Guiming Wang

Rice and natural seeds are important foods for waterfowl in rice growing regions such as the Gulf Coast Prairies of Louisiana and Texas. We conducted a study from August-November 2010 and collected 2,250 soil cores in 50 farmed and 50 idle rice fields in the Louisiana Chenier Plain (CP) and Texas Mid-Coast (TMC) to estimate biomass of waste rice and natural seeds. Estimates are necessary to assess carrying capacity for waterfowl in this region by the Gulf Coast Joint Venture. Waste rice abundance was greatest in CP farmed fields that produced a second crop of rice (i.e., ratoon) and were...

Rice fields are important agricultural habitats for waterbirds (waterfowl, shorebirds, wading birds) worldwide. In the Texas Mid-Coast (TMC) and Louisiana Chenier Plain (LCP), >167,458 ha of rice are cultivated annually. Precise estimates of abundance of waste grain and natural seeds in harvested and idle rice fields are needed to guide conservation of waterbird habitat in this region, which is part of the Gulf Coast Joint Venture (GCJV) of the North American Waterfowl Management Plan. Our objectives were to estimate and compare waste rice and moist-soil seed abundance among rice...

Common mid-rotation forest management practices in intensively-managed pine (Pinus spp.) stands include thinning, fertilization, herbicide use, and prescribed burning. However, greater herbicide use and less prescribed fire have generated questions regarding treatment effects on biological diversity within these systems. Therefore, we determined biodiversity response (songbirds, rodents, reptiles, amphibians, carabid beetles, understory vegetation) to factorial combinations of dormant season prescribed fire and imazapyr herbicide in thinned and fertilized, mid-rotation intensively...