HOME RANGE WILDLIFE RESEARCH

 Gabe attended the Wildlife Field Techniques course in June, 2024.  I graduated from law school in the spring of 2023 and passed the bar exam in the winter of 2024. During law school, I studied environmental law, focusing on larger environmental policies. I volunteered and interned at various wildlife protection agencies. In one of my courses, I wrote my capstone seminar paper on issues facing the protection of the gray wolf under the Endangered Species Act. One thing that became clear throughout my research was that there was a big discrepancy between science and policy: laws were made sometimes not in accord with biological principles – for example, understanding what is a separate “species” versus “subspecies” versus “population” – and the law often made no room for those distinctions. It was during this research that I became much more interested in the science behind wildlife ecology, and realized I wanted the opportunity to firsthand experience how wildlife science is co...

Ron has been a committed supporter of Home Range since our humble beginnings. We are inspired by his story and are so grateful to be a part of it. Enjoy! Before Enrolling in a Home Range Course: I worked as a mechanical engineer for 24 years before being forced into early retirement at the end of 2020. After just two months of "retirement," I decided to pursue a second dream career by going back to school immediately. The idea of a second dream career originated during the Great Recession of 2008/2009. During that time, it was known that finding a worthwhile job would be challenging, so I committed to returning to school in 2008 to become a biologist. However, my plan was derailed because I never lost my job. Reflecting on this, it was both good and bad: good because I was one of three engineers in my department who didn't lose their job; bad because I thought my dream of becoming a biologist would never come true. My original challenges in pivoting to a different career ...

Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) is a lethal neurodegenerative disease affecting wild cervids (e.g., deer, moose, elk, caribou) in North America and Scandinavia. In the US, CWD has been detected in 35 states, and this August, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) announced the first detection of CWD in our home state, Washington.  CWD is caused by infectious misfolded proteins called prions that aggregate in tissues throughout an animal’s body. Prions are predominantly found in lymph and nervous system tissues, including the brain. These prion clusters (amyloids) essentially "swiss-cheese" the brain, causing the neurodegenerative symptoms indicative of this wasting disease. These clinical signs of disease appear in the last 6-8 weeks of a cervid’s life and include symptoms such as weight loss, lethargy, a splay-legged stance, drooping ears, and loss of fear.  Chronic wasting disease affects cervid species common to Washington, such as mule deer, pictured here....

For those of you able to attend our Third Anniversary Party on October 6th, 2024, you had the pleasure of hearing board member John Rohrer tell a tall tale about Home Range and the Fellowship of the Lynx. If you weren't able to attend- you can still share in this wondrous story below. Enjoy. A Tall Tale (a story with unbelievable elements, related as if it were true and factual) based loosely on real HRWR people. I borrowed lines liberally from a popular movie Trilogy. By John Rohrer October 2024 The Fellowship of the Lynx Chapter 1. The world has changed. I feel it in the water. I feel it on the earth. I smell it in the air. Much that once was is lost.  Once the mountains here were cloaked in a thick green blanket of lodgepole pine, spruce, and fir. Wildlife was abundant. Chickadees, nuthatches, and flycatchers flitted through the forest canopy. Red squirrels, chipmunks, and snowshoe hares scampered along the forest floor. Black bears, pine martens, and porcupines padded around. A...

  "This is fun!" I thought to myself as I slowly, methodically, kicked steps into the loose gravel of the backside of Johnstone Pass. Behind me was a group of six- the 2024 WildGift fellowship cohort - each placing their feet exactly where I'd placed mine, trusting me to guide them safely to the bottom of the pass where the ground would once again feel solid underneath us.  Descending Johnstone Pass.  Photo by Jacinta Gordon. An exercise in "Leader of the Day", this was just one of the activities I'd need to coordinate and guide, culminating in a feedback session over dinner where I'd learn how the cohort felt about my leadership. Other leaders had made time for mindfulness and meditation sessions, stretch breaks, and songs...but on our last backcountry day, my only mission was getting us to the trailhead in time to meet our ride. There would be no stopping to soak in the sun. I restrained my enthusiasm and momentum with each step, only to look behind an...

“I’m Margaret Burgess, a Junior Biology major [at Whitman College]. This summer I joined the powerhouse team of women behind Home Range Wildlife Research, a nonprofit based in Winthrop, WA dedicated to wildlife conservation and education. I worked on their Lynx and Wildfire project collecting fuels data and setting wildlife cameras. So what did that look like? Field days were full of excitement and many miles of bushwhacking. My field partner and I would usually meet at the office in town and then drive out to the study area on a heavily washboarded old logging road. During my internship a section of the road washed out due to thunderstorms, but that wasn’t about to stop us, it just added to our eventful daily routine as we slowly bumped over logs, rubble, and downed logs in the work truck. I remember my first day out in the field vividly, following behind my supervisor we hiked up a trail and then suddenly peeled off, shooting up a steep slope and whacking through brush. This set the ...

Since the inception of Home Range a little over a year ago, we have been working towards a large-scope, interdisciplinary project aimed at providing important information for the conservation of Canada lynx. Now, we are thrilled to announce that with funding support from the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation , our research on lynx and wildfire in the North Cascades begins this winter. These maps paint a clear picture as to why this research is urgently needed. The dark green areas show Washington’s lynx habitat, with the orange areas showing where fires burned between 1970 and 1999 (left map) and 2000 and 2021 (right map). In the past 20 years, North Cascades lynx habitat has flip-flopped from being mostly unburned to mostly burned. Climate change, in conjunction with a legacy of fire suppression, has created a tinder box on our landscape. Anyone that lives or spends time in the Methow Valley knows that wildfires have increased to the point that we regularly experience megafires (fires o...