Sonny Bleicher PhD

Biography

Dr. Sonny S. Bleicher is a wildlife biologist whose research examines how animals navigate the competing demands of survival in landscapes reshaped by human activity. Trained as an eco-evolutionary behavioral ecologist, he combines field experimentation, long-term monitoring, and quantitative analysis to understand how wildlife populations and communities respond to environmental change. His work has taken him across desert, temperate, and urban ecosystems on four continents, and it sits at the intersection of behavioral ecology, evolutionary biology, and applied conservation.

Research

Dr. Bleicher’s research program is grounded in behavioral ecology, with particular emphasis on the ecology of fear: the study of how animals perceive and weigh the tradeoff between acquiring food and avoiding risk. His experimental and observational work has shown how species ranging from desert small mammals through marsupials and reptiles to ungulates and mountain lions adjust their foraging, activity, and habitat use in response to perceived risk, and how these individual decisions scale up to shape population dynamics and community structure. This foundation extends into anthropocentric ecology, where he investigates the interactions between humans and wildlife, including how urban development, recreation, and socioeconomic patterns alter the behavior and distribution of animal populations. A parallel line of inquiry addresses invasive species biology, examining the behavioral and morphological traits that allow introduced species to establish, spread, and displace native counterparts. Across these threads, Dr. Bleicher is also interested in the evolutionary and biogeographic patterns that underlie community assemblages, asking how shared evolutionary history and independent adaptation produce convergent, or divergent, responses to similar ecological pressures in evolutionarily distinct systems. Together, this body of work positions his research at the forefront of efforts to understand, and ultimately inform the management of, wildlife in an increasingly human-dominated world.

Teaching and Mentorship

Dr. Bleicher teaches courses in and adjacent to animal behavior, population and community ecology, as well as evolution and conservation biology. Drawing directly on his research program he brings current questions in the field into the classroom. He is especially passionate about quantitative literacy, and is committed to building students’ confidence and fluency in ecological and environmental statistics, skills he considers essential for the next generation of biologists and environmental decision makers. He has developed course-based undergraduate research experiences that give students, including those outside the traditional sciences, direct exposure to the process of scientific discovery, and he regularly mentors undergraduate researchers who go on to co-author peer-reviewed publications, and currently mentors a number of MS in Ecology graduate students in the Wildlife and Conservation theses tracks.

Selected Publications

St. Juliana, J., S. S. Bleicher, S. Mukherjee, S. Vijayan, J. S. Brown, and B. P. Kotler. (2025). Additive, substitutable, and antagonistic prey responses to feral and native predator combinations. Journal of Arid Environments, 229, 105399. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaridenv.2025.105399

Jackson, M. A., and S. S. Bleicher. (2024). Meta-analysis reveals behavioral plasticity, not agonistic behavior, facilitates invasion of brown anoles (Anolis sagrei) and replacement of green anoles (Anolis carolinensis). Diversity, 16, 620. https://doi.org/10.3390/d16100620

Bleicher, S. S., B. P. Kotler, C. J. Downs, and J. S. Brown. (2020). Intercontinental test of constraint-breaking adaptations: testing behavioural plasticity in the face of a predator with novel hunting strategies. Journal of Animal Ecology, 89, 1837-1850. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2656.13234

Bleicher, S. S., B. P. Kotler, and K. Embar. (2020). Ninja owl: gerbils over-anticipate an unexpected flying predator. Behavioural Processes, 178, 104161. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.beproc.2020.104161

Bleicher, S. S., and C. R. Dickman. (2020). On the landscape of fear: shelters affect foraging by dunnarts (Marsupialia, Sminthopsis spp.) in a sandridge desert environment. Journal of Mammalogy, 101, 281-290. https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyz195

Bleicher, S. S., M. Haapakoski, D. Morin, T. Kapyla, and H. Ylonen. (2019). Balancing food, activity and the dangers of sunlit nights. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, 73, 95. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-019-2703-y

Bleicher, S. S., B. P. Kotler, and J. S. Brown. (2019). Comparing plasticity of response to perceived risk in the textbook example of convergent evolution of desert rodents and their predators: a manipulative study employing the landscape of fear. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 13, 58. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnbeh.2019.00058

Bleicher, S. S., J. S. Brown, C. J. Downs, and B. P. Kotler. (2019). Playing to their evolutionary strengths: heteromyid rodents provide opposite snake evasion strategies in the face of known and novel snakes. Journal of Arid Environments, 173, 104025. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaridenv.2019.104025

Bleicher, S. S., B. P. Kotler, O. Shalev, A. Dixon, K. Embar, and J. S. Brown. (2018). Divergent behavior amid convergent evolution: a case of four desert rodents learning to respond to known and novel vipers. PLOS ONE, 13, e0200672. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0200672

Bleicher, S. S., H. Ylonen, T. Kapyla, and M. Haapakoski. (2018). Olfactory cues and the value of information: voles interpret cues based on recent predator encounters. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, 72, 187. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-018-2600-9

Bleicher, S. S., and M. L. Rosenzweig. (2018). Too much of a good thing? A landscape-of-fear analysis for collared peccaries (Pecari tajacu) reveals hikers act as a greater deterrent than thorny or bitter food. Canadian Journal of Zoology, 96, 317-324. https://doi.org/10.1139/cjz-2017-0158

Embar, K., B. P. Kotler, S. S. Bleicher, and J. S. Brown. (2018). Pit fights: predators in evolutionarily independent communities. Journal of Mammalogy, 99, 1183-1188. https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyy085

Bleicher, S. S. (2017). The landscape of fear conceptual framework: definition and review of current applications and misuses. PeerJ, 5, e3772. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.3772

Bleicher, S. S., and C. R. Dickman. (2016). Bust economics: foragers choose high quality habitats in lean times. PeerJ, 4, e1609. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.1609

Bleicher, S. S., J. S. Brown, K. Embar, and B. P. Kotler. (2016). Novel predator recognition by Allenby’s gerbil (Gerbillus andersoni allenbyi): do gerbils learn to respond to a snake that can “see” in the dark? Israel Journal of Ecology and Evolution, 62, 178-185. https://doi.org/10.1080/15659801.2016.1176614

Kotler, B. P., J. S. Brown, S. S. Bleicher, and K. Embar. (2016). Intercontinental-wide consequences of compromise-breaking adaptations: the case of desert rodents. Israel Journal of Ecology and Evolution, 62, 186-195. https://doi.org/10.1080/15659801.2015.1125832

Manuscripts in Review

Bleicher, S. S. (in review). Implications of exam-based and mastery-based grading schemes on non-major student performance and engagement in course-based undergraduate research experiences. Active Learning in Higher Education.

Dixon, A. K., J. F. S. Menezes, J. Wan, I. Tiano, B. P. Kotler, and S. S. Bleicher. (in review). Do personalities have their own foraging niches? A test with Gerbillus allenbyi. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology.

St. Juliana, J. R., W. A. Mitchelle, and S. S. Bleicher. (in review). When the chorus gets loud, risk feels low: evidence for perceived acoustic camouflage in Peromyscus leucopus. Oikos.

Medina, J. M., and S. S. Bleicher. (in review). Shrinking in the face of invasion: meta-analytical evidence for morphological change in urban Anolis lizards. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution.