Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Units Program: Massachusetts
Education, Research and Technical Assistance for Managing Our Natural Resources

This work involves collaborating with federal and state agencies with decision-making authority to improve the long-term management of CWD, Bsal, and WNS. Work involves helping agencies frame the decision they face within their jurisdiction, and identify management alternatives, knowledge gaps, and optimal decisions. Potential partnerships include scientists from the USGS Fort Collins Science center, USGS National Health Center, and USGS Northern Rocky Mountain Science Center (Paul Cross and colleagues), among others.

Management of most diseases are challenging because of trade-offs among important management objectives, uncertainty in the dynamics of the disease, some risks that are well understood and some that are not, jurisdictional overlap, disjunct authorities, and potentially different tradeoffs in individual decisions made by Federal, Tribal, State, and private management entities. Over the past several decades, there are several diseases of great concern in the United States, which include chronic wasting disease (CWD), the salamander killing fungus (Bsal), white-nose syndrome (WNS), SARS-CoV-2, and others. In this proposal, our objective is to frame and analyze the decisions for several disease systems, as well as develop models for supporting surveillance and management decisions other disease systems for their management on federally and state managed lands.

For example, it is well documented that CWD has spread across Wyoming and was detected for the first time in Grand Teton National Park in the fall of 2020. The detection of CWD in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE) has created concern among wildlife managers and the public of the potential impacts that the disease may have on affected host populations, public enjoyment, and local economies. Decision analysis facilitation and technical support could help management agencies understand the diverse needs of affected stakeholders and design actions that align with their long-term management goals for the GYE under the threat of CWD.