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

Alabama Project


Socially mediated avian habitat selection

August 2023 - December 2025


Personnel

Participating Agencies

  • Alabama Department of Conservation & Natural Resources

Habitat selection is a fundamental process influencing individual fitness, and understanding how animals select habitat is thus critical for developing effective conservation and management strategies. Recent evidence suggests that many wildlife species, and birds in particular, use social information as a cue in habitat selection, yet the mechanistic underpinnings of this behavior remain ambiguous. Our work focuses on developing sampling tools and using them to test hypotheses related to when, where, and why social information is important for habitat selection. This work is being conducted in collaboration with researchers from Auburn University, Oregon State University, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Our findings will help improve use of artificial social cues as a management tool to manipulate distributions of target species and improve conservation outcomes.

Presentations Presentation Date
Valente, J.J. (2025). U.S. Geological Survey Cooperative Research Units: working together to address wildlife conservation issues. Auburn University Chapter of the Wildlife Society meeting, Auburn, AL. February 2025
Hall, J.F., and J.J. Valente (2025). Improving soundscape research with a cost-effective device for studying environmental sound and wildlife behavior. U.S. Geological Survey Annual Cooperators Meeting, Auburn, AL. April 2025
Hall, J.F., and J.J. Valente (2025). Bridging soundscape ecology and conservation: A new tool for manipulating and monitoring environmental sound in wildlife habitats. Alabama Chapter of the Wildlife Society annual meeting, Anniston, AL. March 2025
Blake, K., J.F. Hall, L.K. Parvin, and J.J. Valente. (2025). Effects of habitat management on avian communities across Alabama's state lands: implications for targeted management using conspecific attraction. Auburn University Research Symposium, Auburn, AL. March 2025
Blake, K., J.F. Hall, L.K. Parvin, and J.J. Valente (2025). Examining habitat selection mechanisms and changes in habitat use for breeding birds on Alabama’s wildlife management areas. Alabama Chapter of the Wildlife Society annual meeting, Anniston, AL. March 2025