Prescribed burns are used to restore the herbaceous plant communities of tallgrass prairies. Unfortunately, land-use change has driven declines in animal communities that use that habitat, including insect pollinators. Flowering forbs in tallgrass prairies likely depend on insect pollinators for their reproduction, suggesting that restoration efforts may be limited if insect pollinators continue to decline. Further, prescribed burns may lead to the direct mortality of insect pollinators. We thus explore whether Formica ants may be able to compensate for the loss of insect pollinators in tallgrass prairies by monitoring visitation rates of ants and insect pollinators to the milkweed Asclepias tuberosa. Using replicated experimental plots burned at different times (summer, fall, or spring), we found that ants were robust to the timing of prescribed burns and that they averaged 50% of all visits across plots. The distribution of ants and other insect pollinators may be regulated by competitive interactions, as there was a negative relationship between the two potential pollinator communities: the more ant visits, the fewer pollinator visits, and vice versa. The high visitation rates suggest ants may potentially compensate, especially as competitive interactions decrease, but whether that may occur likely depends on their efficiency as pollinators, current plant features, or subsequent plant adaptations to utilize ants.

By the middle of the 19th century, loosely organized systems for “networking” had developed among East Coast American scientists. These networks were both formal, such as memberships in societies or museums, and informal groups of colleagues. Such professional associations helped to establish co-operation in field work, laboratory research, and publication which had a major impact on paleontology. These associations also helped to establish outlets for publication and to acquire government funding for research. Even during the Civil War years, these professional networks served to further science and the careers of a number of young scholars ‘on their way up.’ Some of these activities were conducted under the auspices of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia; others were sponsored through the Federal Government via the United States National Museum (Smithsonian Institution). From these scientific networks, many of which were under the aegis of Joseph Leidy, came a large number of important contributions to Kansas paleontology. Several of these occurred shortly after the close of the Civil War and involved military doctors that were posted to newly established forts in western Kansas. Important discoveries including rich deposits of fossil leaves, type specimens of the marine reptiles including Elasmosaurus platyurus, Polycotylus latipinnis, Tylosaurus proriger, and the first known bird with teeth, Ichthyornis dispar, were made by individuals in Kansas with connections to professionals in the, by then, well-established network of Joseph Leidy.

Temperature affects nearly all of life's processes. Ectothermic animals living in temperate regions are subjected to dramatic daily shifts in temperature that force them to adapt in a variety of ways. The Dotted Wolf Spider (Rabidosa punctulata) mates during fall, which leaves this species vulnerable to temperature swings that can impact their reproductive success. In this study, we manipulated temperature in a controlled laboratory experiment to examine how the mating behaviors of both sexes of R. punctulata are affected in cold (4.4°C) and warm (26.74°C) environments. Overall, the species seems well acclimated to colder environments. While these spiders were slower to begin moving in the cold, they spent an equal percentage of the trial in motion across both temperature treatments. Males were less likely to adopt any mating behaviors in the cold, and overall pairs were significantly less likely to mate in the cold. However, males were able to successfully mount and at least two males were able to copulate in the near freezing temperatures. Directly mounting females without prior courtship was the most successful mating tactic regardless of temperature, and there was a trend suggesting males were more likely to forgo courtship and use direct mounting when interacting with females in the cold. This study highlights the amazing flexibility in reproductive tactics that enable mating success in R. punctulata despite experiencing cold temperatures in their fall mating season.

The distribution of Freckled Madtom (Noturus nocturnus) in Kansas includes the Lower Arkansas and Walnut River drainages of southcentral Kansas and the Little Osage, Marais des Cygnes, Neosho, and Verdigris River drainages of eastern Kansas. Freckled Madtom have not been previously reported from the Spring River subbasin in southeastern Kansas, although there is one record in 1942 from the Spring River subbasin of Missouri. Here we report the collection of five Freckled Madtom individuals from four locations along the Spring River mainstem in Cherokee County, Kansas during July–August 2020. All individuals were presumed to be young-of-year at ≤ 21 mm total length. Our finding of Freckled Madtom in the Spring River of Kansas has conservation implications since it is a Tier 2 Species of Greatest Conservation Need in the state.

Fifteen years have passed since the introduction of white-nose syndrome (WNS) in North America. The decline of several WNS-susceptible bat populations led to the development of bat educational efforts to increase public support for bat conservation. However, few studies reviewed the efficacy of these efforts concerning the public's understanding and perceptions of bats. This study addressed this shortcoming by assessing rural Missourian's attitudes and perceptions towards bats, WNS awareness, knowledge of bat natural history, and level of trust in a state conservation agency. This research's primary goal included informing state conservation agencies of the public's misperceptions of bats, which could help generate strategies for improving bat education. Respondents generally perceived bats positively, especially due to insect control. Despite the availability of educational resources to Missourians, we found numerous limitations in respondents' knowledge of WNS and bat ecology. Certain factors influenced public understanding, as the observance of gated caves best explained the respondents' knowledge of WNS, and respondents with higher education identified Missouri as a WNS-positive state. Lastly, respondents trusted the state conservation agency. Future bat conservation efforts in the Midwest should enhance educational initiatives in public messaging, boost signage at gated caves, and maintain trust in conservation agencies when making management decisions.

The Blackspotted Topminnow (Fundulus olivaceus) is not native to the Spring River subbasin (SRS) of Kansas, where it was first collected from Shoal Creek in the early 2000s. To date, little is known concerning the contemporary prevalence of Blackspotted Topminnow in the SRS of KS, or how prevalence of the closely related Blackstripe Topminnow (Fundulus notatus) in the SRS has varied since Blackspotted Topminnow invaded this system. To evaluate the contemporary prevalence of the Blackspotted Topminnow in the KS SRS, we sampled 55 sites using backpack electrofishing and seining during 2017-2020. We then compared long-term trends in occupancy and relative abundance of the Blackspotted and Blackstripe Topminnows in the KS SRS using four separate datasets collected during 1962-1964, 1993-1995, 1995-2013, and our contemporary dataset from 2017-2020. Between species comparisons of temporal trends were made for the entire SRS of KS, and for physiographic regions within the SRS that differed in habitat characteristics and Blackspotted Topminnow presence. In our contemporary survey, we detected the Blackspotted Topminnow at 11% of sites (6/55), including four Shoal Creek sites and two sites in the Spring River below Empire Lake. Blackstripe Topminnow prevalence was relatively stable in the SRS during 1962-2020, where it was most widespread and abundant within streams of the Cherokee Lowlands and Osage Cuestas. In contrast, between the 1995-2013 and 2017-2020 time periods Blackstripe Topminnow exhibited a declining trend in prevalence within the Ozark Plateau where it was sympatric with the Blackspotted Topminnow. This decline was not observed in the Ozark Plateau where Blackspotted Topminnow was absent. Declining Blackstripe Topminnow prevalence may be due to negative biotic interactions (e.g., competition; hybridization) with the Blackspotted Topminnow, or could be the result of unquantified environmental variation. Regardless, our research showed that the Blackspotted Topminnow is now an established nonnative in the SRS of KS. Consequently, further research of this species is necessary to determine how the invasion process proceeds regarding continued spread and potential concomitant ecological impacts.