Gerald Niemi, Ph.D., Senior Research Associate and Professor
Position and Focus
Dr. Niemi's responsibilities include administration of an environmental and economic development program focused on basic and applied research on forests, soils, water, wetlands and associated landscapes in the Upper Midwestern U.S. region, primarily Minnesota. The Center for Water and the Environment (CWE) is one of three centers within this Institute. The Center currently employs more than 70 individuals including a core group of about 13 PhD level scientists, many technicians, graduate and undergraduate students and support staff. The Center has an annual budget of about $4 M with support by an annual state appropriation of about $600,000 and $3 to 3.5 million from more than 30 externally-funded projects. Research interests include the effects of natural and human-induced disturbances on natural resources, sustainability of natural resources, biostatistics, vertebrate ecology, conservation and landscape ecology.
Background
Ph.D. Biology, Florida State University, Tallahassee, 1983
M.S. Zoology, University of Minnesota, 1977
B.S. Biology, University of Minnesota, 1974
Current Publications
Etterson MA, Niemi GJ, Danz NP. 2009. Estimating the effects of detection heterogeneity and overdispersion on trends estimated from avian point counts. Ecological Applications 19(8):2049-2066.
Niemi GJ, Brady VJ, Brown TN, Ciborowski JJH, Danz NP, Ghioca DM, Hanowski JM, Hollenhorst TP, Howe RW, Johnson LB, Johnston CA, Reavie ED. 2009. Development of ecological indicators for the U.S. Great Lakes coastal region – a summary of applications in Lake Huron. 12(1):1-13.
Ciborowski JJH, Niemi GJ, Brady VJ, Doka SE, Johnson LB, Keough JR, Mackey SD, Uzarski DG. 2009. Ecosystem responses to regulation-based water level changes in the Upper Great Lakes. White paper:1-56.
Johnston CA, Brown TN, Hollenhorst TP, Wolter PT, Danz NP, Niemi GJ. 2009. GIS in support of ecological indicator development. Manual of Geographic Information Systems (56):1095-1113.
McCann NP, Moen RA, Niemi GJ. 2008. Using pellet counts to estimate snowshoe hare numbers in Minnesota. Journal of Wildlife Management 72(4):955-958.
Minnesota Breeding Bird Atlas To complete a systematic count of breeding birds in all townships in the state of Minnesota as part of the Minnesota Breeding Bird Atlas. The methodology will allow samples to be gathered in the future in a representative and repeatable fashion.
