Investigating the effects of mixed-severity wildfires and timber harvest management on interspecific competition and population dynamics of the mesocarnivore guild in northern California and southern Oregon | F17AS00130

Opportunity Information: Apply for F17AS00130

This grant opportunity focuses on how forest disturbances and management choices shape the survival and recovery prospects of fishers (Pekania pennanti) and, more broadly, the balance of competition within the mesocarnivore community in northern California and southern Oregon. The central problem is that modern forest management has to juggle multiple priorities at once: maintaining ecosystem services, reducing wildfire risk, and supporting a viable timber industry. Fishers are used here as a particularly informative focal species because they are sensitive to habitat change, they remain a species of conservation concern in the Pacific states even though they are not currently listed as threatened or endangered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and prior studies suggest there can be meaningful tradeoffs between fuels-reduction treatments and long-term fisher persistence. With wildfires expected to become more frequent and intense in California, the project is framed as timely and practical: it aims to clarify how fishers respond to habitat changes caused by mixed-severity wildfire versus timber harvest and fuels-management activities, and whether those disturbances have distinct ecological consequences.

A major theme of the project is separating the effects of different disturbance types that often occur in the same landscapes. Timber harvest, fuels treatments intended to prevent or moderate wildfire, and wildfire itself can all change forest structure in ways that affect denning sites, canopy cover, prey availability, and travel corridors for fishers. The opportunity emphasizes that long-term monitoring data from an established fisher study population in the region makes it possible to distinguish management-driven impacts from natural background variation. In other words, instead of relying on short snapshots taken before and after a single event, the project can draw on multi-year information to detect patterns in occupancy, reproduction, survival, and movement that correspond to different forest conditions and disturbance histories.

Another key motivation is understanding why fisher populations have struggled to rebound or recolonize parts of their historic range across the Pacific Northwest. Historically, fishers were more widespread in western forests, but their distribution shrank substantially over the last century due to fur harvest and extensive habitat changes associated with logging. While translocation efforts in places like California and Washington have been used to re-establish populations, broader natural expansion into previously occupied habitats has been limited. This grant highlights one plausible explanation: interspecific competition within the carnivore guild. Fishers share space and resources with other mid-sized predators, and competition (or related interactions like interference, displacement from preferred habitat, or increased risk of predation) may suppress fisher presence, density, or recolonization success. The project therefore looks beyond fishers alone and asks how disturbances such as wildfire and timber management shift relationships among mesocarnivores, potentially changing competitive pressure on fishers in ways that either hinder or facilitate population growth.

In practical terms, the funded work is intended to generate management-relevant insights for landscapes experiencing varying levels of timber harvest, habitat treatments, and ecological disturbance. By linking fisher population dynamics and community interactions to specific disturbance regimes and management actions, the project is positioned to inform forest planning that reduces unintended conservation costs while still meeting fuels and timber objectives. The anticipated value is guidance that helps agencies and land managers predict when and where certain practices might create short-term harm but long-term benefit (or the reverse), and how strategies might be adjusted to better support fisher persistence in a future shaped by more frequent large fires.

Administratively, this opportunity is a Department of the Interior, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service discretionary award issued as a cooperative agreement under CFDA 15.664. Eligible applicants were limited to public and state-controlled institutions of higher education. The funding opportunity number is F17AS00130, it was created on March 10, 2017, and it was published as a Notice of Intent indicating the project had already been awarded to Oregon State University. The expected number of awards was one, with an award ceiling of $150,000.

• The Department of the Interior, Fish and Wildlife Service in the natural resources sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Investigating the effects of mixed-severity wildfires and timber harvest management on interspecific competition and population dynamics of the mesocarnivore guild in northern California and southern Oregon" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 15.664.
• This funding opportunity was created on Mar 10, 2017.
• Applicants must submit their applications by This is a Notice of Intent and the project has been awarded to Oregon State University.. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $150,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 1 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Public and State controlled institutions of higher education.

Apply for F17AS00130

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