Rosalind B. Renfrew | Geology Reports

USGS2025

Relationship-centered engagement bridges the divide between science and management, and enhances climate adaptation

The rapid pace of climate change demands changes in management practices. Despite abundant climate adaptation research, the implementation of climate adaptation can lag in the management space. In the present article, we argue that relationship-centered engagement—establishing and maintaining relationships among researchers and natural resource managers—is critical for bridging the research–management gap. We evaluated researcher–manager partnerships within the US Northeast Climate Adaptation Science Center and identified three cultural shifts that institutions, funders, researchers, and managers could adopt to boost the odds of translating findings into action: acknowledging and supporting the central role of relationships in creating and implementing actionable science, lengthening funding timelines to better support establishing and maintaining relationships, and aligning institutional rewards to support relationship building. A renewed focus on relationships can lead to more diverse and effective partnerships that bridge knowledge to practice and hasten adaptation to climate change.

BioScience↗

USGS2023

Potential impacts of land-management schedules on grassland bird nests and fledglings

Trade-offs exist between timing of grassland habitat management activities (e.g., weed and brush control) while also ensuring other conservation objectives (e.g., grassland bird reproductive success) are met. On land set aside for grassland conservation (e.g., lands enrolled in the U.S. Department of Agriculture Conservation Reserve Program and some state and federal wildlife management areas), federal and state agencies set time frames for land management based on avoiding disturbance of grassland bird nests. However, recent calls for considering the needs of dependent fledglings in conservation plans imply a need to evaluate whether current time frames are adequate. We used initiation and end dates for 3,257 nests of 8 obligate grassland bird species in Illinois and Wisconsin and a simulation approach for fledgling survival to estimate the potential proportion of active nests at risk when management (e.g., mowing, fire) occurred on the 1st and 15th day of May, June, July, and August during the breeding season. Management during June had the potential to impact 24–61% of nests, depending on the species. Management during July had the potential to impact 4–52% of nests, depending on the species. If disturbance occurred during August, proportionately few active nests were at risk for any species (0–9% of nests on 1 August, 0–<0.5% on 15 August). Potential proportions of fledglings at risk from management were greatest in July for 7 of the 8 species (7–18%). Our study suggests that on lands where a primary conservation objective is to increase or ensure survival of grassland birds, delaying management activities until August could be beneficial for protecting both grassland bird nests and fledglings.

Illinois, Wisconsin↗