April 11, 2019

USACE Funding Opportunity: Alpine Training Support; Bear DNA Analysis

US Army Corps of Engineers, Alaska District

Cooperative Agreement Funding Opportunity No: POA-CESU-19-03 CFDA No: 12.632

Management, Habitat, Alpine Training Support, FXSB61425519,

Management, Species Nuisance Wildlife – Bear DNA Analysis

FXSBOS691419 Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson Alaska.

Full Announcement is available here: USACE_POA_CESU_19_03_Alpine RFP PKG.

Eligible Applicants – CESU Hawaii, N&W Alaska, PNW.

Estimated Total Funding: $154,00

Application shall be submitted NO LATER THAN 10 MAY 2019, 2:00PM Alaska time.

Contact Information: Questions that are related to Grants.gov including registration and system requirements should be directed to the Grants.gov contact center at 1-800-518-4726. For assistance with this funding Opportunity Announcement please contact Olen.R.Northern@usace.army.mil

The purpose of this Statement of Work (SOW) is to provide details of the work to be performed to support the U.S. Air Force through a cooperative agreement (CA) between the Cooperator, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) and Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson (JBER) Natural Resources program involving the terrestrial wildlife program. The work outlined in the tasks in this SOW support collaborative studies between Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) and Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson (JBER) Natural Resources program involving a multi-year projects.

The objectives of the work to be performed under this cooperative agreement are to conduct natural resource tasks on the federal lands belonging to Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson (JBER), and to prepare reports detailing the results of this work for submission to the USACE Alaska District point of contact (POC) and JBER Natural Resource POC. It is anticipated a Senior Biologist and MS Student would complete the work in supporting the collaborative studies between ADF&G and JBER Natural Resources program.

MAJOR REQUIREMENTS AND TASKS
3.1 ALPINE TRAINING SUPPORT (FXSB61425519)

Wildlife surveys are a component of the Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson (JBER) Natural Resources Project, MGT, Habitat, Alpine Training Support. These surveys are aimed to fill in information gaps of species presence, abundance and distribution across JBER. Monitoring the distribution and relative abundance of wildlife species can be important for documenting the effects of harvest, habitat change, and environmental variability on populations. However, many mammals are highly secretive, difficult to repeatedly capture, and naturally occur at low to moderate densities, making it difficult to estimate abundance over large areas using traditional methods (e.g. mark-recapture, distance sampling, etc.).

Collared pika have been identified within the ADF&G State Wildlife Action Plan as a species of greatest conservation need. Documenting their distribution and abundance is necessary to support sustainably functioning military land. JBER natural resources has collaborated with ADF&G and incorporated surveying collared pika on JBER as part of a larger ADF&G study aimed to fill in the information gaps of species presence, abundance, and reproduction across southcentral and interior Alaska.

Another species of top concern on JBER are wolves. In addition, understanding the wolf population in GMU 14C is important as this population has previously been deemed a risk to public safety. Since 1995, individual wolves in the vicinity of Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson (JBER), Eagle River, and Birchwood displayed increasingly habituated and aggressive behavior toward humans and pets.

3.1.2 ALPINE TRAINING SUPPORT – TASK 1: PIKA SURVEY

The purpose of this task is to identify distribution, habitat use, and abundance of collared pika on JBER. The information collected on JBER will provide key insight to the natural resources on JBER to support management decisions while supporting the multi-agency collaboration. The collared pika study is a multi-agency collaboration with ADF&G as the principle investigator, which aims to address the informational gaps on how abundance, survival, and reproduction are influenced by environmental change in Alaska. The Cooperator shall work closely with the JBER-Natural Resource Manager and ADF&G during the project. Listed below are the ADF&G Collared Pika Study objectives and identified tasks the JBER survey effort is currently addressing.
The objectives for this study are to:
• Conduct a thorough ground based search of known pika sites on JBER for evidence (fresh haypiles or visual observations of pikas) of current occupancy by collared pikas.
• Identify pika territories based on visual observations and presence of haypiles.
• Collect fecal samples from pika territories at all study sites.
• Collect representative samples of vegetation from haypiles.

3.1.3 ALPINE TRAINING SUPPORT – TASK 2: WILDLIFE SURVEY

The purpose of this task is to use a harvest-independent method to monitor distribution and potential population trends of furbearer species on JBER that has limited to no data available. This statement of work supports a multi-year survey in collaboration with the ADF&G GMU 14C study. The information collected on JBER will provide key insight to the natural resources on JBER to support management decisions while supporting the multi-agency collaboration.
The objectives for this study are to:
• Document species presence utilizing aerial track surveys
• Document numbers of packs, pack size, and pack dynamics for wolves on JBER.
• Estimate home range and movements of wolves.
• Estimate survival rates, dispersal, and numbers of wolves on JBER

3.1.4 NUISANCE WILDLIFE – BEAR DNA ANALYSIS

This SOW will be conducted in accordance ADF&G’s established analytical protocols with U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) genomic laboratory, with Cooperator is responsible for sample DNA genotype data identified in the JBER Black Bear DNA Study Work Plan.

The purpose of the JBER Black Bear DNA Study is to support the military mission by minimizing human-bear conflicts on JBER lands, particularly near military operations and the cantonment areas. The project will identify high risk areas (hot spots) from nuisance bear calls and begin a monitoring program focused on problem bear issues on JBER.

Primary objectives for the JBER Black Bear DNA Study:
1. Estimate the number of individual black bears responsible for nuisance calls within the cantonment area on JBER;
2. Identify periods of peak and reduced calls of nuisance black bear responses from den emergence in May until October. This will focus on the cantonment area on JBER.
3. Utilize DNA sampling of residue left by bears at conflict sites such as garbage cans, to generate individual genotypes. Use that data to estimate degree of relatedness among nuisance bears, and test the hypothesis that nuisance behavior of black bears on JBER is a learned behavior following matriarchal lineages.
Secondary Objective:
1. Utilize DNA collected from harvested bears to determine the degree that the current JBER black bear hunt could reduce nuisance bear numbers on JBER.