Matt Falcy, Principal Investigator
My team of scientists and I develop quantitative tools to solve difficult ecological problems. We use math, statistics, and numerical simulations to model fish and wildlife management systems.
I am Assistant Unit Leader of the US Geological Survey's Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at the University of Idaho. I am also Assistant Professor of Biometrics at the University of Idaho https://www.uidaho.edu/cnr/faculty/falcy .
I teach a graduate courses on Ecological Modeling and Bayesian Analysis in Ecology.
Jacob Russell, PhD Student
Jacob is co-advised with Prof. Tim Link. Jacob is linking hydrological models of snowpack and subterranean temperature and moisture to the behavior and fitness of pygmy rabbits. Work in Falcy Lab will entail developing dynamic state variable models (AKA stochastic dynamic programming or Markov decision problem) of pygmy rabbit habitat use behaviors that maximize fitness. The modeling will facilitate exploration of fitness consequences under climate change when behaviors are constrained by evolution versus perfectly optimized.
Nate Nadal, MS Student
Nate is analyzing diets of mountain whitefish in the Kootenai River, Idaho. He will develop simulation studies to assess the power of various multivariate statistical procedures to detect change in diet. This work will then inform an empirical study of stomach content species counts from 2000 mountain whitefish collected before and after a large river nutrient addition effort.
Manuel (Manu) Carballo, MS Student
Manu is modeling selenium concentrations in the Kootenai River and associated burbot and white sturgeon. He is developing spatio-temporal models to accommodate inherent autocorrelations in data. He is also conducting an laboratory experiment on the effects of selenium-enriched food on juvenile burbot survival-at-age. Manu will integrate these efforts into an overall toxicological assessment.