PhD Opportunities in Durham, UK Two Ecology PhD opportunities are available for high quality students at Durham, UK. Brief details are provided below. Further details are available at findaphd.com and in the pdfs linked below.
(1) Management of savannah ecosystems for biodiversity: impacts of burning on mammal and bird populations Supervised by Dr Stephen Willis & Dr Philip Stephens, School of Biological Sciences, Durham University Aims: We aim to explore the use of burning as a management tool to optimise biodiversity across taxa. We will study the annual and inter-annual utilisation of grassland blocks in relation to their spatial configuration. In addition, we will contrast grasslands use by herbivores and birds in areas with and without top predators. Methodology: The research will be focussed in Mankwe Wildlife Reserve (MWR) and Pilanesburg National Park, South Africa. The student will spend two years collecting data across key periods of the year. At MWR we have detailed annual large mammal data over a 15-year period from helicopter surveys of the site and have information on burn regimes for grassland blocks. As MWR contains no large predators, walked mammal and bird transects can be undertaken with minimum risk, unlike many South African protected areas. The student will use point and line transects at MWR and will undertake driven transects for birds and mammals at both MWR and at adjacent Pilanesburg NP; the latter contains abundant large predators. The student will spend extended periods in the field, supported by local personnel, and will undertake regular transects for large mammals across grasslands of differing burn-type and age; Data on age classes of mammals throughout the year will also provide survivorship information, which we will use to create population models to inform management of small reserves. The student will collect information on the seasonal use of areas by mammals and birds and will use pitfall traps and sweep-netting to census invertebrates, relating this to burn age. Information on the carrying capacity of grassland blocks for mammals will be used to optimise site carrying capacities for key taxa. See http://www.dur.ac.uk/s.g.willis/Durham_African_mammals_birds_studentship_flyer.pdf for further information and the application process. (2) Climate impacts on terrestrial nomadic birds of the Australian interior Supervised by Dr Stephen Willis, Durham University; Dr Richard Fuller, University of Queensland Aims: The project aims to collect data on bird abundances, continuing monitoring undertaken in 2011 and 2012 following an extreme La Nina climatic event, and to analyse these combined data to determine the role of climate and other factors in determining the distribution of terrestrial birds of the interior of Australia. Such species are poorly understood; here we intend to develop a better understanding of their ecology and hence how best to protect them against current and future threats. Methodology: We will continue a series of long-distance (1000km+) transects across the interior of SE and central Australia, using line and point censuses at regular intervals along the transects. We will repeat these transects in 2013 and the intention is to run them in subsequent years also. The student will be involved in data collection and the subsequent analyses of these data. We also have acoustic recoding equipment that we will site at rare wetland sites in the interior to monitor changing bird activity over the seasons. The resultant occurrence and abundance datasets will be related to factors such as fine temporal-scale climatic data and remote-sensed vegetation productivity data. The student will then create dynamic models to simulate the movement patterns of birds across the Australian interior and use these to inform conservation planning. http://www.dur.ac.uk/s.g.willis/Dur_UQ_nomads_studentship_flyer.pdf for further information and the application process. The projects are in competition with others for funding. Success will depend on the quality of applications received, relative to those for competing projects. Contact [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> if you have specific queries.
