R packages for enhancing the Geospatial Population Estimator (GSPE) of moose in Alaska.

Description

The US Fish and Wildlife Service, Region 7 intends to award a single source financial assistance agreement as authorized by 505 DM 2.14 (B) to Oregon State University. This notice is not a request for proposals and the Government does not intend to accept proposals. This financial assistance opportunity is being issued under the Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit (CESU) Network: (http://www.cesu.psu.edu/materials/partners.htm). The CESU network provides research, technical assistance, and education to federal land management, environmental, and research agencies and their partners. The partners serve the biological, physical, social, cultural, and engineering disciplines needed to address natural and cultural resource management issues at multiple scales and in an ecosystem context The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) is proposing a collaborative effort with Oregon State University to create R statistical analysis packages to enhance the Geospatial Population Estimator (GSPE) of Wildlife in Alaska. The GSPE software is used by the Service and Alaska Department Fish and Game to develop population estimates for moose from aerial surveys. Substantial updates to the 20 year old software will improve its functionality and make it more useful to state and federal biologists. The updates will enable biologists to modify detection functions based on variable habitat conditions. This is particularly important in Game Management Units in the state where snow cover in autumn is now less consistent making moose more challenging to detect. Updates to the GSPE software were among the top recommendations from the 70 biologists and managers at the April 2018 Moose Monitoring Workshop. The updates to this model will include inclusion of additional analysis tools and variable detection rates, and a basic user interface.

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