Academic interests: environmental policy and sustainable ecosystem management,
restoration ecology and conservation biology.
Areas of expertise: native plant propagation for upland prairie and oak savanna
ecosystem restoration projects; native plant garden design and residential
landscape construction specializing in water features; home remodeling.
Dissertation topic: historic, current and future population trends of Oregon
oaks and associated neotropical songbirds.
Education: B.A. Botany with honors, University of Texas, Austin. M.S. Environmental
Sciences (Ecology track) with Wildlife Science minor, OSU.
I was born in Anchorage, Alaska but spent most of my life in Austin, Texas.
After graduating from the University of Texas, I started a landscape design
and construction business that specialized in native plant gardens, ponds
and waterfalls, and garden structures. As founder and president of a community
conservation association, I worked with a broad cross-section of government
agencies and private landowners to promote environmentally appropriate
land uses and conservation of endangered species habitat in the Texas Hill
Country
west of Austin. After many environmental assessments and hundreds of garden
projects, my husband and I decided to leave the sprawl of central Texas
and move to the home of my grandparents and my father--Oregon.
After working as a botanist for Marion County Parks doing upland prairie
restoration and native seed propagation, I began my current life as a grad
student at OSU
to learn more about Pacific Northwest forest and prairie ecosystems. I
am the mother of three great kids, live with golden retrievers, fish and
a calico
cat, and can proudly say that after remodeling 4 houses together, my husband
and I are still happily married.
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