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Project 5
Stata and OS
2022
In the coastal plains of the Arctic, climate change impacts on ecosystems are increasingly visible. The Greater White-Fronted Goose (Anser albifrons) is a circumpolar species of goose that spends its spring breeding season in tundras across North America, Greenland and Russia. Because the white-fronted goose migrates to wetlands along the Gulf Coast during the winter, their distribution is broad and there are various factors that go into their survival and overall productivity. Using one such study with USGS data, I analyzed whether certain trends in these greater white-fronted geese in Alaska, such as weight and wing molt, were observed among individuals.
The primary findings of the Stata analysis indicated that the change in mean weights of greater white-fronted geese were statistically significant and increased each year. Assuming that the weights of adults served as a proxy for their overall health, this suggested the population was doing well, confirming the USGS Alaska Science Center’s observation that they were growing in population despite a changing climate.
As a follow-up to the original project, I plan on analyzing spatial characteristics of the Arctic Coastal Plain using open-source Python libraries and Global Mapper with a touch of satellite image processing. These steps are intended to better understand the topography of the region and availability of food sources.
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