HDRU News
Today is:
Summary of Consultations, Outreach Activities,
Honors, Awards, and other
Scholarly Activities
The HDRU has traditionally made consultation and
outreach a part of its research partnership with DEC.
The HDRU also provides consultation and conducts
workshops for other resource management agencies. In
addition, Unit faculty and staff are active in a wide variety
of professional activities. Examples of activities for
2005 are summarized below.
Consultation to the New York Fish and Wildlife Management Board
HDRU Leader Tom Brown continued to serve as the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences representative to the New York Fish and Wildlife Management Board. In 2005 this responsibility entailed preparing semi-annual progress reports to keep Board members aware of HDRU activities—particularly those related to the habitat and access issues that the Board is responsible for addressing.
Small Game and Furbearer Harvest Surveys: A Cooperative Effort with DEC
HDRU staff worked with Bureau of Wildlife staff in a collaborative effort to implement DEC’s annual small game and furbearer harvest surveys. HDRU staff designed survey instruments and assumed responsibility for implementation of survey mailings (i.e., sample sizes of 5,000 and 4,500). DEC assumed responsibility for data entry and analysis.
Outreach on Human-Bear Conflict Management
HDRU Graduate Research Assistant Meredith Gore collaborated with DEC and Cornell Cooperative Extension to develop, produce, and distribute educational materials designed to reduce human-black bear conflict in residential communities in Southeast New York. Gore in Leadership Program HDRU Graduate Research Assistant Meredith Gore continued to work with the Emerging Wildlife Conservation Leadership Program (EWCL), a cooperative effort of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Defenders of Wildlife. In 2005, this responsibility entailed attending a capacity-building workshop at the White Oak Conservation Center in Yulee, Florida and developing an international conservation program focused on bears of the world. Meredith served on a sub-committee focused on enhancing compliance with Cambodian wildlife law through institutional capacitybuilding through training in best practices.
Integrating Human Dimensions in Natural Resource Management in the National Park Service
HDRU Co-leader Dan Decker is working with
Margaret Wild, DVM, PhD, and other staff of the Biological
Resource Management Division (BRMD) of
the National Park Service to develop a collaborative
graduate training program addressing the human dimensions
of wildlife management in national parks. As
a result of this project, one Ph.D-level traineeship has
been established within HDRU, held by Kirsten Leong
(see Ms. Leong's report in this document). Dan collaborated
with BRMD staff in several efforts in 2005:
• Developed a symposium proposal on wildlife habituation
for the 2005 Annual Meeting of TWS in
Madison, WI. The session included two papers
focusing on human dimensions of habituation.
Five papers from the symposium (including the
two HD papers) are under consideration as a special
section for the Wildlife Society Bulletin.
•
Developed, with Bill Siemer and Shawn Riley, a
workshop on wildlife disease management sponsored
by NPS. One product of the workshop was
a manager’s concept model of the wildlife disease
management system. A description of the model
was the focus of an invited presentation by Dan
for the International CWD symposium, which then
led to an invited paper for a special issue of Human
Dimensions in Wildlife.
• Developed, with Shawn Riley and Jordan Pusatari
Burroughs (both at MSU), a NPS-sponsored workshop
on Contingency Planning for Invasive Species
Management.
• Led an expert panel to explore development of a
“wolf deployment” alternative for the Elk Management
EIS for Rocky Mountain National Park.
•
Worked with natural resource management staff at
Acadia National Park to plan for a month-long project
during summer of 2006 for purposes of developing
a “scientist in residence” program at the park,
and to identify research needs to serve park management,
including a human dimensions research
agenda.
International Conference on Human Dimensions of Fish and Wildlife Management
HDRU Co-leader Dan Decker is representing Cornell HDRU in planning for an international conference on human dimensions of fish and wildlife management, slated for 2008. The conference is being spearheaded by Colorado State University’s Human Dimensions in Natural Resources Unit, with Cornell and University of Montana involved in the core planning group. Aquatic Stewardship Symposium HDRU members Barbara Knuth and Bill Siemer provided leadership that resulted in a special symposium at the 2005 American Fisheries Society (AFS) Annual Meeting in Anchorage, Alaska. The symposium brought together 18 speakers to discuss the most current thinking about how to define, foster, and evaluate desirable aquatic stewardship behaviors as well as how to develop the educational programs and other motivating forces underlying such behavior. This symposium reflected a partnership among academics, aquatic resource educators, fishery management professionals, and the fishing and boating industries to develop a shared understanding of desired characteristics of aquatic resource stewardship. Knuth and Siemer are serving as editors of the symposium proceedings, which will be published by AFS in 2006.
Consultation to the Fish Mercury Project of the California Bay-Delta Authority
HDRU Co-leader Barbara Knuth chairs the Scientific Peer Review Panel for this major project that is examining mercury contamination in fish in the San Francisco Bay-Delta watershed, and working to increase public awareness of fish contamination issues, with the overall goal of reducing mercury exposure in humans and wildlife.
Consultation to the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission
HDRU Co-leader Barbara Knuth provided advice
to the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife
Commission in their efforts to develop a new mercury
advisory process for tribal communities in the upper
Great Lakes. The risk communication guidance she
provided contributed to the design of a new, visuallybased
fish consumption health advisory program cognizant
of cultural tradition and local community
concerns.
Presentation:
Knuth, B.A., A. DeWeese, J. Foran, and N. Kmiecik.
2005.
Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission Risk Management and Communication Program: Reducing health risks to the Anishinaabe from methylmercury. National Forum on Contaminants in Fish. Baltimore, MD.
Council of Environmental Deans and Directors
HDRU Co-leader Barbara Knuth was appointed by
the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Dean to
serve as Cornell’s representative on the Council of
Environmental Deans and Directors, the university
affiliate program of the National Council for Science
and the Environment.
HDRU Risk Communication Research is
Applied in Seafood Marketing
To help consumers make informed choices about
fish—which is protein rich and heart healthy but may
harbor chemical contaminants—HDRU Co-leader
Barbara Knuth serves as a scientific adviser to Seafood
Safe, a new voluntary fish labeling program for companies,
retailers and restaurants. The program uses certified,
independent laboratories to test for environmental
pollutants, particularly mercury and PCBs, in fish.
Knuth advises Seafood Safe to help develop their
methodology, standards and labels on how to communicate
a product’s risk to consumers. The labels indicate
how many meals consumers can consume of the product
each month without being exposed to dangerous levels
of the contaminants. Seafood Safe was founded in 2005
by Henry Lovejoy, the president of EcoFish, a New
Hampshire-based company that produces frozen fish
dinners with sustainable harvested seafood for natural
food stores. It will be launched to the fish industry at
large during 2006.
Presentation:
Lovejoy, H., and B.A. Knuth. 2005. Seafood Safe:
marketing and labeling contaminant-tested fish.
National Forum on Contaminants in Fish. Baltimore,
MD.
Service on National Research Council Committee
HDRU Co-leader Barbara Knuth was appointed to the Committee on the Review of Recreational Fisheries Survey Methods of the National Research Council. The committee is critically reviewing the types of survey methods used to estimate catch per unit effort and effort in recreational fisheries. Leadership in Scientific Societies HDRU Co-leader Barbara Knuth served as President of the American Fisheries Society, Vice- Chair of the World Council of Fisheries Societies, and on the International Steering Committee for the 5th World Fisheries Congress scheduled for October, 2008 in Yokohama, Japan. In 2005 Dan Decker finished his term as pastpresident of TWS, completing his service on TWS Executive Committee of TWS Council. Among his activities for TWS in 2005, Dan served on the search committee for the TWS Executive Director position.
Service on Boards
HDRU Co-leader Dan Decker served on the Board of Governors for the New York Sea Grant Institute (Vice-chair), Cornell Community and Rural Development Institute, and Cornell Institute for Social and Economic Research. Other Academic and Professional Briefs HDRU leader Tom Brown is serving as an associate editor for the Journal of Wildlife Management.
