Cooperative Agreement for CESU-affiliated Partner with Great Lakes-Northern Forest Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit | G23AS00320

Opportunity Information: Apply for G23AS00320

The US Geological Survey (USGS) is soliciting a cooperative agreement with an eligible partner from the Great Lakes-Northern Forest Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit (CESU) to carry out research that strengthens ongoing efforts to restore native coregonine fishes in the Great Lakes. This opportunity is framed around the reality that the Great Lakes, like many large freshwater systems, have been heavily altered by human-driven pressures over time, leading to habitat loss or simplification and major declines in biodiversity. Among the groups most affected are coregonines (the sub-family that includes several whitefish and cisco forms), which have experienced some of the most severe outcomes in the basin, including outright extinction of certain species and local extirpations of others.

The scientific and management context for this funding is the Coregonine Restoration Framework, a basin-wide, science-based approach that fishery managers across the Great Lakes endorsed in 2018. The Framework calls for a coordinated restoration plan backed by targeted scientific support. In practical terms, that support includes experimental studies and genetic work to clarify what is threatening remaining coregonine stocks that are of conservation concern, and what barriers might prevent successful reintroduction of species that disappeared from particular lakes or regions. The opportunity also highlights a central challenge: while reintroduction and hatchery-based supplementation are already being used and will likely be essential for recovery, the Great Lakes basin has limited capacity to run controlled experiments that compare and refine the best methods for capturing, transporting, rearing, and stocking fish in ways that reliably produce strong survival and re-establishment.

A key example described in the notice is Lake Ontario, where several coregonine species that were lost locally still persist in other parts of the basin such as Lake Superior. That situation creates both an opportunity and a technical challenge: source populations exist, but restoration success depends on developing and validating rearing techniques for rare deepwater forms and ensuring that hatchery-produced fish closely match wild fish in the traits that matter for long-term persistence. The announcement emphasizes the importance of producing hatchery fish that are genetically appropriate and that retain wild-like morphology and behavior, since differences in these areas can reduce fitness, disrupt local adaptation goals, or undermine restoration outcomes.

Through this cooperative agreement, the USGS is seeking a CESU partner that can provide experimental support to USGS stations in Cortland, New York and Oswego, New York. The intent is to expand the scientific foundation available to restoration practitioners by increasing the ability to conduct applied experiments, integrate genetics and other diagnostic tools, and generate actionable findings that can be used by managers implementing the Framework across the basin. Because this is a cooperative agreement rather than a standard grant, it implies substantial involvement by the USGS in shaping and carrying out the work in partnership with the recipient, which is consistent with CESU program goals of linking federal science needs with university and partner expertise.

Administratively, the opportunity is listed as a discretionary financial assistance award under the USGS, with an assistance listing (CFDA) number of 15.808 and a science and technology/research and development activity category. Only organizations that are official participating partners in the Great Lakes-Northern Forest CESU are eligible to apply. The opportunity number is G23AS00320, it was created on March 21, 2023, and the original closing date was April 21, 2023. The stated award ceiling is $3,500,000, indicating the project could be relatively large in scale depending on the final scope, staffing, facilities, and experimental design needed to support the USGS stations and the broader coregonine restoration science agenda.

• The Geological Survey in the science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Cooperative Agreement for CESU-affiliated Partner with Great Lakes-Northern Forest Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 15.808.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2023-03-21.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2023-04-21. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $3,500,000.00 in funding.
• Eligible applicants include: Others.

Apply for G23AS00320

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