Fred E. Smeins

Changes in white-winged dove (Zenaida asiatica) distribution and habitat use have occurred in Texas since the 1940s. Breeding populations are now common in urban areas throughout Texas. These changes have resulted in unique challenges for monitoring populations in urban environments because of factors such as traffic, construction, and residential development. Delineating potential breeding habitat within urban areas may make surveys more efficient. Our objectives were to examine nest tree selection and identify habitat attributes associated with urban populations of white-winged doves. We...

Brood counts are used frequently by state conservation agencies to estimate wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) recruitment. We performed power analyses for 25 years of Rio Grande Wild Turkey (M. g. intermedia; RGWT) brood-count data from five ecological regions of Texas in order to determine if these data had sufficient (1-b ?0.80) power to detect inter-annual and long-term changes in turkey production of 10%-20%, which we considered biologically meaningful. We then analyzed the data to determine trends in production. The analyses showed that a minimum annual sample of 200-500 turkey-group...