Visiting Professional Workshops

The primary purpose of the Visiting Professionals travel grants is to provide a diversity of field oriented experiences for students working with natural resource professionals at Taylor Ranch Field Station.  A second purpose is to introduce professionals, university faculty, agency scientists, or educators to the field station to stimulate interest in development of future research or educational activities from the field station.  Up to $1,000 in travel expenses is available to each recipient.  For details see the 2007 Visiting Professionals Application.  Applications will be accepted throughout the year if funding is still available after the initial deadline of February 15th.
 
Prior Year Workshops

The class spent their days in dry suits snorkeling the icy three-degree waters of Rush Creek and Big Creek, exploring a range of habitats available to over-wintering juvenile salmonids, from active beaver ponds, beneath the footbridge, deep pools, and quick-running riffles. Students were afforded glimpses of mountain whitefish, spotted sculpin, and adult steelhead.










Students participated in a PIT-tagging tutorial with the Idaho Fish and Game fish screw trap in place on Big Creek. All students had the opportunity to assist in the daily weir activities and to PIT tag juvenile steelhead. In addition, students collected aquatic invertebrates at Cougar Creek, hiked to the top of the benches, and calculated discharge measurements in Big Creek.  The class departed the station with memorable wildlife sightings and the field experience necessary to place into context some of the recent fisheries work published on Central Idaho river systems.

As climate warming brings reduced snowpack and increased water deficits, ecosystem productivity is reduced and species shifts become widespread. The objective of Dr. Kavanagh’s research is to improve monitoring tools for understanding the biophysical processes influencing productivity in complex mountainous ecosystems, while specifically addressing the depth and magnitude of the cold air pool surrounding the Taylor Ranch weather station. The climate data at Taylor Ranch is one of the few long-term data sets within a wilderness area, and is very valuable for assessing potential impacts of climate change on ecosystem productivity. Temperature and relative humidity will be monitored along an elevational transect installed upslope of the weather station.

Summer students at Taylor Ranch will gain hands-on experience in this work, including instruction on processing and interpreting elevational transect data, and will receive instruction on the cascade effects of climate change on the timing, magnitude, and duration of mountain snowpacks.

Mazeika Sullivan, Research Scientist at the University of Idaho, will return to the Taylor Wilderness Research Station in 2008 for a continuation of his study on the American dipper (Cinclus mexicanus), and a reprise of his 2007 workshop on the ecology of riverine birds.  Dippers occupy fast-flowing mountain streams and cold-water coastal streams, and their reliance on clear, unpolluted water make dippers excellent indicators of water quality and valuable biomonitors of the cumulative effects of landscape changes in montane watersheds. Sullivan’s study investigates differences in dipper food sources, reproductive measures, and breeding population characteristics across a range of landuse types across Idaho to determine the effects of landscape changes such as logging, grazing, and other uses of mountain resources.

Sullivan’s workshop will address aquatic and semi-aquatic bird ecology, sampling and survey techniques, morphological measurements, feather and blood collection, and behavioral observation methodology. These methods will be applied to a suite of riverine birds, including dippers, mergansers, sandpipers, and kingfishers. Students will also be permitted to participate in Sullivan’s study over the course of the week.

Each year, 15 graduate students begin their graduate residential semester at the McCall Outdoor Science School (MOSS) with an intensive 3-week training session in ecosystem science, teaching methods, and outdoor leadership. These students then serve as field instructors to over 2,500 Idaho K-12 students, teachers, and parents in residential and outreach settings throughout the following school year.

Their training will now include a backcountry component, where students put curriculum concepts into practice at the Taylor Wilderness Research Station. Students will backpack into the station, take part in field sessions on local flora and fauna, and be exposed to the ongoing field research conducted at the station during their 2-day stay.