Jeffrey A. Spendelow

USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center
12100 Beech Forest Road
Laurel, MD 20708-4030

Telephone: 301-497-5665

Fax: 301-497-5545

Email: JSpendelow@usgs.gov

Research Wildlife Biologist

Primary Responsibilities: 
Duties include planning and carrying out fieldwork on the population dynamics and ecology of coastal birds, assessing the impacts of management activities on these birds and their habitats, and assisting population modelers in the development of new multistage models to estimate various population parameters.  Current projects involve:

Coordinating a cooperative study with several co-investigators of the regional metapopulation dynamics and ecology of endangered Roseate Terns (Sterna dougallii) throughout Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York.  We have used formal capture/recapture models to test various hypotheses about geographic and temporal variation in adult and juvenile survival, recruitment and age-specific breeding, and fidelity/intercolony movement rates.  Our work has demonstrated that a lack of suitable nesting habitat is not a major factor limiting population recovery and that the apparent stability in breeding population size at smaller colonies is due to a net immigration of new recruits from the largest and most productive (source) colonies.  We also have demonstrated a substantial inequality in the sex ratio of breeding adults, and are in the process of determining what consequences is having on population recovery and viability.

Providing technical assistance and scientific expertise to the USFWS (Division of Refuges and Roseate Tern Recovery Teams); other federal, state, and local agencies; the Ornithological Council; and to graduate and undergraduate students.

Education/Training:  B.S., Yale University, 1972; Biology
Ph.D., Yale University, 1980; Biology/Ornithology

Active Projects: 
Determination, biological consequences, and modeling of sex-specific demographic rates in declining, threatened, or endangered metapopulations

Publications/Products: 

Spendelow, J.A., D.A. Shealer, I.C.T. Nisbet, J.S. Hatfield, and J.D. Nichols.  2005.  Sex-specific survival rates of adult Roseate Terns: are males paying a higher reproductive cost? (Poster presented at joint Waterbird Society/Pacific Seabird Group meeting; Portland, OR, 19-23 January 2005)

Shealer, D.A., J.A. Spendelow, J.S. Hatfield, and I.C.T. Nisbet.  2005.  The adaptive significance of stealing in a marine bird and its relationship to parental quality.  Behavioral Ecology 16:371-376.

Nichols, J.D., W.L. Kendall, J.E. Hines, and J.A. Spendelow.  2004.  Estimation of sex-specific survival from capture-recapture data when sex is not always known.  Ecology 85:3192-3201.

Lebreton, J.D., J.E. Hines, R. Pradel, J.D. Nichols, and J.A. Spendelow.  2003.  Estimation by capture-recapture of recruitment and dispersal over several sites.  Oikos 101:253-264.

Spendelow, J.A., J.D. Nichols, J.E. Hines, J.-D. Lebreton, and R. Pradel.  2002.  Modelling postfledging survival and age-specific breeding probabilities in species with delayed maturity: a case study of Roseate Terns at Falkner Island, Connecticut.  Journal of Applied Statistics: 29:385-405. 

Nisbet, I.C.T., and J.A. Spendelow.  1999.  Contribution of research to management and recovery of the Roseate Tern: Review of a twelve-year project.  Waterbirds 22:239-252. 

Nisbet, I.C.T., J.S. Hatfield, W.A. Link, and J.A. Spendelow.  1999.  Predicting chick survival and productivtiy of Roseate Terns from data on early growth.  Waterbirds 22:90-97.

Spendelow, J.A., J.D. Nichols, I.C.T. Nisbet, H. Hays, G.D. Cormons, J. Burger, C. Safina, J.E. Hines, and M. Gochfeld.  1995.  Estimating annual survival and movement rates of adults within a metapopulation of Roseate Terns.  Ecology 76:2415-2428. 

Spendelow, J.A., R.M. Erwin, and B.K. Williams.  1989.  Patterns of species co-occurrence of nesting colonial Ciconiiformes in Atlantic Coast estuarine areas.  Colonial Waterbirds 12:51-59. 

Spendelow, J.A., and S.R. Patton.  1988.  National Atlas of Coastal Waterbird Colonies in the Contiguous United States: 1976-1982.  U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Biological Report 88(5).  x and 326pp.