It’s 2020 and this year has been full of surprises and lessons. In fact, one news site (The Atlantic) deemed 2020 as the “second-most traumatic year in American history”, and yet we still have months to go. While quarantining at home, attempting to get work done, I find myself reminiscing about simpler times, and reflecting…

Dr. Barbara Clucas is an Urban Ecologist at Humboldt State University and an alum of UC Davis Animal Behavior graduate group. Last spring, she returned to UCD to give a talk about her recent work examining human-avian interactions in Seattle, Washington and Berlin, Germany. While she was here, she sat down to chat about her…

Dr. Michael Sheehan is currently finishing up a Ruth Kirschstein National Research Service Award postdoctoral fellowship in the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at UC Berkeley working with Prof. Michael Nachman. Next month, he will be starting as an Assistant Professor in Neurobiology and Behavior at Cornell University. Earlier this spring, Dr. Sheehan gave a talk at UC Davis on his…

Athena Aktipis is an Assistant Professor in the Psychology Department at Arizona State University, co-Director of the Human Generosity Project, and Director of Human and Social Evolution and co-founder of the Center for Evolution and Cancer at the University of California, San Francisco.  Dr. Aktipis received her BA in Psychology at Reed College,  her PhD in…

Ellen Ketterson is a Distinguished Professor of Biology and Gender Studies at Indiana University.  Selected by students at UC Davis to give a Storer Lecture, she talked with Ethogram writer Helen Chmura about her life studying the evolution, behavior, and physiology of juncos. The Ethogram: When you were a kid, what did you want to be?…

Preston Wilson is an Associate Professor in the Acoustics and Dynamic Systems & Control program of the Mechanical Engineering Department at the University of Texas in Austin. A native of Texas he received his Bachelor’s degree and Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from University of Texas in Austin and then a PhD in Mechanical Engineering…

I love being out in the field. That’s what drew me into being a behavioral ecologist and so I’m glad…