Member Spotlight

My undergraduate work at Stanford University had an emphasis on marine intertidal ecology but also played baseball while there and represented the USA on their baseball team.  In graduate studies,  I focused on Fisheries for my Masters’ (stream macroinvertebrate community response to organochlorine insecticides and Ph.D. (high mountain glacial lake classification) at Oregon State University.  Since finishing graduate work at OSU, I walked across the street and have worked as a Fishery biologist/ wetland ecologist for CSS, Inc., as a technical services provider to the Environmental Protection Agency in Corvallis Oregon.  Over the years I have worn many hats at the EPA working on a number of national and regional programs involving streams, rivers, and wetlands including the Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program (EMAP), the National aquatic Resource Survey’s (NARS) National Wetland Condition Assessment and most recently, the National Rivers and Streams Assessment.  I’ve classified landscapes and teamed with colleagues to develop models of aquatic vertebrate assemblage integrity and tolerance to evaluate and predict ecological condition of stream and river communities using fish assemblages as an indicator.  I’ve overseen field crews, sampled streams and developed QA methodologies for assessing field crews. Most recently I developed a recreational fisheries index for U.S. streams and rivers that evaluated correspondence with ecological condition. Along the way, my interest in fisheries got me involved with the American Fisheries Society, joining in 1987. I started with the local state chapter in Oregon, then went to my first National Meeting in 2003, to meet other colleagues I had worked with from afar over the years.  Bob Hughes encouraged me to go to my first Water Quality Section meeting that year, talked me into helping with the newsletter, the website and eventually, I ran for Section President, serving from 2007-2009. Soon after, I took over the reins as the Section Secretary/Treasurer, a position I still fill.

Though shocking fish professionally is very effective, I much prefer recreational fishing, particularly saltwater rock fishing where you never quite know what interesting new species might turn up. My interests range from enjoying Celtic music to being an avid mushroom hunter, vegetable gardener, bonsai enthusiast, a propagator of Japanese maples and satsuki azaleas, and love to cook and bake. There just never seems to be enough daylight in a day to get it all in.