Funding Wizard

U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), Western Ecological Research Center, is offering a Cooperative Agreement to one Member of the Californian Cooperative Ecosystems Studies Unit (CESU) Program. The project is titled “Distribution of Herpetofauna of Conservation Concern and Interacting Species in California Foothill Streams.”

The U.S. Geological Survey, Wetland and Aquatic Research Center (WARC) is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU Partner to study the causes and effects of phenological changes in salamander life history events. This opportunity will provide an avenue for assisting the USGS-WARC with the development of models for simulating and predicting the effects of future climate conditions on salamander populations.

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), Western Ecological Research Center, is offering a funding opportunity to a Member of the Cooperative Ecosystems Studies Unit (CESU) Program. The project is titled “Understanding ecological processes for restoring rare plant species to their native habitats under increasing land use and changing regional climate”. The goal of this project is to develop conservation and management strategies for rare desert plant species covered under Clark County, Nevada Multiple Species Habitat Conservation Plan (MSHCP). The Mojave Desert in southern Nevada is home to rare plant species including white-margined beardtongue (Penstemon albomarginatus), Las Vegas bearpoppy (Arctomecon californica), Blue Diamond cholla (Cylindropuntia multigeniculata), three-corner milkvetch (Astragalus geyeri var. triquestrus), and sticky buckwheat (Eriogonum viscidulum). Habitat loss is a major threat to these protected species, and the inability of plants to migrate may require human intervention either by re-introducing plants to favorable habitats within a species’ range (assisted gene flow) or outside a species’ range where different conditions prevail (assisted colonization). USGS currently partners with Clark County to determine seed ecology and breeding systems of these species for increasing conservation seed collections (i.e., direct field harvests and propagation through soil seed bank) and to successfully re-introduce plants into habitats to augment populations. These strategies support the MSHCP mission to balance long-term conservation and recovery of the diversity of natural habitats and native plants while providing beneficial use of land by the growing population of Clark County, one of the fastest growing counties in the U.S.

The USGS is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU partner for research spatial analysis of mainstem riverine habitat of invasive Black Carp. Black Carp Mylopharyngodon piceus are an introduced species in North America with a rapidly expanding distribution within the Mississippi River basin. This species is anticipated to threaten native mollusk species due to a special adaptation of the pharyngeal process for crushing even thick-shelled mollusk prey. Scientists with the Columbia Environmental Research Center are actively relocating telemetry tagged Black Carp to identify habitat use and movement patterns throughout the year. To complement physical relocations of tagged Black Carp in statistical analysis of spatial ecology, bathymetric mapping of the mainstem Mississippi, Missouri, and Illinois rivers is required in combination with metrics describing proximity to wing dikes and other engineered river control structures and site specific bathymetric layers. This project consists of creating a seamless layer for the range described below.

The US Geological Survey is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU partner for research in harmful algal blooms. The purpose of the proposed project is to develop a hydrodynamic and water-quality model of a 16-mile reach of the upper Illinois River known as the Starved Rock Pool. The Starved Rock Pool is known to experience harmful algal blooms. The model will be 2-dimensional in the vertical and longitudinal directions and averaged over the lateral direction. A 2-dimensional grid will be generated, and water balance, hydrodynamic, and temperature calibrations will be performed in developing the model. Real-time water quality and streamgage data will provide time series data for model boundary conditions. Discrete velocity and temperature profiles will be measured in the water column at several locations within the study reach to provide model calibration data. Model output will consist of 2-dimensional, laterally averaged hydrodynamic and water temperature time series. The model will be used to give insight into the roles that hydrodynamics and temperature play in the process of the development of Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs) in the study reach.

The USGS Wyoming-Montana Water Science Center (WY-MT WSC) is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU partner for research titled, “Tongue River 2100: Future Tongue River streamflow estimates to enable Northern Cheyenne data-driven water management and planning.” This research will provide future streamflow estimates for the Tongue River (MT) to inform Tribal water management and decision making. Research Objectives: To work with Tribal and community project partners to understand their future streamflow data needs, to translate those needs into scientific analyses and products, and to communicate project results back to project partners.

The US Geological Survey, Southwest Biological Science Center (SBSC), is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU Partner to provide financial assistance for research investigating changes in vegetation greenness and water use in western U.S.A. riparian zones which include monitoring of native and non-native riparian plants. Related to riparian ecosystem change monitoring due to both natural and anthropogenic landcover change in rivers and streams of the Lower Colorado River Basin, as well as monitoring of all restoration activities along these tributary streams, USGS seeks to measure changes in greenup and evapotranspiration using satellite images.

The U.S. Geological Survey, Northern Rocky Mountain Science Center (NOROCK), in collaboration with the Alaska Science Center, is offering a funding opportunity to study the effects of wildfires and fuel treatments on habitat characteristics and food resources of the Jemez Mountains salamander (JMS) in the Valles Caldera National Preserve (VALL), NM. The JMS is an endangered, subterrain species endemic to the Jemez Mountains that generally only goes aboveground to mate and feed. They are strongly associate with cover objects like logs and rocks and are sensitive to temperature (12.7 C is optimal, 33.5 C is fatal). About 50% of VALL’s forested landscape is potential habitat for JMS, which is susceptible to high-severity wildfires—thought to be the greatest threat to JMS. VALL is working with its partners to reintroduce fire into the VALL’s ecosystem in a way that reduces the risk of catastrophic wildfires; however, it is unknown how JMS will respond to fuel reduction treatments. Forest managers need information on how JMS and critical aspects of their habitat, including food resources, might respond to their treatments. This opportunity will allow for 1) sampling of soil and litter microarthropods and macroarthropods in various management and wildfire units, 2) quantification of soil nitrogen, phosphorus, and pH in the same units, and 3) the evaluation of experimental forest management approaches that best support habitat characteristics benefitting JMS. Monitoring of the experimental forest management approaches will include quantifying soil moisture, temperature, organic matter, nitrogen, and phosphorus—metrics likely to directly or indirectly affect JMS and their food resources. The proposed sampling and assessments are needed to provide VALL forest managers information on links between wildfire and fuel management impacts on JMS critical habitat characteristics, so they can make informed stewardship decisions regarding the endangered JWS.

The U.S. Geological Survey, Southwest Biological Science Center (SBSC) is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU partner for research to design and implement monitoring of the microclimate within the Gemini Solar Project footprint to document the effects of solar panels on soil and vegetation, informing affects to plant communities and habitat suitability for the federally listed desert tortoise (Gopherus agassizii). Solar panels influence soil and vegetation communities by creating soil disturbance and altering microclimate, including temperature, hydrology, and albedo. These microclimate variables serve as controls over plant community dynamics, which form the basis of important food webs, including for the desert tortoise.

The U.S. Geological Survey Southwest Biological Science Center is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU Partner for research aimed at assessing how DOI long-term monitoring data and new monitoring methods can be used to build scalable fuel models to assess wildfire risk, treatment effectiveness, and scenario-casting of alternative management actions. Wildfires can spread indiscriminately across Department of the Interior (DOI) and adjacent lands in the western U.S., making it vital to protect human infrastructure and natural resource values at risk. An essential step to mitigate wildfire risk is to assess and monitor the types, amounts, and distributions of fuel across DOI lands. While several approaches exist for monitoring fuel loads in forest ecosystems, fuel assessments are less common in non-forest ecosystems where a majority of DOI lands reside. The goal of this funding opportunity is to examine the capabilities of new and existing field- and remote sensing-based data sources, databases, and tools to provide accessible fuel products for DOI decision-making and planning.