Austin and Pyle looked at the habitat selection of small mammals in a montane wet meadow as effected by cattle grazing and fall burning on the Grays Lake National Wildlife Refuge in Idaho. All mammal populations fluctuated significantly between years; highest in 1998(pre-treatment) and lowest in 1999(first year of treatment). Yet, treatment or microhabitat has no significant effect on the capture rates of any species, which their were five looked at in total(montane vole Microtis montanus, meadow vole Microtis pennsylvanicus, vagrant shrew Sorexvagrans, ermine Mustela erminea and deer mouse Peromyscus maniculatus). Austin and Pyle stated that the same year they began the treatments coincided with a population crash of the areas small mammals. Since this was just a two year study, the authors suggest that a longer study may be more effective and eliminate such factors as population crashes and climate variability, which can have a large effect on the outcome.
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