2025 Midwest Fish & Wildlife Conference

2025 Midwest Fish & Wildlife Conference

Jordan Meyer

Missouri Department of Conservation

Policy Coordinator

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5:00pm CST

Student Icebreaker Meet & Greet Grand FGH (4th Floor)

6:00pm CST

Welcome Networking Social - Sponsored by USFWS Grand Foyer (4th Floor)

7:00am CST

Continental Breakast with Exhibitors - Sponsored by St. Louis Zoo WildCare Institute Grand Foyer (4th Floor)

8:00am CST

Plenary Session 1 and Awards Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Ben Batten • Jim Inglis

10:05am CST

Coffee Break - Sponsored by Wildlife Management Institute Grand Foyer (4th Floor)

10:30am CST

Annual Membership Meeting – North Central Section of The Wildlife Society Grand C (4th Floor)Jeremy Holtz

12:00pm CST

Student & Professional Networking Luncheon (pre-registration required) Grand Ballroom (DEFGH)

1:40pm CST

Wildlife Track: 'On The Road Again' Native Species Seeding By Midwestern DOTs and Potential Improvements Regency F (2nd Floor)Wesley Bollinger

2:00pm CST

S-02: Fish Freeways: How Rock Ramps are Assisting Prairie Stream Fish Movement Regency B (2nd Floor)Seth Callahan S-03: CWD: Identifying the Motivations and Barriers of Landowners to Participating in Targeted Removal to Manage Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) in Missouri Regency E (2nd Floor)Jason Isabelle

2:20pm CST

Wildlife Track: PHASE: Pollinator Habitat Aligned with Solar Energy Regency F (2nd Floor)Alison Little

2:40pm CST

Wildlife Track: Protecting Remnant Prairies and Grassland Reconstruction/Restoration Success Across Missouri. Regency F (2nd Floor)Jerod Huebner

3:00pm CST

Coffee Break Grand Foyer (4th Floor)

3:20pm CST

Wildlife Track: The Role of Extralimital Exploration in Avian Range Expansion Sterling 3 (2nd Floor)Wendy Dorman

3:40pm CST

S-02: Utilizing the USFWS National Fish Passage Coordination Map and the SARP National Aquatic Barrier Inventory and Prioritization Tool to Assess Stream Connectivity Across the Western Great Plains Regency B (2nd Floor)Jacob Zona

4:00pm CST

Wildlife Track: Integrated dynamic occupancy models reveal declines in gamebird distributions in Illinois and sampling bias in eBird data Sterling 3 (2nd Floor)Lauren Scopel S-02: Connecting Freshwater Resilience and Barrier Prioritization Regency B (2nd Floor)Mary Khoury

4:20pm CST

Wildlife Track: Using the Motus Wildlife Tracking System to fill knowledge gaps for priority Neotropical migratory birds in the Midwest and beyond Sterling 3 (2nd Floor)Sarah Kendrick

4:40pm CST

Wildlife Track: Expansion of Motus in Missouri and the Midwest: examples of local and large scale Motus tracking Sterling 3 (2nd Floor)Kristen Heath-Acre

6:00pm CST

Offsite Dinner and Social ($) - Sponsored by Missouri Conservation Heritage Foundation Anheuser-Busch Brewery

7:00am CST

Continental Breakast with Exhibitors - Sponsored by PayIt Grand Foyer (4th Floor)

8:00am CST

Plenary Session 2 and Awards Grand Ballroom (DEFGH)Rob Hunt • Roger Still

10:05am CST

Coffee Break Grand Foyer (4th Floor)

10:20am CST

S-12: Not Just Ducks...Reframing Wetland Conservation Sterling 3 (2nd Floor)Frank Nelson

10:40am CST

Wildlife Track: The power of bats: evaluating protected bats during energy project planning Sterling 9 (2nd Floor )Brittany Schweiger

11:00am CST

Wildlife Track: Widespread pesticide exposure and plant damage in natural areas in Illinois Sterling 9 (2nd Floor )T.J. Benson

11:20am CST

Wildlife Track: Impact of invasive Burmese python on the abundance of two endemic endangered species in the Florida Keys Sterling 9 (2nd Floor )Shauna Sayers

11:40am CST

S-08: Adaptive Management for a Reintroduced Population of Blanding’s Turtles (Emydoidea blandingii) Grand B (4th Floor)Callie Klatt Golba

12:00pm CST

Lunch On Your Own Offsite

1:20pm CST

S-10: Testing the Waters: A Foray Into Floating Wetlands Regency B (2nd Floor)Kara Tvedt

1:40pm CST

S-08: Effects of Prescribed Fire and Mowing on Smooth Greensnake Detection and Nesting Activity Grand B (4th Floor)Allison Sacerdote-Velat

2:00pm CST

Wildlife Track: Surfing the Blue Wave: Is blue-winged teal resource selection influenced by fine-scale variation in wetland availability? Regency F (2nd Floor)Jeffrey Edwards

2:20pm CST

Wildlife Track: Wetland Management and Habitat Associations of Breeding Secretive Marsh Birds, including King Rail, in Missouri Regency F (2nd Floor)Ryan McGinty

2:40pm CST

Wildlife Track: River-Floodplain Connectivity: Effects on Ecological Communities in Restored Wetlands along the Lower Missouri River Regency F (2nd Floor)Josh Williams

3:00pm CST

Coffee Break Grand Foyer (4th Floor)

3:50pm CST

S-12: Ducks Plus: Cultivating Sustainable Landscapes with Partners Sterling 3 (2nd Floor)Mark Flaspohler

4:20pm CST

S-09: Producer's views on conservation programs in the Rainwater Basin region of Nebraska Mills 3 (4th Floor)Natalia Hagen

6:00pm CST

Poster Session & Tradeshow Social - Co-Sponsored by Aquatic Control, HDR Engineering & NASA Grand Ballroom (4th Floor) P-09: Survey of mammal biodiversity in a midwestern urban natural area using trail cameras: a collaboration between Missouri Western State University (MWSU) and Snapshot USA (2022-2024) Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Cary Chevalier P-10: Predicting habitat suitability for endangered Indiana bats using niche-based distribution modeling Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Elizabeth Biro P-11: Bat Communities along an Urbanization Gradient in St. Louis, MO Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Elizabeth Biro P-12: Comparing Pre and Post White-nose Syndrome Distributions of Three Bat Species in Eastern Nebraska Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Daniel Peacock P-13: Exploring Fecal and Environmental DNA Detection of Bat Species of Greatest Conservation Need via Nanopore Adaptive Sampling Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Thomas Raad P-18: Long-term Dynamics of Seasonal Tree Phenology and Forest Songbird Populations Across the Central Hardwoods (Preliminary Findings) Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Benjamin Tjepkes P-24: Spatial Ecology of Blanding’s turtle (Emydoidea blandingii) on Loess Bluffs National Wildlife Refuge, Northwest Missouri Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Grace Allen P-27: Metapopulation Dynamics of Urban Turtles: Why Did the Turtle Leave Campus? Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Mark Mills P-31: On The Overwintering Temperatures Of Eastern Copperheads (Agkistrodon contortrix) in East-Central Missouri And The Influence Of Substrate And Shaded Air Temperature On Emergence, Egress, And Ingress Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Ben Jellen P-94: Urban Wildlife Management success: Eleven years of Canada goose (Branta Canadensis) population management on Missouri Western State University campus. Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Cary Chevalier P-96: Development and Cloud Implementation of the New Annual National Land Cover Database for the United States Grand Ballroom (4th Floor)Jesslyn Brown

7:00am CST

Continental Breakast with Exhibitors Grand Foyer (4th Floor)

8:00am CST

S-08: Crawfish Frog Conservation in the Midwest Grand B (4th Floor)Nate Engbrecht S-15: An Overview of the Sustainable Rivers Program Grand A (4th Floor)Heidi Mehl S-17: The Public’s Perceived Importance and View of Midwest Fish and Wildlife Agencies Regency F (2nd Floor)Lisa Parks

8:20am CST

S-16: Climate Science in Service of Migratory Bird Management Regency D (2nd Floor)Olivia Ledee

8:40am CST

S-16: Microclimates and Species Life History Differences Inform Climate Vulnerability in a Grassland Songbird Community Regency D (2nd Floor)Benjamin Zuckerberg

9:00am CST

S-16: Joint Venture Decision Support Tools: Brainstorming Ideas to Account for Climate Change Regency D (2nd Floor)Mohammed Al-Saffar

9:40am CST

S-13: Missouri Ozark Forest Ecosystem Project: Adapting to change Sterling 3 (2nd Floor)Shelby Timm

10:15am CST

Time and Place DeBrief Meeting (For host team representatives from Missouri (2025) and Indiana (2026) Mills 6 (4th Floor)

10:40am CST

S-19: Section 10 of the Endangered Species Act: An Underutilized Tool for Conservation Planning Sterling 9 (2nd Floor )Rebecca Sloan

11:20am CST

S-19: Development and Implementation of Missouri's Landscape Health Index Sterling 9 (2nd Floor )Jon Podoliak

11:40am CST

S-19: Planning for Pollinators: How Voluntary Conservation Agreements Can Encourage Landscape-Scale Conservation Sterling 9 (2nd Floor )Catherine O’Reilly