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2006 raptor counters Sue (left) and Corrie "enjoying" a late October snow squall. 

Staff: Fall 2009

Executive Director Janelle Long
   
RAPTOR RESEARCH  
Raptor Banding Research David Evans
Spring Research Coordinator Frank Nicoletti
(fall & spring) Raptor & Passerine Counter Karl Bardon
Raptor Counter Aldo Contreras Reyes
Raptor Bander Shawn Hawks
Raptor Bander John Gorey
Raptor Bander Larry Clemente

PASSERINE RESEARCH

 
Passerine Research Dave Grosshuesch
EDUCATION  
Education Director Debbie Waters
Volunteer Coordinator & Naturalist Julie O'Connor
Naturalist Sarah Glesner
Naturalist Beth Miller
Naturalist Mariah Jeske
Naturalist Tara Haynes
Naturalist Heidi Faris
Count Interpreter Erik Bruhnke
Count Interpreter Katie Brown

The Hawk Ridge staff consists of employees, volunteers and contractors.
 


218.428.6209
jlong@hawkridge.org

Janelle Long grew up in Greenfield, WI where her childhood days were filled with explorations of any nearby forest, field, or pond.  The connections she made with nature had a lifelong impact on her career interests.  She attended the University of WI - Stevens Point to complete degrees in Wildlife Management and Biology with a minor in Conservation Biology.  A whole new world in the outdoors was revealed to her through the hands-on courses, field trips, and enthusiastic professors.  She vividly remembers the excitement she felt seeing her first Sandhill Crane and Pileated Woodpecker.  From that point on, she was hooked on birds and couldn't wait to see and learn more.  Janelle spent three summers helping out with Ph.D. bird research projects at Great Smoky Mountain Nat'l Park in TN, the grasslands of southwestern WI, and the Shawnee Nat'l Forest in IL. Her passion and concern for birds and the environment were heightened as she witnessed population declines due to habitat loss, cowbird parasitism, predation, etc.   

This led her to the next phase in her career in the field of environmental education.  Janelle's journey began by spending a year teaching at four Audubon Centers in NM, CT, VT, and ME.  In 2003 she began a graduate naturalist program at Wolf Ridge Environmental Learning Center in Minnesota.  From Wolf Ridge she continued her graduate work and completed her M.Ed. in Environmental Education at the University of MN - Duluth in 2005.  Janelle worked for two years for the Bureau of Land Management as the Education Coordinator at Yaquina Head Outstanding Natural Area on the Oregon coast.  She continues to dedicate her time and share her interests for bird conservation and environmental education as the executive director.  She hopes to promote stewardship for Hawk Ridge and help others establish their special lifelong connection to nature. 

David Evans has been at Hawk Ridge since 1972, when he started the raptor banding station.  (What was intended to be a temporary interlude from his agricultural interests turned into an avocation gone severely awry!)  In the "off" season, he has participated in many raptor studies; notably, banding nestling Bald Eagles in Wisconsin since 1970, translocation of nestling Bald Eagles from Alaska and Wisconsin as well as Wisconsin Ospreys to less "blessed" states, banding nestling Ferruginous and Swainson's Hawks in North Dakota, and monitoring nesting Peregrine Falcons in Duluth and on the North Shore.  And, in the off "off" season, studying wintering Snowy Owls in the Duluth-Superior harbor since 1973. 

(And he still reads his Wisconsin farm paper every week!)


fnicoletti@hawkridge.org

Frank Nicoletti grew up in New York State along the Hudson River where he started watching raptors at the age of 11. His passion for raptors and other birds fueled him to work at various locations including Cape May and Sandy Hook NJ, Braddock Bay NY and in Israel. From 1984 until 1996 he traveled throughout the country and conducted various raptor related projects which included nesting surveys, tracking winter raptors and migration work. He arrived in Duluth in 1991 to count raptors and to witness the invasion of the Northern Goshawk and he conducted the count until 2005. After moving to Duluth permanently in the fall of 1996, he conducted the first spring count of raptor migrating north in Minnesota along the West Skyline Parkway of Duluth. This study ran from 1997-2005. Frank continues to study raptors and has been concentrating on boreal forest owls and managing raptor banding sites. He has published a number of papers on birds and has helped with many authors working on books and articles.

He lives just north of Duluth with his wife, Kate and two dogs, Chester and Phoebe. Frank’s excited to take on the spring migration as spring research coordinator.

Although Karl Bardon has traveled around the country doing various field projects with birds, his favorite jobs are those spent counting birds. The road to Hawk Ridge has included such diverse projects as radio-tracking eiders in the Arctic, studying trans-Gulf migration from an oil-platform off Louisiana, and nest searching for Tapaculos in the temperate rainforests of Chile. When it comes to counting birds, Karl’s specialty has been waterbirds, having spent many seasons as the waterbird counter at Whitefish Point, Michigan, and Cape May, New Jersey.  But after witnessing the awesome migration through Veracruz, Mexico as an official hawk counter in 2006, he has decided raptors are pretty cool, too.  Karl is back for his third season as a raptor counter and also the passerine counter!

Aldo Contreras Reyes hails from Chavarrillo, Veracruz, Mexico, where he started birding and watching hawks at the age of 15. Amongst his many talents, Aldo is a published digital photographer, a birding/nature guide for Cafaselva (an ecotourism group based in his hometown), has volunteered and counted for the Veracruz River of Raptors project of Pronatura Veracruz, counted raptors in the Manzano Mountains for Hawk Watch International and last but certainly not least, Aldo started a spring count in Chavarrillo to document the hundreds of thousands of raptors that migrate past as well as roost in the adjacent mountain forest. It took Aldo three weeks and his inexhaustible energy to build a tower for the Chavarrillo spring count. Once Aldo counted 600,000 roosting Swainson's Hawks using "his" mountain. Another of Aldo's passions is teaching children about raptors and through their experiences he hopes to impart a conservation ethic. Aldo is eager to experience the fun of counting Rough-legged Hawks in the teeth of a northwest wind.

Shawn Hawks was born in Pocahontas, Iowa--a tiny agricultural town in the prairie pothole region of northwest Iowa. At a young age he enjoyed hunting waterfowl, pheasants, Hungarian partridge and whitetail deer, but enjoyed waterfowl hunting the most. Shawn also enjoyed fishing and traveling with his family. After graduating with a double undergraduate degree in Biology and Conservation Management from Upper Iowa University in tiny Fayette, Iowa, Shawn pursued a graduate degree in Zoology at North Dakota State University in Fargo, North Dakota. He has extensive experience in avian population ecology and hopes to pursue a Ph.D. researching metapopulation dynamics. Some recent experiences, however, have taught him that the most important things in his life are his family and having good long-lasting friendships. He also enjoys SCUBA diving and live music performances, especially rockabilly bluegrass!

John Gorey is interested in bird and mammal conservation.  He enjoys being outside running, hiking, kayaking, camping and biking.  John also loves to identify the natural world during his activities--birding, mushroom hunting and herping.  He uses any excuse to be outside!  Being a raptor bander at Hawk Ridge in 2008 was his first job after graduating from Murray State in Wildlife Biology and now on his second season with us, he couldn't be happier.  John plans to continue working seasonal jobs until he has to return to school for further advancement.  As far as he's concerned, the longer that takes, the better!
After studying songbirds for two seasons, Larry Clemente is pleased to be working with raptors. As a recent graduate from college in New York, he is learning the correct procedures for field biology and plans on working with birds until returning to the world of academics for graduate school. He is not getting bitten or nailed as much as his first week at Hawk Ridge, but still lives in mortal fear of being on the business end of a Golden Eagle's talons. Larry hopes to one day be the world's greatest biologist.


dgross@hawkridge.org

Dave Grosshuesch is originally from Howard's Grove, WI and now lives in Duluth, Minnesota.  Dave got involved in field research in 1991, and has worked on many projects, including nesting studies, surveys, and migration banding in Wisconsin, Louisiana, California, British Columbia, Minnesota, and North Dakota.  He also worked with mammals on the Canada Lynx project in Minnesota.  He earned a B.S. in Wildlife Management and Biology at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point in 1994 and began working at Hawk Ridge in 1995 as a raptor bander.  A year later he started his passerine study and bands an average of 5,400 birds each fall season.  Dave finished his master's degree in biology from the University of Minnesota Duluth in 2009.  He continues to coordinate the passerine banding operation while working full time for the US Forest Service.


218.428.3539
dwaters@hawkridge.org

Debbie Waters grew up near Marquette in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.  She first became enamored with birds while studying ornithology at Northern Michigan University, from which she received her B.S. in Ecology in 1996.  Debbie has worked on many avian research projects: banding woodcock, surveying loons, wetland bird surveys, passerine surveys, raptor surveys and both passerine and raptor nest monitoring, as well as studying deer populations and amphibians.  She received her M.Ed. in Environmental Education from the University of Minnesota Duluth.  Debbie began her career as the Hawk Ridge naturalist in the 2001 season, became the education director in 2005, and continues to enjoy sharing her passion for birds with visitors.

 


218.348.2291
joconnor@hawkridge.org

Julie O'Connor is a Duluth original!  Her family moved to Alaska when she was young, where her dad first introduced her to birds of prey--an injured owl was dropped off at their house, and he rehabilitated it (it was the 70's!).  After moving back to Minnesota, a few years of "life on the farm" exposed her to Minnesota's abundant ecosystem.  Julie spent ten years in restaurant management before deciding to return to the University of Minnesota Duluth, where she earned her B.S. in Outdoor Recreation and Environmental Education.  Her re-introduction to Hawk Ridge as an adult occurred in 2001 while attending a spring banding program with Dave Grosshuesch and volunteering at the Main Overlook that same fall.  In 2002 she became the volunteer coordinator and has been leading the success of the volunteer program ever since.

 

Sarah Glesner has lived in Duluth her entire life, most of that time spent looking up at Hawk Ridge. Her love of the outdoors and of birds began at an early age when her mother would take her outside to watch kettles of hawks over their home. This love of animals transformed into a desire to educate. As a result, Sarah spent two years volunteering at the Lake Superior Zoo as a docent, then working as the Junior Docent Coordinator and now as their Volunteer Coordinator. During her time at the zoo, she was able to handle some wonderful little birds. After staring into their beady little eyes, she decided it was true love! This is Sarah's third year up at the ridge as staff; she was a count interpreter in 2007, a naturalist in 2008 and she is thrilled to be part of the team as a naturalist again this fall.
Beth Miller grew up in Duluth about two miles from the Ridge as the hawk flies, or about three miles as the bike rides. She has visited Hawk Ridge since about 1973, riding over on bikes with friends during junior and senior high school. (Never skipping class to do this, of course.) Inspired by the "old" John Denver song "The Eagle and The Hawk," she caught the raptor bug in the early 1970's as a result of these early visits to the Ridge. She has been passionate (or obsessed) about raptors ever since.

Beth has volunteered at the Ridge since the volunteer program began in 2002, and joined the staff in 2006. She got her B.A.S. in Education from UMD too many years ago to mention, and her M.Ed in Educational Media/Technology from St. Scholastica in 1993. She moonlights as a fourth grade science teacher in one of Duluth's public schools, teaching science to fourth graders for the last 16 years. She teaches her students that migrating hawks are a perfectly good reason to drop everything, grab some binoculars and got outside to check out the flight. Students have been known to summon her from the teachers' lounge if they spot a good hawk flight during lunch recess, because spotting a good hawk flight is worth extra credit in science.

Mariah grew up in Lake Elmo, Minnesota spending her free time exploring the outdoors near her house.  Her curiosity about nature and wildlife developed at an early age and stemmed from numerous camping and canoeing trips into wilderness settings across the U.S.  As she grew up, her interest and love for nature and its living creatures directed her career path.  She currently has one year of classes left at the University of Minnesota Duluth and in May of 2009 she graduated with an Outdoor Education degree and a business minor.  Mariah had developed an interest in birds and ever since volunteering at Hawk Ridge in the fall of 2006 she has become more fascinated with them.  Mariah has been with Hawk Ridge as an intern since June of 2008, working as a naturalist at the Peregrine Watch program and also performing various internal organizational tasks.  She feels very fortunate to have had the experience of interning at Hawk Ridge and is excited to be working as a naturalist during the fall migration.

Tara Haynes grew up on the outskirts of Duluth, spending much of her time exploring her backyard deciduous forests and swamps. Since graduating with a B.A. from the University of Minnesota Duluth, Tara has spent years working in education and social work, and several summers working seasonal outdoor jobs (in the BWCA, Alaska and Colorado) due to her love of nature and adventure. In 2005 she first visited Hawk Ridge during the fall migration and was captivated with the display of a Red-tailed Hawk! Tara began volunteering during the fall of 2006, joined the staff in 2007 and she is excited to continue learning about raptors while educating Hawk Ridge's visitors again this season.

Heidi Faris is originally from Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. She moved to Duluth two years ago to work at the Lake Superior Zoo as the education program coordinator. After working with several different animals the sassiness of raptors got her hooked. Heidi spent her childhood playing outdoors, camping and catching crayfish and frogs in the nearby river. She graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh with a B.S. in Geology and is currently attending the University of Minnesota Duluth for her M.Ed. in Environmental Education. Heidi spent the past 7 years teaching at various outdoor education facilities, educating students of all ages about the environment. Getting people involved in the outdoors and appreciating nature is something she strives for in her job at the Lake Superior Zoo and while continuing her second year as a naturalist at Hawk Ridge.

Erik Bruhnke grew up in Waukesha, WI and has been passionate about nature and the environment ever since he was a young boy. Erik worked at Wild Birds Unlimited through high school, and has been captivated by birdwatching as a result of this bird job. He graduated in May 2008 from Northland College in Ashland, WI with a B.S. in Natural Resources and Biology. During his time at college, he took advantage of the excellent birding opportunities throughout Chequamegon Bay (Ashland/Bayfield area). By the time of his graduation, Erik had observed 248 species within a 30-40 mile radius of campus. He teacher-assisted the field ornithology & ornithology classes a total of three times and also explored northwestern Mexico on a ‘Birds of Mexico’ spring course. His friends and faculty refer to him as ‘Birdman’ orBirdfeeder.’ He thinks of birds as a healthy obsession, which he loves to share with and inspire others.

In 2008 Erik received the ‘Volunteer of the Year Award’ from the Ashland Fish and Wildlife Conservation Office, for conducting weekly migratory waterfowl surveys over three years. Erik has also worked in North Dakota conducting nest surveys & nest monitoring along an oil pipeline installation. Throughout the summer of 2007, he was privileged to work with Dave Grosshuesch and Jim Lind to conduct breeding bird surveys for University of Minnesota Duluth. Erik is excited to be working at Hawk Ridge as a count interpreter again this fall!!

Katie Brown-Mesedahl grew up in Duluth, Minnesota. Despite her longtime proximity to Hawk Ridge, she first began visiting as a volunteer in 2006. It was here where she became fascinated with birds and migration. Katie earned a B.S. in Ecology and Biology and minored in Environmental Studies at St. Could State University in 2003. Since that time, Katie has worked various field jobs in the Dakotas and in Minnesota, studying a variety of subjectsk, from malformations to exotic species. She also worked in an environmental laboratory as a biologist for a few years. During this past year, Katie earned a teaching license from the College of St. Scholastica and recently became employed as a science teacher. Katie loves to be outdoors and is thrilled to be back as a count interpreter again this fall!