Grantee Research Project Results
2004 Progress Report: Habitat Alteration and Disease Effects on Black-Tailed Prairie Dogs
EPA Grant Number: R829091Title: Habitat Alteration and Disease Effects on Black-Tailed Prairie Dogs
Investigators: Collinger, Sharon K. , Ray, Chris , Cully, Jack , Gage, Kenneth , Kosoy, Michael
Institution: University of Colorado at Boulder , Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Division of Vector - Infectious Diseases, Ft. Collins, Colorado , Kansas State University
Current Institution: University of Colorado at Boulder , Centers for Disease Control and Prevention , Kansas State University
EPA Project Officer: Packard, Benjamin H
Project Period: December 15, 2001 through December 14, 2004 (Extended to December 14, 2005)
Project Period Covered by this Report: December 15, 2003 through December 14, 2004
Project Amount: $500,000
RFA: Wildlife Risk Assessment (2001) RFA Text | Recipients Lists
Research Category: Ecological Indicators/Assessment/Restoration , Aquatic Ecosystems , Biology/Life Sciences
Objective:
The objective of this research project is to focus on the combined effects of habitat alteration and wildlife community structure on the risk of disease outbreaks in the black-tailed prairie dog, a species of conservation concern. This species is susceptible to bacterial blood diseases transmitted by fleas, including sylvatic plague and bartonellosis. Prairie dog colonies that contract plague commonly suffer 100 percent mortality, so predicting the risk of exposure to plague is critical for prairie dog conservation. Because plague may be the most critical threat to the survival of black-tailed prairie dogs, we hope to gain a better understanding of the spatial and temporal dynamics of plague in this system.
Predicting disease outbreaks involves consideration of multiple population stressors. Most diseases spread through contact between individuals of a single species, therefore the prediction of outbreaks depends on prediction of population dynamics within the species. Blood diseases like the plague spread through contact between black-tailed prairie dogs and the many alternate mammalian hosts that live in the same habitat. Our research addresses effects of landscape structure and land use on the dynamics of black-tailed prairie dogs and on the dynamics of the alternate host community.
Progress Summary:
Our research group held a 2-day meeting in January 2004 to discuss our progress from Year 2 of the project and to determine goals and refine any sampling procedures for Year 3 of the project. Based on plans made during the January 2004 meeting, our field crews trapped small mammals that potentially serve as reservoir hosts for plague at 44 sites in Boulder County and at 30 sites at 3 national grasslands in Wyoming, Colorado, and Kansas. We collected fleas, blood, and tissue samples from each animal for analyses of pathogen occurrence and for population genetic analyses of prairie dog colonies. We collected more than 2,500 blood samples and more than 10,000 fleas during the summer of 2004. All of the fleas have been identified to species. The samples were dominated numerically by two flea species: Oropsylla hirsuta, which occurs primarily on prairie dogs, and Aetheca wagneri, which occurs primarily on deer mice. The blood and flea samples currently are being analyzed for pathogen occurrence at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Fort Collins, Colorado.
We had previously mapped the perimeters of approximately 100 prairie dog colonies in Boulder County, Colorado, and measured colony characteristics using GIS. During Year 3 of the project, we continued to collect data on these colonies, including prairie dog burrow density for all 100 colonies, prairie dog density for 24 colonies, and vegetation cover for 24 colonies. These data have been input into the GIS database and georeferenced to overlay on base layers supplied by Boulder City Open Space and Mountain Parks and Boulder County Open Space Departments. For information on prairie dog colonies in less urbanized landscapes, we mapped colonies on the Cimarron National Grassland, Kansas; Comanche National Grassland, Colorado; Kiowa National Grassland, New Mexico; Rita Blanca National Grassland, Oklahoma and Texas; and Thunder Basin National Grassland, Wyoming. We have developed an excellent and growing GIS database that includes plague and prairie dog colony information across the geographic range of the black-tailed prairie dog.
Future Activities:
Our research group will hold another 2-day meeting in April 2005 to discuss research progress and plans for the upcoming field season. From May to September 2005, we will conduct our third year of live trapping of prairie dogs and other rodent species to collect information on distribution and abundance of rodents and collect fleas and blood for disease screening. We will continue to analyze blood and flea samples collected in 2004 and to analyze data collected from the 2 years of the study completed to date.
With the field data that we have collected in the three field seasons funded by this grant (2003-2005), we will develop general mathematical models. The models will address the importance of habitat structure and community structure on risk from diseases that infect multiple host species and examine specific models for predicting risk of disease outbreaks in the black-tailed prairie dog in different landscapes. These models should illustrate the potential for multiple stressors (habitat alteration, community alteration, and introduced disease) to influence population risk.
Our field research will provide data to determine the statistical relationships between outbreaks of plague and bartonellosis in black-tailed prairie dogs and in the alternate host community. First, detailed studies of landscape structure and use, population demography, and disease will be conducted at five study sites in Colorado, Kansas, and Wyoming. Second, landscape structure and use will be related to presence-absence studies of disease and host populations conducted across several counties in Colorado and neighboring states.
Journal Articles on this Report : 4 Displayed | Download in RIS Format
Other project views: | All 47 publications | 15 publications in selected types | All 12 journal articles |
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Brinkerhoff RJ, Ray C, Thiagarajan B, Collinge SK, Cully Jr. JF, Holmes B, Gage KL. Prairie dog presence affects occurrence patterns of disease vectors on small mammals. Ecography 2008;31(5):654-662. |
R829091 (2003) R829091 (2004) R829091 (Final) |
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Collinge SK, Johnson WC, Ray C, Matchett R, Grensten J, Cully JF, Gage KL, Kosoy MY, Loye JE, Martin AP. Landscape structure and plague occurrence in black-tailed prairie dogs on grasslands of the western USA. Landscape Ecology 2005;20(8):941-955. |
R829091 (2003) R829091 (2004) R829091 (Final) |
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Collinge SK, Johnson WC, Ray C, Matchett R, Grensten J, Cully Jr. JF, Gage KL, Kosoy MY, Loye JE, Martin AP. Testing the generality of a trophic-cascade model for plague. EcoHealth 2005;2(2):102-112. |
R829091 (2003) R829091 (2004) R829091 (Final) |
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Johnson WC, Collinge SK. Landscape effects on black-tailed prairie dog colonies. Biological Conservation 2004;115(3):487-497. |
R829091 (2002) R829091 (2003) R829091 (2004) R829091 (Final) |
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Supplemental Keywords:
risk assessment, pathogens, ecosystem, scaling, habitat, ecology, epidemiology, modeling, exploratory research environmental biology, wildlife, wildlife risk assessment, animal responses, conservation, disease, endangered species, fleas, prairie dogs,, RFA, Scientific Discipline, Geographic Area, Ecosystem Protection/Environmental Exposure & Risk, wildlife, Ecosystem/Assessment/Indicators, State, Environmental Monitoring, Ecological Risk Assessment, Ecology and Ecosystems, molecular epidemiology, risk assessment, ecosystem modeling, habitat, population stressors, endangered species, assessment models, ecology, ecosystem assessment, molecular diagnostics, animal responses, environmental risks, fleas, habitat loss, Wildlife Risk Assessment, conservation, genetic testing, wildlife community structure, risk models, ecological assessment, ecological impacts, ecosystem indicators, pathogen, environmental stress, ecosystem stress, ecological models, habitat alteration, prarie dogs, disease, ecological research, Colorado (CO)Relevant Websites:
http://spot.colorado.edu/~sharonc/CollingeLab.htm Exit
Progress and Final Reports:
Original AbstractThe perspectives, information and conclusions conveyed in research project abstracts, progress reports, final reports, journal abstracts and journal publications convey the viewpoints of the principal investigator and may not represent the views and policies of ORD and EPA. Conclusions drawn by the principal investigators have not been reviewed by the Agency.