Wildlife Ecology & Management Flashcards
7 cards from real ESA practice questions. Tap to flip, then mark Knew It or Still Learning — missed cards come back until you master them.
Read the first 7 Wildlife Ecology & Management flashcards as text
In wildlife management, 'compensatory mortality' means that:
Answer: Hunting mortality replaces some natural mortality so total mortality remains similar
Compensatory mortality hypothesis states that harvested individuals would largely have died from other causes anyway, so total annual mortality rates remain relatively unchanged.
The minimum viable population (MVP) concept in conservation biology refers to:
Answer: The smallest population size with a specified probability of persistence over a defined time period
MVP is the smallest population size estimated to have a specified probability (e.g., 95%) of survival over a defined period (e.g., 100 years), accounting for demographic and environmental stochasticity.
Which ecological process does the Allee effect describe?
Answer: Reduced individual fitness or population growth rate at very low population densities
The Allee effect describes positive density dependence at low population sizes, where per capita growth rate decreases as population density falls below a threshold.
Habitat suitability models (HSMs) in wildlife ecology are most commonly used to:
Answer: Predict the spatial distribution of species based on environmental variables
Habitat suitability models use species occurrence data and environmental predictor variables to predict the probability of suitable habitat across a landscape.
Which term describes the phenomenon where a small founding population has reduced genetic diversity due to chance sampling from the original population?
Answer: Founder effect
The founder effect occurs when a new population is established by a small number of individuals, capturing only a subset of the original population's genetic variation.
A keystone species is defined as one that:
Answer: Has a disproportionately large effect on its community relative to its abundance
A keystone species exerts a large influence on community structure and function disproportionate to its numerical or biomass contribution, often through predation or habitat modification.
In wildlife population ecology, 'lambda' (λ) is used to represent:
Answer: The finite rate of population increase (Nt+1/Nt)
Lambda (λ) is the multiplicative growth factor of a population per unit time; λ > 1 indicates growth, λ = 1 stability, and λ < 1 decline.