Learning and adaptation in the management of waterfowl harvests

A formal framework for the adaptive management of waterfowl harvests was adopted by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 1995. The process admits competing models of waterfowl population dynamics and harvest impacts, and relies on model averaging to compute optimal strategies for regulating harvest. Model weights, reflecting the relative ability of the alternative models to predict changes in population size, are used in the model averaging and are updated each year based on a comparison of model predictions and observations of population size. Since its inception the adaptive harvest program has focused principally on mallards (Anas platyrhynchos), which constitute a large portion of the U.S. waterfowl harvest. Four competing models, derived from a combination of two survival and two reproductive hypotheses, were originally assigned equal weights. In the last year of available information (2007), model weights favored the weakly density-dependent reproductive hypothesis over the strongly density-dependent one, and the additive mortality hypothesis over the compensatory one. The change in model weights led to a more conservative harvesting policy than what was in effect in the early years of the program. Adaptive harvest management has been successful in many ways, but nonetheless has exposed the difficulties in defining management objectives, in predicting and regulating harvests, and in coping with the tradeoffs inherent in managing multiple waterfowl stocks exposed to a common harvest. The key challenge now facing managers is whether adaptive harvest management as an institution can be sufficiently adaptive, and whether the knowledge and experience gained from the process can be reflected in higher-level policy decisions.     

Disaster threat: Preparedness and potential response of the lowest income quartile

For a community to manage hazards successfully, those who are responsible for planning and implementing responses to a disaster threat situation must understand the social and economic realities of populations at risk. A random sample survey of residents in the vicinity of a US Army chemical weapons storage depot in Alabama confirms that those in the lowest quartile of household income (i.e., less than US $25,000 in 1999) differ in important ways from the rest of the sample. Using economic status as a grouping variable resultedin identifying a concentration of individuals with special needs. This group differed significantly from the remainder of the sample as to demographic and attitudinal characteristics, hazard knowledge and concerns, emergency preparedness, and emergency decision-making and their likelihood of taking protective actions. Respondents in the lowest income quartile reported greater restrictions in physical abilities, fewer community contacts, a heightened concern about area hazards, and limited resources for taking preparedness and response actions.     

Phenogenetic response of silver birch populations and half-sib families to elevated ozone and ultraviolet-B radiation at juvenile age

Phenogenetic response of silver birch populations and half-sib families to separate and combined elevated ozone (O₃) concentrations and ultraviolet-B (UV-B) radiation dozes was studied at juvenile age in the climatic chambers. Significant population and family effects were found for seedling height, lamina width, and leaf damage. The exposure to UV-B radiation decreased genetic variation at the stage of seed germination. Complex exposure to UV-B and O₃ caused an increase of genetic variation at the stage of intensive seedling growth: seedling height genetic variation in separate treatments increased from 23.7–38.6 to 33.7–65.7%, the increase for lamina width was from 10.2–13.9 to 13.6–31.8%. Different populations and families demonstrated differing response to elevated complex UV-B and O₃ exposure. Changes of genetic intra-population variation were population-specific. Such changes in genetic variation under the impact of stressors can alter adaptation, stability, and competitive ability of regenerating populations in a hardly predictive way.