Trophic Facilitation by Introduced Top Predators
This publication is the culmination of a program proposed and initiated by YNP Chief Scientist John D. Varley and YERC's Chief Scientist. Then YERC field intern Chris Wilmers took on this "Food for Masses" NPS funded project as his PhD dissertation project at UC - Berkeley. Chris is now a Professor at UC - Santa Cruz and continues to document the key role that predators play in the healthy functioning of ecosystems. This publication is widely cited as a prime example of the many ecosystem benefits provided by the famous reintroduction of wolves in Yellowstone (1995-96).
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Infectious Diseases in Yellowstone’s Canid Community
This paper is a follow-on to the disease monitoring program initiated in 1991 by Sue Consolo-Murphy and YERC's Chief Scientist who wrote YNP's original inventory and monitoring proposal. Only the wildlife disease portion was funded and lead to a widespread monitoring of wildlife diseases in YNP and the surrounding ecosystem.
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Book Chapter on Wolves and Human Coexistence
This book chapter fully explores the conflicts surrounding wolves in the US West and provides thought-provoking guidelines of how we humans can successfully coexist with wolves. The concepts included in this chapter were originally crafted at a 3-day workshop lead by YERC's Chief Scientist in 2015. The workshop included the leading wolf and carnivore biologists in the continent and was funded by an NSF Research Coordination Network (RCN) grant awarded to the University of Idaho joint with the University of Montana. YERC's Chief Scientist was co-PI on that grant.
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Wolves and Coyotes - NY Times Article
This article along with a follow-on Scientific American article challenged the 'landscape of fear' hypothesis caused by wolves. In that hypothesis wolves relegated elk away from the lowland floodplains which subsequently allowed riparian communities to flourish. This is captured is a much-viewed video entitled, "How Wolves Change Rivers". Based on YERC's long-term monitoring of browsing history on willow and aspen, YERC's Chief Scientist challenged this popular story. Empirical data and other studies as to why willow and aspen communities did or did not respond to wolf presence laid the foundation for more complete, science-based explanation as to what really happened to elk and elk browsing of willow and aspen communities. Change in nature is rarely, if ever, driven by a simple, single cause. Rather, Nature is a multi-causal, interactive system and requires investigators to follow established scientific and sampling guidelines which includes not favoring your pet hypothesis.
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