Call for Papers 64th Annual Meeting of The Western Section of The Wildlife Society February 7-10, 2017 Peppermill Resort in Reno, NV |
We are excited to announce that we are now accepting abstracts for papers to be presented as posters or 20-minute oral presentations for the concurrent technical and poster sessions. Please submit your abstracts before October 15, 2016. The tentative meeting schedule is posted HERE. Check back soon as new events will continue to be added. Concurrent Technical Session topics may include, but are not limited to: - Mainland invasive species: challenges and management
- Island invasive species: new and emerging techniques for control
- Working in constrained or hostile environments: how does one cope?
- Public land ownership and management
- Hunting as a foundation for the North American Wildlife Model
- Wildlife Techniques and Technologies
- Designing and Implementing Climate Adaptation Strategies
- The Effects of Drought and Water Management on Wildlife
- Conservation and Challenges in the Urban-Wildlife Interface
- Policy, Management, and Human Dimensions of Wildlife Management
- Wildlife and Renewable Energy
- Challenges and Success in Regional Planning and Open Space Management
- Ecology and Management of Wildlife on Military Lands
The following may be expanded into multiple sessions based on papers received: - Ecology and Management of Birds
- Ecology and Management of Shorebirds
- Ecology and Management of Amphibians and Reptiles
- Ecology and Management of Mammals
The theme of the 2017 conference is Invasive species: globalization and bad decisions. Thus, the committee particularly encourages abstract submissions that relate to invasive species that affect either native wildlife or their habitats (e.g., invasive plants that negatively affect wildlife habitat). Note: Session titles may be added or changed at a later date based on papers received. If a group has the desire and sufficient participants to create a unique session please contact Meeting Program Chair Rocky Gutierrez (R. J. Gutierrez). A poster session will be held on the evening of Thursday, February 9, 2017, during which authors "present" their poster, answer questions, or discuss their work with interested viewers. Hors d'ouevres will be served, and a no-host bar will be available.
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Invasive Species: Globalization and bad decisions While the causes and consequences of species invasions have attained high visibility within the past few decades, they have long been a negative transformative agent for wildlife communities and habitats within the area encompassed by the Western Section of TWS. Species invasions began in California and Nevada with the transformation of vegetation communities by invasive grasses and weeds unwittingly brought to California by colonizing Spaniards in the 17th century. Mosquitoes were introduced to Hawaii in about 1826 and have served as hosts for malarial parasites that have subsequently decimated endemic Hawaiian birds. World War II likely led to the introduction of brown snakes to Guam that have subsequently eliminated or reduced many species there. Yet these initial waves of invasion will not be the last because they continue today in various ways. In our conference theme we use the word "globalization" in a general sense to mean anything related to the movement of potentially invasive species as a consequence of human movement (accidents), commerce, and nostalgia (purposeful introductions). Invasions are also often the result of bad decisions whether they were well-intentioned decisions or simply ill-conceived. "Bad decisions" clearly overlap decisions related to commerce as well as purposeful decisions that result directly in negative invasions. Ironically, the wildlife profession has often been at the forefront of purposeful introductions of potentially invasive species in an attempt to "improve" hunting opportunities and wildlife habitat. In keeping with a broad vision about our theme, invasive plants, issues of public policy, and laws are relevant topics. The former because invasive plants can affect habitats upon which wildlife depend and policy decisions and laws affect the ease by which invasive species persist or enter the country and whether we do anything about them once they are here (e.g., de facto protection of wild pigs in California and protection of wild horses and burros on public lands). Our plenary speaker is Dr. Daniel Simberloff. Dr. Simberloff is the Nancy Gore Hunger Professor of Environmental Science at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. He received his PhD from Harvard University in 1969 working with Dr. Edward O. Wilson. Dr. Simberloff has had an extraordinarily productive career publishing nearly 500 papers. Many of his papers have been seminal works in their fields and have provided new theory or challenges to current ideas in ecology. He has been a leader in the study of invasion biology making contributions to the presidential Executive order 13112 on invasive species, serving on the IUCN Invasive Species Specialist Group, serving as current editor of the Journal of Biological Invasions, and recently publishing a book on the subject - Invasive Species: what everyone needs to know. He has also served on the National Board of Governors of The Nature Conservancy, the federal Invasive Species Advisory Committee, and several editorial boards of international journals. Among his many honors, he was named Eminent Ecologist by the Ecological Society of America in 2006, received the Ramon Margalef Prize in Ecology in 2012, and was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2012. |
Working Groups are encouraged to meet in our extra meeting space and will be scheduled on a first-come, first-served basis. Please schedule all meetings before 12/1/16. Interested in being a Session Chair or Planning Committee Member for this meeting? Our planning committee conference calls will begin in late August, and we are always eager to have more help. You'll work with some great people, have lot's of fun and help to shape another great Annual Meeting. |
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| photo by Whitney Peak Hotel |
The Peppermill Resort in Reno, NV was chosen for many reasons.
- Foremost, we strive to hold our meetings throughout our Section, as the annual meeting connects, invigorates, and strengthens the work of local Chapters.
- Second, this facility offers us extensive meeting space at no cost to the Section in exchange for the hotel rooms our attendees will book. The recently renovated hotel rooms cost as little as $59 per night.
- Finally, and this is really cool, the Peppermill is a very green facility for all the regular reasons, plus more. They harness geothermal energy which now heats 100% of the Resort's domestic water and mechanical heat throughout the 2.1 Million square feet foot facility, 24/7. Tours of the geothermal plant will be offered during our meeting.
While we'd like to return to Sacramento for an Annual Meeting, at this time there is not an affordable option for our meeting size, as attendance has grown steadily over the past decade. We annually tour Sacramento properties, and will return there as soon as possible. Our 2018 meeting will be held in Santa Rosa at the Vineyard Creek Hyatt (February 5-9, 2018) and we are just starting to research options for our 2019 meeting. Let us know if you'd like to help with this process! |
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