fire in the region has increased by as much as 200%. These changes in fire regimes are associated with loss of the sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) and native grasses and forbs in which many native animals, including Greater Sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus), breed and feed. Managers have suggested changes in fire regimes, fuels treatments and post-fire restoration with...
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FY2015This effort complements a project, supported by the Joint Fire Science Program, to explore relations among cheatgrass-driven fire, climate, and sensitive-status birds across the Great Basin. With support from the NW and SW Climate Science Centers and the GB CESU, we aim to engage managers at local, state, and regional levels, and to involve both field-level and director-level personnel, during all stages of the proposed project. Our methods of engagement are intended to save managers time and decrease some of the uncertainty in planning and decision-making rather than to create additional pressures on managers time. We will conduct field visits, workshops, and interactive briefings to build trust and increase...
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We will use recently-developed models (see Hanser et al. 2011a) mapping the occurrence or abundance of six sagebrush obligate or near-obligate species of conservation concern (four songbirds, one reptile, and one mammal). We will evaluate how important habitats for each species overlap with similarly developed sage-grouse habitat occurrence models (Hanser et al. 2011b), as well as how sage-grouse priority habitats overlap with biodiversity hotspots for the other sagebrush species. This project will evaluate the degree to which sage-grouse conservation can act as an umbrella for other sagebrush dependent species within the Wyoming Basins ecoregion, the Utah-Wyoming-Rocky Mountain ecoregions in their entirety and...
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