Category: ecology
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It’s Okay to Pull Back (Or, Confessions of a Would-Be Entomologist)
Friday, I met my student, Gabrielle, on a frosty spring morning to set up traps for her capstone project. Gabrielle is following up on work begun last year assessing the impact of stem nester refugia on native bee communities in prairie remnants at Jerry Smith Park. Sampling in 2020 hit some roadblocks due to the…
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Farewell, 2020
As this extraordinary year winds down, I find myself reflecting not so much on what 2020 took away, but on the surprise gifts this year left on my doorstep even as it demanded a transformative, dramatic shifts in pretty much everything that I do. Nothing will recover the 340,000+ American lives lost this year due…
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School of Natural and Applied Sciences at Avila U
On some of the many reasons I’m happy and excited to become Chair of the School of Natural and Applied Sciences (SNAS) at Avila University. #AvilaProud #AvilaSTEM #AvilaSNAS
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(Re)Connecting Wild
I promised I’d share some inspiring stories from NACCB2020, so this week I’m embedding the short film (Re)Connecting Wild from NineCaribou Productions. (Re)Connecting Wild documents the efforts of the Nevada Department of Transportation and partners to re-connect an historic mule deer migration route. Projects like these protect wildlife as well as human life and property,…
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Virtual Inspiration
By February of this year, when Covid-19 was just making its presence known in the U.S., my summer calendar was booked. Early June, I planned to attend the Society for Ecological Restoration’s (SER) global conference in Quebec. By midsummer, I would be at Kenyon College in Ohio teaching their summer Young Science Writers program. My…
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Words of Courage, Comfort, and Contemplation
There are small things I can point to as bright spots inside the pandemic. Among these, I’ve discovered the pleasure of podcasts. I know: I’m years behind on this one. I’d never listened to podcasts before March 2020, but being away from the office – and people in general – nudged me into finding new…
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Reconnecting
Normally this time of year I would be at my annual Women’s Writing Retreat, more affectionately known as Dollbabies Week. Like so many other spring activities and conferences, that plan was washed away by the tide of Covid-19. My literary colleagues and I have organized a remote edition instead. It won’t be the same, but…
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Bees in the Time of Covid-19
Life has been transformed in the past couple weeks for pretty much everyone in the United States, and around the world. At Avila University, faculty, staff and students have undertaken a monumental effort to move our entire spring curriculum online. Virtual classes started yesterday, almost all of us wading into unknown territory. On the bright…
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Urban Habitats for Native Bees
I’m happy to report that my article on native bees in urban habitats is now available in this month’s issue of Ecological Restoration. Based on work completed with my Honors Biology student Laura Presler for her capstone project at Avila University, the paper provides evidence for the important role of small remnant habitats in conserving native…
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Dia de la Amistad
My bee page is now updated – check it out for details about our 2020 field season. I’m excited about my projects, coordinated as always with KC Wildlands, KC Parks, and the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC). We’re going to conduct a standardized survey of a unique habitat in the Kansas City area, the rocky…