{"id":60669,"date":"2013-01-03T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2013-01-03T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/uri-students-cottontail-project-sparks-interest-in-wildlife-research-career\/"},"modified":"2013-01-03T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2013-01-03T00:00:00","slug":"uri-students-cottontail-project-sparks-interest-in-wildlife-research-career","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2013\/01\/uri-students-cottontail-project-sparks-interest-in-wildlife-research-career\/","title":{"rendered":"URI student\u2019s cottontail project sparks interest in wildlife research career"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\tKINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 January 3, 2013 \u2013 University of Rhode Island student Keri Dyer fought through thickets of brush and briers and through knee-deep wetlands to study the habitat needs of New England cottontails, but never once in her project did she actually see the subject of her research. She didn\u2019t expect to.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cAvailable habitat for New England cottontails in southern New England has declined by 86 percent since the 1960s,\u201d said Dyer, a resident of Smithfield studying wildlife and conservation biology at URI. \u201cThey like new growth forests, but due to fragmentation and maturing of habitat, there is minimal habitat available so populations are very very low.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tA 2010-11 survey of the region\u2019s native rabbit found just one New England cottontail in all of Rhode Island, despite having more than 100 people searching for them.<\/p>\n


\n\tEfforts to protect the cottontails have focused on finding and identifying their preferred habitat \u2013 shrubby areas with scattered small trees.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cThe rabbits need a certain amount of shrub coverage to thrive,\u201d she explained. \u201cThe average seemed to be about 60 percent shrub coverage, and just about the only places that have that coverage are new growth forests,\u201d like abandoned farm fields or areas where forests had been cut down several years ago.<\/p>\n

Working with URI graduate student Amy Gottfried and Professor Tom Husband, Dyer visited 78 such locations throughout Rhode Island and eastern Connecticut last summer. At each site, she laid out a 50-meter grid, counted and measured woody shrubs, assessed herbaceous cover, and calculated how much area was covered by trees. <\/p>\n


\n\tAccording to Dyer, protecting habitat is crucial to restoring healthy populations of New England cottontails, but scientists must also cope with the non-native Eastern cottontail, which was introduced to the area in the early 1900s and seems to be outcompeting the native rabbit for resources.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cThe two species look very similar, they have the same range, and the introduced species seems to be able to live in areas that are more developed and closer to people,\u201d she said. \u201cNew England cottontails hide in the brush to avoid predators most of the day and only come out in the early morning and at dusk.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tDyer\u2019s research was conducted as part of the URI Coastal Fellows Program, a unique initiative designed to involve undergraduate students in addressing current environmental problems. Now in its 17th year, it is based at URI\u2019s College of the Environment and Life Sciences. Students are paired with a mentor and research staff to help them gain skills relevant to their academic major and future occupations. <\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cI really liked learning field techniques, and I loved working outside, even when it was hot and raining,\u201d Dyer said.<\/p>\n


\n\tThe cottontail project wasn\u2019t Dyer\u2019s first foray into wildlife research. In 2011 she analyzed the health of local salt marshes using a small baitfish as an indicator species. The project involved catching mummichogs and dissecting them in a lab.<\/p>\n


\n\u201cMummichogs are hardy, so the health of the mummichog tells us about the health of the marsh,\u201d said Dyer.<\/p>\n


\nThe URI student is already looking forward to conducting another research project next summer, perhaps even in collaboration with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.<\/p>\n


\n\u201cI\u2019ll work on whatever project they have and do whatever needs to be done. Just give me some bug spray,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n


\nThe experience she gained from her first two research projects has convinced Dyer that a career in environmental research is in her future.<\/p>\n


\n\u201cI definitely want to do research with wildlife, and a career with Fish and Wildlife would be ideal,\u201d she concluded. \u201cI would especially like to work with birds of prey. But for now, I\u2019ll let the wind take me and find a good place for me.\u201d<\/p>\n


\nPhoto submitted by Keri Dyer<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 January 3, 2013 \u2013 University of Rhode Island student Keri Dyer fought through thickets of brush and briers and through knee-deep wetlands to study the habitat needs of New England cottontails, but never once in her project did she actually see the subject of her research. She didn\u2019t expect to. \u201cAvailable […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":60672,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-60669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60669","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60669"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60669\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60669"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60669"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60669"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}