Conservation Working Dogs and Zoos Helping Wildlife

photo courtesy of TNC and WD4C

 

Meet “Moose” a hard-working canine with the nonprofit organization Working Dogs for Conservation (WD4C).

Moose recently completed a tour of duty on Santa Cruz Island as part of a multi-organizational effort to find a better way to gather information on island spotted skunks.

Island spotted skunks only live on Santa Rosa and Santa Cruz Islands. As island foxes recovered on these islands, island spotted skunks seemed to have declined. There is concern for these rare little skunks and a lack of understanding about their relationship with island foxes. Do island foxes directly impact island spotted skunks? Do they compete for similar resources?

Friends of the Island Fox has supported several research investigations into this relationship:

• C. Gagorik and V Zhang: "Examining habitat use and movement patterns of island foxes and island spotted skunks on Santa Cruz Island”
• J. Schammel: Dietary overlap and change between island foxes and island spotted skunks on Santa Rosa Island
• J. Owen: Genetic relationships of spotted skunk subspecies
• D. Thomaier: Occupancy modeling of island spotted skunks on Santa Rosa and Santa Cruz Islands using field cameras 

In 2024, the question arose about western spotted skunks in captivity that might participate in research studies as a control for island spotted skunks. FIF’s Education Director, Keri Dearborn, did an internet search and found “Boo” a female western spotted skunk at the Sequoia Park Zoo. Boo and her two brothers had been orphaned when they were very young. Though they were rescued, they became imprinted on humans and couldn’t be returned to the wild. Boo was living at the Sequoia Park Zoo in Eureka and her two brothers were at the Turtle Bay Exploration Park near Redding.

 

While Thomaier’s field cameras have documented island spotted skunks, to-date identifying individual skunks in images has been very difficult. Island spotted skunks push off radio collars and typically avoid capture.

Lara Brenner, Island Scientist with The Nature Conservancy, had been working with a conservation dog to sniff out invasive Argentine ant colonies on Santa Cruz Island. Could a conservation working dog locate island spotted skunk dens? Finding scat and dens would be less invasive than capturing skunks and might open up a whole new way to determine their numbers.

Moose gets suited up for work

 

Moose had experience tracking grizzly bears and locating their dens. Could he do the same job for tiny island spotted skunks? Protocol for a test was put in place. Because island foxes are susceptible to canine diseases and because island foxes can be a source of disease for dogs, Moose was up-to-date on all of his vaccinations.

The two zoos collected soiled bedding and feces from the three western spotted skunks. The fragrant material was sent to a WD4C training location in Montana, where Moose learned to identify spotted skunk scent. Would the western spotted skunk scent be close enough to the island spotted skunk scent for Moose to be successful?

 

Toward the end of 2024, Moose and his handler traveled to Santa Cruz Island. Moose “hit the ground running,” Brenner says. As a conservation working dog, he wears a special harness with bells and a GPS locator. Brenner explains that the GPS locator “is so that we can record his tracks and understand [his] search effort… i.e. how far does Moose have to go and how long does he have to sniff before he finds a skunk?”

On the first day, Moose signaled his handler that he’d found an island spotted skunk den. 

Working the hillsides with a canine nose, detection dogs are more efficient than people and have a higher success rate locating a target species. Over three weeks, Moose found several den sites, including this one with an island spotted skunk at home, and 12 scats.

Island spotted skunk in den (courtesy of TNC)

Can DNA from the scats identify individual island spotted skunks? Can genetic meta-barcoding of scat samples identify specific dietary items for island spotted skunks and island foxes? We’re just at the tip of learning how working dogs like Moose can contribute to island conservation?

courtesy of TNC and WD4C

 

This project is a multi-institutional collaboration between Sequoia Park Zoo, Turtle Bay Exploration Park, The Nature Conservancy, Working Dogs for Conservation, and Friends of the Island Fox. The biggest credit goes to the four-footed collaborators: the three western spotted skunks who are helping their wild counterparts and a very talented working dog named Moose.

Reaching a New Milestone - 440 Radio Collars

When does 1+1 = 440?

When an eight-year-old Island Fox Ambassador joins forces with a long-time island fox donor to fund FIF's 440th radio-tracking collar.

 

Rose was along for the ride when her sister Joy chose Channel Islands National Park as one of the parks she'd like to visit as part of the "Every Kid Outside" National Park pass for 4th graders. Visiting from her family home in North Carolina, little sister, Rose became an island fox fan. 

 

The sisters had sewn projects to raise funds for their trip, but rather than spend her earnings on herself, Rose determined to help island foxes.

LeAnn from Wisconsin has been supporting island foxes since 2020. Nearly every month, she sends what she can. Over the course of a year, her selfless efforts add up.

Together Rose and LeAnn have funded Friends of the Island Fox's 440th radio collar. Their collar will be refurbished this spring and fitted on an island fox during the summer/fall 2025 health checks.

$220 refurbishes an island fox radio collar to monitor their survival. More about collars

 

Protecting island foxes takes a community of concerned people. From students to adults, local Californians to people across the U.S. and around the world, island foxes are thriving in the wild because YOU CARE. 

You can become an Island Fox Ambassador, too!

Training Biologists to Be Investigators When an Island Fox Dies

Dr. Jessica Sanchez overviews Necropsy Workshop

In November 2024, Friends of the Island Fox sponsored the 3rd "Island Fox Necropsy Workshop" in collaboration with the Santa Barbara and San Diego Zoos. This workshop was held to train island managers and field biologists to investigate island fox mortalities and determine cause of death. In this blog post, wildlife veterinarian and FIF board member, Dr. Jessica Sanchez, describes how necropsies are preformed and why they are such an important part of island fox conservation.

Necropsy tool kit

In the field of wildlife biology, understanding the reason animals die is an important first step to conserving populations. We must know what the problem is before we can start to address it. Tracking causes of death (AKA "mortality") also helps us learn more about the biology of a species–for example, the common diseases they get, their average life expectancy, the survival rate of their young, etc. By performing necropsies regularly on animals that die, we can: 1) learn what a normal, baseline mortality rate is and the common causes of death, and 2) more quickly detect if something abnormal is happening, such as the canine distemper outbreak on Santa Catalina Island.

The determination of cause of death is the expertise of pathologists, who dissect carcasses in what are called "necropsies" (the equivalent of a human autopsy). Epidemiologists study the patterns of disease in populations and help determine if a given mortality is expected for a population, or if something new/abnormal is happening, such as a newly introduced disease or an epidemic (higher than normal rates of disease).

 

Island fox with radio-tracking collar

On the Channel Islands, managers place radio-collars on a subset of the fox populations every year. These collars allow biologists to track animals and learn about their biology and behavior, but also to detect when they have died. The collars allow us to detect these deaths and retrieve the carcasses quickly, often from places where they would otherwise be hard to find (like deep in the woods, buried under vegetation, or even in a golden eagle nest!) Because we can retrieve these carcasses quickly, they are less likely to be degraded by the environment, giving pathologists the best chance to determine the cause of death.

Once in the pathology lab, scientists will look at the entire carcass for signs of the cause of death. They are true detectives, looking for signs of injury from being struck by a car, talon marks from a golden eagle, or pneumonia from infection. After examining the carcass visually (a "gross necropsy"), they collect tissues for microscopic examination. These tissues are stored in special chemicals that preserve the structure of the cells, so the pathologist can look at them under the microscope. This is how we identify bacterial or viral infections, abnormal protein buildup, cancers, and more. (Cancer in island foxes). They also collect swabs and blood samples to test for antibodies against disease ("serology"), use genetic material to identify pathogens like viruses and bacteria ("polymerase chain reaction" or PCR), or test for toxicants like rodenticides. For unusual or complicated cases, several experts may get involved, including virologists, immunologists, toxicologists, and epidemiologists.

Sometimes, sending a carcass off-island to a pathologist is not practical. In these cases, it is important that island biologists can perform "field necropsies" on the island. They can perform the gross necropsy and collect key samples to send off-island to the pathologist and laboratory for further investigation. These may not be as detailed as a necropsy from a pathologist, but they allow us to gather important information on cause of death and save tissues that could be important for future research.

Dr Leslie Woods leads the workshop

 

In November, twenty island biologists and researchers gathered at the Santa Barbara Zoo for training in performing necropsies. Drs. Leslie Woods (UC Davis) and Patty Gaffney (San Diego Zoo) are board certified veterinary pathologists who have worked with island foxes for decades. They led teams through performing full necropsies and collecting important tissues for further examination in the laboratory. We discussed common cause of death in island foxes and the signs to look for on gross necropsy. 

Accurately identifying sample slides

Participants also learned about sample storage and human safety when it comes to handling blood, tissues, and chemicals. FIF and the Island Fox Conservation Working Group plan to continue workshops like this periodically to train new staff and refresh the skills of field staff who are so important for the daily monitoring of these fox populations. They are our eyes and ears out on the island, looking for any new or emerging threats to the populations.

PPE is necessary to when working with animals that have died

Trainings like this highlight how important long-term monitoring and surveillance is for wildlife conservation, especially for a species such as the island fox which evolved isolated on an island and is under constant risk from introduced disease and invasive species. Radio-collaring foxes is critical for us to detect mortalities ASAP so we can retrieve the carcass as quickly as possible before signs of the cause of death start to degrade. It also helps us gather baseline information on survival rates of different age classes and sexes. Performing regular necropsies, even in the absence of an outbreak or other crisis, allows us to collect an invaluable archive of health and disease information about this species. Island fox researchers have built a database from hundreds of island fox necropsies going back 25+ years, which current and future researchers can use for studies on genetics, disease, reproduction, diet, and more. (Island Fox Research)

Thank you for supporting island fox research. Your support enables FIF to host workshops like this to train future generations of biologists to protect the island fox. - Dr. Jessica Sanchez

See Dr. Jessica Sanchez in action performing an island fox health check. 

A huge thank you to all those who helped facilitate this workshop:

Santa Barbara Zoo, San Diego Zoo, UC Davis and the CA Animal Health and Food Safety Lab