Rob Swiers has dedicated as significant portion of his academic and professional career to of Northern Sierra Fisher Reintroduction. He began working on the project on the Eastern Klamath Study Area using non-invasive genetic sampling and mark-recapture analyses to evaluate the removal of fishers from the population for translocation to the northern Sierra Nevada. He successfully transitioned the work into his master’s thesis at North Carolina State, completed in 2013. Beginning the same year, Rob assumed the Project Manager position on the Stirling study site as Aaron Facka transitioned back to course work and writing at North Carolina State. Rob has done a tremendous job keeping track of project research objectives, field staff, budgets, accounting, cooperator communication; in short everything a successful field project requires, and then some. Thus we are sad to report Rob is transitioning out of the Project Manager position to take on some other project-related responsibilities prior to moving on to other opportunities.
Rob Swiers holding an immobilized female fisher, fall 2013
Rob will be focusing on noninvasive analyses for Stirling and the Eastern Klamath Study Site over the next several months. A more complete understanding of the rich data set from the Eastern Klamath will further support our understanding of non-invasive protocols and their implementation in Stirling for long-term population monitoring. He will also be supporting the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in reviewing the current state-of-knowledge of fisher habitat selection that will assist the Service with developing conservation guidance for fisher habitat.
Rob, we sincerely appreciate all of your efforts on the project, look forward to your continued investment in our non-invasive analyses and review of fisher habitat selection, and wish you the very best in your next step.
Northern Sierra Fisher Reintroduction 