Our lab has led several projects on elk ecology and diet on Yurok ancestral lands, weaving Traditional Ecological Knowledge with methods like molecular scatology
Elk diet molecular scatology
Our most current elk project investigates diet of Roosevelt elk. We are using molecular scatology (DNA-based analysis of fecal samples) on fecal pellets collected from a prairie system within Redwood National and State Parks, also Yurok ancestral lands.
Look closely…can you spot the elk scat in this photo?
Elk fecal survey and vegetation on Yurok ancestral prairies
In this project, we partnered with the Yurok Tribe Wildlife and Environmental Departments to survey for elk fecal samples and vegetation composition across Yurok ancestral prairies within Yurok jurisdiction. This work was conducted by undergraduate research, Matthew Marshall (Hupa), as one of several projects under a NSF Research for Undergraduates (REU) program, coordinated by our PI.
Yurok Traditional Ecological Knowledge as related to elk.
In this project, we worked in partnership with the Yurok Tribe Wildlife Department to conduct interviews with community members about traditional knowledge related to elk. The image shown is a word cloud from the resulting publication of this work, highlighting key themes from the conversations.