People

Meet the team!

Dr. Lisa M. Ellsworth
Assistant Professor

Lisa's research program is focused on the interactions among people, plants and animals, and disturbance processes in Western rangelands and forests. She uses both field and modeling techniques to investigate how management alternatives modify risk and resilience to wildfire and to post-fire recovery. Lisa is also a science communication fellow with the Wilburforce Foundation, and believes strongly that strengthening the ties between people and place through education and outreach is one of our most important tools to conserve landscapes.

Andres Schmidt
Research Associate, Fisheries and Wildlife Science

As a physical geographer with a strong background in complex data analysis and spatial modeling, Andres is interested in the exploration and analysis of the ever-increasing richness of data from remote sensing projects or measurement networks including species distributions, land cover and land use information, forest fire fuel repositories, and long-term climate data. His research focuses on the application of process models, machine learning methods, neural networks to analyze and model a variety of geophysical processes associated with a changing climate reaching from atmosphere-land exchange to wildfire risk assessments. Andres is the lead spatial analyst for the Wildfire Resilience project.
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7110-6652
RESEARCHGATE: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Andres_Schmidt

Paige Stephens
M.S. Student, Wildlife Science

Paige's research is focused on investigating the use of large downed wood as post-fire refugia for terrestrial salamanders in Pacific Northwest Forests. Her research interests include forest restoration ecology and fire ecology. She received a B.S. in Biology from Southern Oregon University Honors College with a focus on field, organismal, and ecological studies. She has prior experience working as a Forest Ecology Technician in mixed-conifer forests of the Western U.S., as a Biotechnology Laboratory Assistant at Southern Oregon University, and as an NSF Research Experience for Undergraduates Research Fellow at the University of Virginia Blandy Experimental Farm.

Blaise Hoene
B.S. Honors Student, Animal Science

Originally from Idaho, Blaise came to OSU for undergrad to study Animal Science. With an interest in the relationships between animals and the environment, her current research involves using targeted grazing to reduce the impacts of wildfire.

Claire Williams
B.S. Honors Student, Environmental Sciences

Claire is a senior majoring in Environmental Sciences with a specialization in ecology and GIS. She is currently completing an undergraduate honors thesis on the effects of fuel reduction treatments on future fire behavior in juniper woodland ecosystems in the SageSTEP network. Before starting her thesis, she helped build fuel models for research on how fuel reduction treatments modify fire behavior in the sagebrush steppe. She hopes to begin a M.S. in ecology after graduation.

Danielle Beazer
M.S. Student, Environmental Sciences

Danielle graduated from Great Basin Community College with BA in Integrative Studies with emphasis in Natural Resources. Her internship involved creating a geologic field guide, and editing videos for the educational youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cfDfXp4YLA . She spent 2018 summer with GBI NCC doing fuels reduction, and Great Basin wild rye wetlands restoration. She spent 2019 and 2020 summers with the Forest Service in Elko as a Rangeland Management Technician. This is her first year as an OSU Graduate Student, where she will be working on the SageSTEP project. She and spends free time with her dogs, reading, and LARPing.

Traci Bond
Graduate Certificate Student, Wildlife Management

Growing up in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountain range in California, Traci’s youth was filled with hiking, backpacking, and skiing. After being thoroughly inoculated with a love for the outdoors she attended UC Davis and completed a degree in Ecology and is currently finishing up a masters certificate in wildlife management from OSU. Traci spent her time as an undergrad working in the Tahoe basin studying mountain pine beetles and forest pathogens before landing a job in Santa Cruz. Since moving to the coast she has worked for CalFire and California State parks. Her work has spanned the San Mateo Coast from Monterey into the Santa Cruz Mountains. When not at work outdoors or trail running with her two dogs, you can find Traci in her garden, sewing and knitting, or baking up a storm.

Lab Alumni

Dr. Jacob Dittel
Postdoctoral Research Associate

I study species interactions and animal behavior, with the focus of my research at the intersection of animal behavior and seed dispersal. Specifically, I research the mutualisms between plants and their animal dispersers as well as the interactions among seed dispersers. With little known about what factors influence the distribution or strength of the mutualisms, I am interested in further understanding broad-scale distributions of seed dispersal mutualisms and identifying important factors that either facilitate or hinder the relationships. Most of my research revolves around the food-hoarding behaviors of rodents and how it affects their communities. I am interested in how the behavior of these rodents effects plant communities (via food hoarding behaviors) and how a specific behavior, seed-cache pilfering, may facilitate competitor coexistence. Recently, my research has focused on how rodents may influence the invasion front in sage-steppe habitats. Specifically, how rodent seed preference and changing landscapes from invasions may affect how and where native plants are dispersed.

Jake is now an an Assistant Professor at Northern Alabama University
Website: http://dittelj.wixsite.com/deepsquirrelthoughts

Elizabeth Schuyler
Ph.D. Student

I am a doctoral researcher at Oregon State University and the focus of my research is on understanding how mule deer respond to multiple and interacting management techniques, as well as natural disturbances. My research approach is largely based on applied ecology, in which I use spatial and statistical modeling to understand resource selection and population dynamics of large ungulates. I feel that as ecologists, we play a critical role in understanding the drivers of change in wildlife populations so that we can make well informed conservation and management decisions.

Lizz is now a Postdoctoral Scholar at Oregon State University

Schyler Reis
M.S. Student

My research focuses on developing a comprehensive and holistic understanding of how future climate scenarios will affect plant community distribution and ultimately the fuels and fire disturbance events that will precede community shifts. This is something I feel is of the utmost importance for developing proactive management actions, and constructive ecological predictions, aimed at conserving the widespread, yet delicate ecosystems of the semi-arid American West.

I am currently exploring how Soil-Plant-Atmospheric interactions, climate driven disturbance regulated plant community shifts, and long-term sagebrush dynamics interact. By embracing remote sensing technologies, I hope to revolutionize how data is collected, analyzed, and communicated, ultimately aiming towards aiding in the development of a more predictive discipline of ecology.

In Schyler's spare time he creates art depicting the beauty of the sagebrush biome and generally entertains the rest of the lab group with poems and songs, field costumes, and weird food.

Schyler is now a PhD student at Oregon State University

Danielle Jackson

I am a student studying Natural Resources and Sustainability at Oregon State University and plan on achieving my B.S. in the Spring of 2019. My goal is to pursue a career working to restore and conserve fish and wildlife habitat within the Pacific Northwest through both research and policy changing. For too long our society has focused on being reactive to ecological issues. I would like to change that mindset and create a more forward thinking approach by looking ahead and predicting possible ecological issues and use proactive conservation efforts in order to mitigate or deter them completely.

Dani joined the lab in Summer 2017 working on the Post-Fire Recovery project

Dan Marvin
Professional Science Master (2016)
Fisheries and Wildlife Administration

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