Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem study examines large mammals’ responses to heat

by Diana Setterberg, Montana State University
October 29, 2025

A study of nine species of large mammals in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem has revealed that their behavioral responses to summer heat were influenced more by the structure of their environments than by their biological traits or greater temperature increases – a result the Montana State University ecologist who co-authored the study finds encouraging as the region’s climate continues to warm.

Justine Becker, an assistant professor in the Department of Ecology in the College of Letters and Science, is the co-lead author of the study published this month in the journal Ecosphere. Becker and a team of researchers from the University of Wyoming, where Becker was a postdoctoral researcher when the study began, collaborated with the Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, U.S. Geological Service, the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, and Idaho Department of Fish and Game to synthesize data and conduct the multi-species analysis.

Becker studies the ecological factors that cause behavioral variation in wildlife, particularly in animal movement and habitat use decisions. She said the study was designed to determine how different environmental conditions and inborn traits influenced large mammals’ responses to rapidly increasing temperatures – in this study, variations in maximum daytime temperatures in summer. The researchers included several species and populations in the study to help them better understand ecological patterns, as well as trends in the specific ecosystem they studied. Becker said the study was motivated by the understanding that rising temperatures due to climate change present an increasingly prevalent stressor to animals.

Keep reading: https://www.montana.edu/news/24894/greater-yellowstone-ecosystem-study-examines-large-mammals-responses-to-heat

Read the Ecosphere paper: https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ecs2.70432