Gobbling across landscapes: Eastern wild turkey distribution and occupancy-habitat associations.

Extensive restoration and translocation efforts beginning in the mid-20th century helped to reestablish eastern wild turkeys () throughout their ancestral range. The adaptability of wild turkeys resulted in further population expansion in regions that were considered unfavorable during initial reintroductions across the northern United States. Identification and understanding of species distributions and contemporary habitat associations are important for guiding effective conservation and management strategies across different ecological landscapes.

Responses to land cover and grassland management vary across life-history stages for a grassland specialist.

Grassland birds have exhibited dramatic and widespread declines since the mid-20th century. Greater prairie chickens () are considered an umbrella species for grassland conservation and are frequent targets of management, but their responses to land use and management can be quite variable. We used data collected during 2007-2009 and 2014-2015 to investigate effects of land use and grassland management practices on habitat selection and survival rates of greater prairie chickens in central Wisconsin, USA.

Swift action increases the success of population reinforcement for a declining prairie grouse.

Translocations have become an increasingly valuable tool for conservation in recent years, but assessing the successfulness of translocations and identifying factors that contribute to their success continue to challenge biologists. As a unique class of translocation, population reinforcements have received relatively little attention despite representing a substantial portion of translocation programs. Here, we conducted population viability analyses to quantify the effects of 216 reinforcement scenarios on the long-term viability of four populations of Greater Prairie-Chickens () in Wisconsin, USA, and used multiple linear regression to identify factors that had the greatest relative influence on population viability.