WFA Admin & Comm

What is wildlife?

• All free ranging wild animals that are not domesticated

What is Wildlife conservation?

• An effort to maintain and use wildlife wisely to ensure that those populations will persist and thrive into the future.

What is Wildlife management?

• App. of ecological knowledge to populations of vertebrate animals and their plant and animal associates in a manner that strike a balanace between the needs of those populations and humans.

Types of management

1. Preservation: Natural systems are left alone w/o human disturbance or manipulation.

   • EX: States and federal wilderness areas, National parks, and monuments

2. Direct management: Intensive manipulation of habitat, population, or ecosystem.

   • EX: WMA’s, National Forests, wildlife refuges, and private lands.

3. Passive Management: Minimal direct action in favor or given species (variable)

   • EX: Significant amount of private landowners and municipalities.

The Pre-European N.A. Continent

• Expansive Native civilizations

  • Culture and Religious beliefs

  • Languages (>2000)

  • Economics and Trade

  • Political structures

• Utilized wildlife for food, clothing, tools, and more

• Actively managed habitat

• Agriculture

Post European Settler Arrival to N.A.

• Immediate land clearing for farming and timber products

• Fish and wildlife were harvested for subsistence and European market

• Fur bearer species declines

• Domesticated animals compete and spread disease

• War against predators begins.

• Infectious diseases kill >90% of Native Americans

Colonization and westward expansion

• Land clearing for farming and timber products greatly expanded as the U.S. government policies and land deals are made.

• Market hunting and fishing exponentially increases sending 100’s k deer and bison hides to European Market.

• Passenger Pigeon once numbered nearly a billion dramatcally decline

• War against predators expands

• Native Americans continue to loose and are forcibly removed from their lands

The birth of the public trust doctrine

• 1842: Supreme court case Martin v Waddell

  • "together with all the lands, islands, soils, rivers, harbors, mines, minerals, quarries, woods, marshes, waters, lakes, fishings, hawkings, huntings and fowlings, and all other royalties, profits, commodities and hereditaments to the said several islands, lands and premises belonging and appertaining, with their and every of their appurtenances, and all the estate, right, title, interest, benefit and advantage, claim and demand of the King, in the said land and premises,"

• “That all wildlife is owned by no one individual… it is owned by the public and held in trust by the government who manages it for the benefit of the people”

The North American Model of Wildlife conservation

• Pillars (2001)

  1. Wildlife as a public trust resource

  2. Elimination of Markets for wildlife

  3. Allocation of wildlife by law

  4. Wildlife can only be killed for legitimate purposes

  5. Wildlife is an international Resource

  6. Science Based Wildlife Policy

  7. Democracy of hunting

Ignites Movement

• Public outcry leads to action

• Professional and citizen groups form

  • Boone and Crocket

  • Wilderness society

  • Wildlife society

• Leaders step forward

  • Theodore Roosevelt

  • Gifford Pinchot

  • John Muir

  • Aldo Leopold

  • Fannie Cooke

Movement and Political Action

• Passed key legislation

  • Lacey Act (1900)

  • Migratory Bird Treaty (1918)

  • Pittman and Robinson Act (1937)

  • Endangered species act (1969, 1973)

  • Clean Water Act (Air; 1970)

  • Wilderness act (1969)

  • National Environmental Policy Act (1970)

  • Farm Bill (1985)

Federal Agencies

• U.S. Forest serves

• National Parks service

• U.S. Fist and Wildlife service

• Environmental Protection Agency

• Natural Resource Conservation Science

• USDA APHIS Wildlife services

State Agencies

• Dept. of wildlife and fish

• Dept. Natural Resources

• Dept. Environmental Quality

• Soil and Water Conservation service

• Land Grant Universities

Non-Governmental Agencies

• Ducks Unlimited

• The nature conservatory

• Bone and Crocket Club

• Wildlife federation

• Sierra Club

• National Wild turkey Federation

• Audubon Society

Disciplines of Wildlife Conservation and Management

• Ecology

• Psychology

• Chemistry

• Economics

• Taxonomy

• Law Enforcement

• Engineering

• Planning

• Policy

• Physics

• sociology

• biology

Evolution of the field

• Yesterday

  • Game Mgt.

  • Single species Mgt.

  • Restoration

  • Big Game species

  • Iconic Species

  • Legislation

• Today

  • Landscape level mgt.

  • Global warming

  • Hypoxia zone

  • Invasive species and diseases

  • Urbanization

  • Species Diversity