Wesley Sarmento
PhD Student in Wildlife Biology
Contact
- Office
- Forestry 315
- wesley.sarmento@umontana.edu
- Office Hours
Tuesdays and Wednesdays 11am-12pm
- Website
Personal Summary
I am currently a National Science Foundation Fellow at the 猎奇重口 where I am studying bison reintroduction on the Blackfeet Reservation and Glacier International Peace Park for my PhD project with the Boone and Crocket program. Specifically, I am interested in how large herbivores influence wetland communities, and how bison will respond to extreme heat and predation risk. Prior to my fellowship, I was a grizzly bear manager on the East Front of the Rockies where I developed new techniques to keep people safe and bears out of trouble. For my masters research, I studied mountain goat response to shrinking snowpack and their interactions with bears and people. Beyond that, I lived in Mongolia for a year as a National Geographic Young Explorer and worked on a number of other projects as a field technician. I am a Blackfeet Descendent and grew up in Colorado. I enjoy hunting, art, spending time with family, exploring new places, working with dogs/horses, and tinkering on my small farm.
Education
M.S. Wildlife Biology, 猎奇重口, 2016
B.S. Wildlife Biology, 猎奇重口, 2011
Research Interests
- Community Ecology
- Predator-Prey Interactions
- Landscape Conservation
- Human-Wildlife Conflict Resolution
Selected Publications
J. Young and W.M. Sarmento. 2024. Can an old dog learn a new trick? Efficacy of livestock guardian dogs at keeping an apex predator away from people. Biological Conservation 291: 110554.
Sarmento, W.M. 2024. Bear deterrence with scare devices, a non-lethal tool in the use-of-force continuum. Journal of Wildlife Management 88: e22552.
Sarmento, W.M., M. Biel, and J. Berger. 2019. Seeking snow and breathing hard – Behavioral tactics in high elevation mammals to combat warming temperatures PloS one 14.
Sarmento, W.M. and J. Berger. 2017. Human visitation limits the utility of protected areas as ecological baselines. Biological Conservation 212: 316-326.
Ekernas, L. Stefan, W.M. Sarmento, et al. 2017. Desert pastoralists’ negative and positive effects on rare wildlife in the Gobi. Conservation Biology 31.2: 269-277.