Only 24 wild red wolves are known to exist, but canids with red wolf genetics were recently found along the American Gulf Coast. What does this mean for future conservation actions?
On May 15, 2019, the Wolf Conservation Center offered a free webinar with Dr. Kristin Brzeski on the history of red wolf conservation and what a recent discovery of red wolf ancestry along the Gulf Coast means for future conservation actions.
The presentation includes a brief discussion of red wolf taxonomy, including implications of a recent red wolf taxonomic review that found them to be a unique species. Dr. Brzeski also touches on her research addressing red wolf x coyote hybridization and how the rediscovery of red wolf ancestry in coyotes in Texas and Louisiana reshapes our view of hybridization between the species.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Dr. Kristin Brzeski is a new assistant professor at Michigan Technological University, having just started in the fall of 2018. Kristin conducted a postdoctoral fellowship at Princeton University and her Ph.D. at Louisiana State University, where she studied canid and endangered species genomics. Kristin's research has focused on red wolf inbreeding and subsequent fitness consequences of reduced genetic variation in extant red wolves. In addition to her domestic conservation genetics research, Kristin co-founded an NGO focused on biodiversity conservation in Central Africa. She strives to incorporate burgeoning genomic and scientific tools into wildlife conservation and management, both at home and abroad.
The Wolf Conservation Center is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit environmental education organization committed to conserving wolf populations in North America through science-based education programming and participation in the federal Species Survival Plans for the critically endangered Mexican gray wolf and red wolf. Through wolves, the WCC teaches the broader message of conservation, ecological balance, and personal responsibility for improved human stewardship of our World.
For more information about wolves and the WCC's participation in wolf recovery, please visit www.nywolf.org and follow the WCC on Facebook ([ Ссылка ]) and Twitter ([ Ссылка ]), and Instagram ([ Ссылка ]
