The challenges of the future require the Refuge System to develop additional scientific expertise to effectively and adaptively manage fish, wildlife, and habitats. It must forge strong partnerships with Landscape Conservation Cooperatives and other scientists to assure coordination and collaboration across the landscape. The conservation challenges of the future are not obstacles that the Service and the Refuge System can overcome alone. The Refuge System and the Service must lead and be strong partners in conservation science. Communication and collaboration are foundational requirements that must be embraced and implemented if future conservation goals are to be achieved. Placing a strong emphasis on partnerships, building coordinated management, research and monitoring projects that are useful at multiple scales, and communicating the results to the conservation community will improve the Refuge System’s ability to leverage assistance, enhance its abilities to share ideas, plans and strategies, and maximize the conservation community’s capability to capitalize on shared interests and opportunities.
Collaborative efforts will ensure that the Refuge System prioritize its scientific needs in coordination with state wildlife programs. The ability of the Refuge System to efficiently share and distribute information and data, synthesize and report findings, and provide expertise to the conservation community will result in meeting the goals and objectives of refuges and their mission. The Refuge System will engage with local, regional and national level organizations and communities to solve conservation problems.
Recommendation: Encourage a culture of science and expand contributions to the scientific community through more sharing information and data, publishing scientific findings in peer-reviewed journals, and becoming participants and leaders in professional societies.
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Develop a strategic partnership with colleges and universities with a two fold mission: 1) encourage undergraduates and graduate students to look toward USFWS and other resource based agencies as potential employers; 2) develop long term requirements for I&M for baseline data collection, with component packages that individual students can complete within a reasonable timeframe (Senior Project, Thesis). Ensure that each component “Problem Statement” is stand alone, but will integrate within the baseline and within landscape model. Encourage the finest scientific efforts by program participants.
Please refer to prior comments re fitting into FWS plan, e.g., the NAWMP. etc.
Appoint a conservation science liaison to gather information about field research from outside the Service on the effectiveness of adaptive management strategies and techniques, and disseminate that information within the Service. The Service should maximize its resources by learning from the work of others. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of relevant research projects underway on land owned by other government agencies, at university and independent field stations, at NAS-funded sites like the LTER network, and on land owned by nonprofits. Much of this research is published in peer-reviewed journals, online or in print, but it’s unrealistic to expect overworked Refuge biologists or even regional science staffs to keep up with all of it. While some Service biologists are already active as individuals in science networks like AAAS, the Society for Conservation Biology, the LTER network, etc. the Service should consider networking with those groups and others in a systematic, purposeful way, and conveying the information gathered to the regional and refuge scientists who need it most.