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The Wildlife Habitat Nutrition Laboratory
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The Department of Natural Resource Science's "Wildlife Habitat and Nutrition Lab", has been in operation since 1978. Established by Dr. Jack Nelson (faculty director), the lab is directed by the department chairman, Dr. Keith A. Blatner, and is operated under the supervision of Bruce Davitt (Research Technologist Supervisor). The lab maintains a self - sustaining budget and pays for all other wages, salaries, benefits, equipment, maintenance, supplies (goods and services), computer and travel expenses.
The unit :
- principally performs laboratory services on a contract basis for state, federal, and private natural resource agencies throughout the country.
- assists in some of the department faculty's research efforts and conducts its own nutrition research.
- provides training and part-time employment for students while they pursue their degree.
- conducts tours of the lab and deer/elk research facilities for various visiting groups and classes.
- cooperates with other departments in allowing use of lab equipment otherwise unavailable to these researchers and their students.
The lab determines the food habits of both domestic livestock and wildlife and performs chemical analyses on plants eaten by those animals (protein, fat, fiber, ash, calories, digestibility). Controlled feeding trials have been conducted using sheep, cattle and mule deer to determine how well these animals digest and utilize diets of different composition and nutritional quality. The intent is to develop methods for predicting the nutritional well-being of free-ranging animals.
On campus research and off-campus contract work has involved:
Domestic
livestock
cattle
sheep
goats
feral horses
pigs
Upland Birds
turkey
ptarmigan
snow geese
spruce grouse
sage grouse
sharptail grouse
ruffed grouse
mountain quail |
Small Mammals
muskrat
chipmunk (yellow pine)
deer mouse
nutria
river otter
beaver
mountain beaver
lemming
red-backed and tundra voles
arctic hare
pocket gophers
Marsupials
ringtail possums
greater gliders
bandicoot
bettongs |
Ungulates
elk
deer
reindeer
moose
caribou
muskoxen
bison
pronghorn
mountain goats
bighorn sheep
Carnivores
black bear
grizzly bear
coyote
mountain lion |
Other
grasshoppers
army cutworm moths
hornets
anchovy
smelt
herring
rhinoceros
silver leaf langur monkey
Francois langurs
Victoria crowned pigeon
a 16,000 yr. Old Woolly
Mammoth discovered
frozen in the Alaskan tundra |
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For more information, contact Bruce Davitt at bbdavitt@mail.wsu.edu or (509)335-2318
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