About Washington Conservation Science

Jon leads the crackerjack Science team in Washington, applying science to maximize conservation impact on the ground and to extend influence on conservation around the world.  Jon got his start in conservation as a butterfly catcher and flower counter, aided by college training in ecology and grade school training in counting to ten and higher.  Since then, Jon’s science career has included research and writing about diverse topics from salmon and endangered species to climate change and conservation return-on-investment.  He is the lead author of the Atlas of Global Conservation and more than two dozen other peer-reviewed publications.  As one of the Conservancy’s global science leaders, Jon has worn a number of hats in the organization before joining the Science team here in Washington, including Science Lead for the Gulf of Mexico program, Director of the Global Climate Change program, Director of Emerging Strategies, and leader of the Global Habitat Assessment Team.  Now he’s back home in Seattle, eager to help protect the places that make Washington so special.  For fun, he likes to walk his dog, watch birds, ride bikes and fly fish.  One at a time is good, two or three at a time is even better. Jon carpools to work in an all-electric car.

Roger grew up in Nigeria where his childhood fascination with natural history was sparked by oiny-going-goings and ungaloos. Similar experiences with odd plants and animals in Washington and later Argentina sent him on a career trajectory studying ecology. Currently, Roger works on conservation of coastal watershed and estuarine biodiversity, focusing on Puget Sound. He is developing tools to help coastal managers assess and restore estuaries, working with partners on a regional monitoring and adaptive management framework for river delta restoration, and identifying links between healthy ecosystems and healthy human communities. As an undergrad, Roger was the only vegetarian Animal Science major. Currently, he is neither a vegetarian nor an animal science professional.

Liane’s work primarily focuses on watershed ecology: in essence, how can we restore ecological processes and functions representative of late-seral forest landscapes to forests and streams found within managed, working-forest landscapes. She lead the design and implementation of a long-term study at TNC’s Ellsworth Creek preserve to evaluate the efficacy of active and passive watershed restoration pathways. This effort included extensive ecological monitoring throughout the watershed in order to quantify pre-treatment conditions, evaluate long-term treatment response, and inform on-the-ground management and restoration practices. Another element of her work that she enjoys is connecting Ellsworth Creek to similar projects throughout the region through groups such as the Pacific Northwest Forest Restoration Learning Network as a way to facilitate communication of scientific information and expand knowledge of watershed restoration. In her spare time, Liane has no plans for competing in the Tour de France but she did make it to the top of the race’s famous Mt. Ventoux during a bike tour of southern France last fall.

Kara has studied coastal areas in Washington and Chile, and has a strong interest in applied conservation and planning.  Her background includes intertidal biodiversity and plankton ecology research, biology education, and science-based planning and adaptive management facilitation.  She currently leads community-based conservation planning to set priorities and develop strategies locally and regionally. Kara is also dedicated to advancing conservation planning and practices and is working on integrating socioeconomic values as well as climate change adaptation science to inform policy and implementation. Kara’s favorite place in the entire world is a Pacific Northwest beach.

Sonia provides science support for central and eastern Washington programs. Her current focus is central Washington, in shrub steppe and dry forest systems (Moses Coulee Conservation Area and Tapash Sustainable Forest Collaborative, respectively). She works with program staff to determine how best to learn from the stewardship and restoration actions taken, and what scientific knowledge or tools can be brought to bear to strengthen the scientific support for decision making. She is currently starting a research project focused on identifying species that can be monitored as indicators of the impacts of climate change in shrub steppe and east-side forests. She is also working with program staff to develop a wheat field restoration experiment, and a monitoring plan to measure progress towards shrub steppe conservation goals.

As a GIS Specialist, Erica provides cartographic and data management support to The Nature Conservancy’s Washington Chapter. She also provides staff with geospatial technical hardware and software assistance and acts as webmaster for the Washington Conservation Science and Planning website. Her passion for both art and the environment is reflected in all of her work. For fun, Erica enjoys buying food at farmer’s markets and cooking gourmet meals.

Julie has been conducting research on migratory birds for over a decade, with a focus on population dynamics of threatened or endangered shorebirds and seaducks. Much of her career has been spent living in a tent, driving a zodiac, and searching for nests in very remote locations of Alaska. She has an M.S. in Wildlife Biology from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, where her research focused on human disturbance of Black Oystercatchers breeding in Kenai Fjords National Park. Julie’s best job ever (aside from Washington TNC of course) was a zodiac diver/ornithologist on south Georgia Island.

As the Conservation Associate, Alycia supports the Conservation Science team, Eastern Washington program, Heritage program, and Collins Northwest Conservation Fund. Her previous work experience includes working for Cascade Land Conservancy and the University of Washington. In her spare time, Alycia is an amateur ghost hunter.

Brad is a Landscape Ecologist with the Washington Chapter’s planning team. He works on habitat connectivity conservation and climate change. Brad is also responsible for Circuitscape, a software package for habitat connectivity modeling. Brad did genetic work on mountain lions for his Ph.D, but the first animal he genotyped was his pet cat.  It didn’t go well- the first sample was contaminated with his own blood when the angry donor scratched him.

Darren grew up in western Ireland where heather, hazel and hawthorn were the backdrop to his early experiences in nature. Later he moved to Washington state where his interest in conservation was nurtured through active participation in volunteer events. He returned to Ireland in 2008 to partake in a master’s program with a very long title. Not only did he spend time in Ireland but he also ended up in the Netherlands and Finland where he became well versed in broad array of topics including mire restoration, metapopulation dynamics and Atlantic salmon biology. The program also indirectly taught him about the strong influence culture plays in the practice of conservation — an important lesson he has taken back with him to the USA. Darren assists the Washington Chapter of The Nature Conservancy in performing complex spatial analyzes. His current projects include developing tools that automate the mapping of wildlife habitat corridors and devising a model to identify priority areas for dry forest conservation. In his free time Darren likes to play with his young son. When he can he escapes into the hills.

Kit grew up in CA and studied birds.  His family ran a injured and orphaned raptor rehabilitation center while he was in junior high and high school to keep him off of the streets.  Kit studied the effects of DDE on eggshell thinning on Peregrine Falcons in central and southern CA.  He then branched out and studied Western Pond Turtles and did his Master’s Thesis on nesting and nest site selection on a coastal CA stream.  He later worked for numerous federal agencies in Oregon doing wildlife work and moved back to CA and worked for a conservation district and the NOAA Restoration Center.  His parents raised alligators and electric catfish at the house he grew up in before he was born so he was destined to work with animals in some capacity.

Ryan started his ecology career in the tree-less prairies of the Midwest, so learning to love the coniferous forests of the Pacific Northwest wasn’t very difficult.  His past research has broadly focused on the response of terrestrial ecosystems to environmental change and human disturbance and our society’s efforts to conserve and restore these ecosystems.  Ryan is now focused on the dynamics of inland forests at community to landscape scales and is closely working with the Tapash Sustainable Forest Collaborative in eastern Washington and the Clearwater Basin Collaborative in northern Idaho.

As a GIS Analyst with the Science Team in support of conservation planning Matthew will be working on spatial data development for Coastal and Marine Spatial Planning on the outer Washington coast and benthic habitat modeling for Puget Sound. A background in physical geography exposed him to surface hydrology modeling, climate variability, land cover change and fragmentation analysis and modeling, GIS, remote sensing and programming. Previous research projects include water quantity and quality modeling for Puget Sound, Chesapeake Bay and Galveston Bay using Natural Capital Project’s InVEST toolbox; predictive land cover modeling of the central Puget Sound; land cover change and fragmentation analysis in the southwestern Amazon; hydrologic modeling and climate variability analysis in Costa Rica; and spatial and temporal scaling of regional scale satellite imagery in Florida. In his spare time Matthew fancies trainspotting, bicycling, camping, composting and berry picking.