Info: Due dates for homework will be announced in class when assigned.



The take home test is posted at the bottom of this module.  Based on the vote in class on Friday, I will assign the take home in class on Monday 11/18 and it will be due on Monday 11/25 (ignore the old date on the test itself).

Subject

Grizzly bear delisting as an introduction to the use of PVA.  Final delisting decision in Federal Register.

A simple count based PVA assuming exponential growth, using only the base functions in MS Excel.   Here is the same count based PVA in R, with some extensions, including switching from an exponential growth model to a density dependent model that incorporates a carrying capacity. Here is a version that removes sampling variance using a Bayesian state space model.

Proof that geometric mean lambda and arithmetic mean r yield the same growth.

An illustration of the problems created by sampling error in estimates of N

  • false  density dependence
  • incorrect estimation of extinction risk

 

Basic demography review and example with African wild dogs including demographic PVA results for three populations

 

Demographic PVA: Using Leslie matrix for age-structured population projection.

Reading

  1. CWP CH. 5.
  2. CWP CH. 6.
  3. CWP CH. 7.
  4. Beissinger S & Westphal MI 1998.  On the use of demographic models of population viability in  endangered species management.  J. Wildl. Mgmt. 62:821-841 pdf  (BIOE 440 optional, BIOE 521 required)
  5. ABGR CH 6
  6. USFWS information on Mountain Golden Heather

Homework

 

  • R Exercise Six, Stochastic Leslie matrix projection v1: .  The script uses the popbio package  to  implement  stochastic projection and estimate extinction risk via the 'multiple matrixes' approach.  That is, at each time step, it resamples from a set of projection matrices (each matrix comes from a single year of observation).
  • R Exercise Seven, Stochastic Leslie matrix projection v2: Uses the popbio package to implement stochastic projection by treating each entry in the projection matrix as a distribution with a given mean and variance, and making a random draw from the distribution at each time step.

Take Home Test

The take home exam will require you to begin with a demographic data set and modify one of the models of population dynamics to estimate extinction risk, using R.  T