Marten s are small bodied carnivores that inhabit mature forests throughout their distributional range due to their habitat specialization, large spatial requirements, and longevity, marten have…

The University of Wisconsin-Madison will receive $274,805.77 under a Project Grant award from the U.S. Department of the Interior Fish and Wildlife Service Region 3. The funding supports work under the Fish and Wildlife Management Assistance federal grant program (CFDA 15.608).

Specifically, the University will conduct research and monitoring of the American marten (Martes americana) recovery network across the Great Lakes region. This will include analyzing genetic data, GPS/telemetry data, and land cover information to assess the abundance, vital rates, connectivity, and viability of marten populations. The results will inform habitat management by state, tribal and federal agencies to enhance population connectivity and viability. The University will also identify key habitats and corridors to support future recovery efforts. This project fosters collaboration among tribal and state wildlife agencies and lays the groundwork for long-term regional species monitoring.

Marten s are small bodied carnivores that inhabit mature forests throughout their distributional range due to their habitat specialization, large spatial requirements, and longevity, marten have been used as sentinel species for the management of structurally complex forests throughout north america along their southern range boundary in the great lakes region, martens were largely extirpated by the 1930S with only a small population remaining in northeastern minnesota beginning in the 1950S, dozens of regional translocations involving hundreds of individuals has created a recovery network for this species similar to natural metapopulations but emerging from human agency that features multiple sub populations of martens occurring in areas of varying habitat quality and demographic potential, but with unknown connectivity and uncertain regional viability our lack of information on the trajectory, connectivity and viability of american martens martes americana in the great lakes region has hampered regional informed management of this reintroduced and putative recovering metapopulation this is particularly relevant given the species is endangered in wisconsin and recovering in neighboring states, their role as an indicator species for the USFS, as well as their important status as a clan animal for the objibwe tribes this project will provide new information on the abundance, vital rates, connectivity, and the first viability analysis for this recovery network across the great lakes region by linking our analyses with land cover data and management histories, our results will inform state, tribal and federal land management decisions to enhance the connectivity and viability of these populations additionally, we will identify locations and habitats featuring the greatest potential for future recovery as well as habitat corridors connecting the recovery network our project will leverage and unite multiple years of non invasive, genetic based data with global positioning system and radio telemetry data and lay the groundwork for a long term and regional monitoring plan for this species this project will foster a collaboration among red cliff band of lake superior chippewa, university of wisconsin madison, apostle islands national lakeshore, united states forest service and great lakes indian fish and wildlife commission, wisconsin department of natural resources and minnesota department of natural resources