Natural Resources Job Board

The Wild Turkey Lab (www.wildturkeylab.com) at the University of Georgia’s Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources is seeking a highly motivated M.S. student to join a collaborative research team investigating the ecology and management of wild turkeys. This work will focus on various ecological and behavioral aspects of wild turkeys.  The field research associated with this position will involve capture of wild turkeys, the use of GPS transmitters, and autonomous recording units to evaluate movements, reproductive ecology, and gobbling activity within the Piedmont region of Georgia.  This work is part of an ongoing, long-term research project that has spanned numerous study sites throughout the southeastern United States.  The successful candidate will have a single field season that will span ~8 months (January-August), followed by intermittent field work, and class work, data analysis, and thesis preparation.  One objective of the project is to investigate the influence of season structure, harvest regimes, and other factors on gobbling activity. Beyond this objective the student will work closely with project PIs to design a thesis that best suits his/her interests and will have access to the most comprehensive dataset collected on wild turkeys.  This dataset includes spatial data on turkeys and other species of interest, genetics, demographic, auditory, and image data from numerous study sites.  This project will also include assistance from field technicians, other graduate students working on the broader field effort, post-doctoral researchers, and collaboration with faculty from Louisiana State University, Tennessee Tech University, the University of Nebraska, and the University of Texas El Paso.  We are seeking applicants with a keen interest in ecology and conservation of wild turkeys, strong work ethic, basic knowledge of radio-telemetry and GPS, an understanding of the capabilities of GIS technology, an ability to safely operate all-terrain vehicles and 4-wheel drive trucks, and comfort climbing trees to deploy ARUs.