MSU Research Roundup-Sage survival -Rivers and houses-Back to class -Shuttle effect

Sage survival

A century ago, the northern Great Plains had a lot more sagebrush
than it does today. And perhaps no species is more dependent on
the gray-green shrub than the sage grouse, leading biologists to
worry about bird numbers. A few small, isolated populations
elsewhere are considered threatened, but how well is the popular
game bird doing in Montana? Jay Rotella, head of the ecology
department at MSU, and his students plan to find out. They are
monitoring sage grouse populations on private land near Roundup.
They’ll check for nesting success and the effects of hunting, for
example. The study is being done for the Montana Department of
Fish, Wildlife and Parks and the Bureau of Land Management.

Rivers and houses

The upper Yellowstone River drew a lot of attention following
back-to-back 100-year floods in 1995 and ’96. Next year came the
Governor’s Upper Yellowstone River Task Force to spur discussion
and action on what area residents want for that stretch of river. A
lot of science is taking place, too, on fish, wildlife and land-use
issues. MSU research associate Monica Brelsford is heading up one
piece of a much larger study in the area. She’s documenting
land-use change along portions of the Yellowstone from Springdale
to Gardiner. She’s using photographs from 1948 to the present to
document those changes starting at the river and reaching up into
foothills. The work is funded by the Environmental Protection
Agency.

Back to class

Historical studies of class and class struggles have fallen off in the
past decade, says MSU history professor Billy Smith. To look at
the events and research of recent years, Smith is organizing the
Michael P. Malone Memorial Conference named after the late
historian and MSU’s 10th president. The conference will be held in
the Bozeman area in September 2003. It will focus on class and
class struggles in North American and the Atlantic world from 1500
through 1800. Smith is also putting together a collection of essays
on the same topic. Several MSU offices are providing funding for
the conference.

Shuttle effect

Flying on the space shuttle had a much greater impact on his
career than he would have imagined, says Loren Acton, a research
professor at MSU "It really opens a lot of doors," he commented
recently after the book "Space Shuttle: The First 20 Years" came
out. Acton, who was quoted in the book, flew on an eight-day
mission in 1985. He was one of seven crew members on the
shuttle’s 19th flight and gathered information by telescope. Still
involved with telescopes, Acton was part of the team that
designed and built the telescope that flew on the Yohkoh
spacecraft, which was launched in 1991. Acton is now leading the
Yohkoh Galileo Project to archive the information it gathered.
Yohkoh stopped operating in December 2001.

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