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Northern Rocky Mountain Science Center
Northern Rocky Mountain Science Center scientists work throughout the U.S. and the world on a diverse set of issues to support the safeguarding, understanding, and management of our public lands.
Featured Research
Featured Research
READI-Net—A network of robotic environmental DNA samplers to enhance the early detection of aquatic biological threats
Featured Research
Featured Research
NOROCK is developing drought early warning systems for fisheries and water management
NOROCK Quick Links
NOROCK Quick Links
Check out our most up-to-date data & science, and learn about any upcoming NOROCK opportunities .
News
Inaugural USGS Wildlife Health Awareness Day - April 25, 2025
Inaugural USGS Wildlife Health Awareness Day - April 25, 2025
USGS Factsheet Highlights Importance of Cryospheric Research
USGS Factsheet Highlights Importance of Cryospheric Research
Spring 2025 Highlights from EESC’s Disease Decision Analysis and Research Group
Spring 2025 Highlights from EESC’s Disease Decision Analysis and Research Group
Publications
Failure to meet the exchangeability assumption in Bayesian multispecies occupancy models: Implications for study design
Bayesian hierarchical models are ubiquitous in ecology. Random effect model structures are often employed that treat individual effects as deviations from larger population-level effects. In this way individuals are assumed to be "exchangeable" samples. Ecologists may address this exchangeability assumption intuitively, but might in certain modeling contexts ignore it altogether...
Automated snow cover detection on mountain glaciers usingspaceborne imagery and machine learning
Tracking the extent of seasonal snow on glaciers over time is critical for assessing glacier vulnerability and the response of glacierized watersheds to climate change. Existing snow cover products do not reliably distinguish seasonal snow from glacier ice and firn, preventing their use for glacier snow cover detection. Despite previous efforts to classify glacier surface facies using...
The relationship between body condition, body composition, and growth in amphibians
Body condition of animals is often assumed to reflect advantages in survival or reproduction, but body condition indices may not reflect body composition, or condition may be unrelated to fitness-associated traits. The relationship between body condition indices and composition has rarely been quantified in amphibians, and body condition has not previously been related to growth in adult...
Science
USGS Chronic Wasting Disease Research at NOROCK
Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a growing management issue in the U.S. and has been detected in 36 states as of April 2025, including many western states. There is no cure or vaccine for CWD, and the disease threatens economically important animals like elk and deer. NOROCK scientists have taken a multi-pronged approach to develop actionable science including 1) evaluating CWD management options...
USGS Chronic Wasting Disease Research at the National Elk Refuge
Over the past 20 years, chronic wasting disease (CWD) in Wyoming has been spreading slowly outward from the southeastern corner of the state into the Greater Yellowstone Area and Wyoming's elk feed grounds. CWD detections have been getting closer to the National Elk Refuge, which provides supplemental feeding to approximately 8,000 elk and 500 bison each winter. NOROCK scientists have been...
The influence of natural mineral licks on wildlife disease dynamics
Some locations on the landscape can aggregate animals of multiple species and could become hotspots of disease transmission. One example of this are areas of localized concentrations of minerals that animals like deer, elk, bighorn sheep, and mountain goats use and diseases like chronic wasting disease or respiratory diseases could spread among or within species who use natural mineral licks...