The Highlands Biological Foundation will kick off its annual Zahner Conservation Lecture series at 6 p.m. on Thursday, June 15 with Dr. Allen Hurlbert’s program titled “Birds, Big Data, and Citizen Science: Understanding the Impacts of Global Change,” with a small reception to follow.
As the world undergoes various facets of environmental change – from warming, to habitat loss, to shifts in seasonality – everyday people can help scientists understand the impacts on natural ecosystems through citizen science. In this talk, Hurlbert will provide examples of how citizen science has enhanced our understanding of how global change impacts birds and insect bird food across North America, and how you can help these efforts.
Hurlbert is an accomplished ecologist and academic leader with extensive experience in studying ecological communities and the processes that shape their diversity and composition. Hurlbert earned his Ph.D. in Biology from the University of New Mexico in 2005. He is currently a Professor of Biology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where he also serves as the Director of Graduate Studies for the Environment, Ecology, and Energy Program.
Hurlbert’s expertise in ecological research is recognized internationally, and he has been a member of the Highlands Biological Station’s Board of Scientific Advisors since 2016.
In his lab, he and his team investigate the structure and dynamics of ecological communities, using a range of approaches from manipulative experiments to modeling and working with global-scale datasets. Their research encompasses both vertebrate and invertebrate species as well as plant communities and aims to understand the factors that determine patterns of diversity, composition, turnover, and relative abundance.
This program is sponsored by Kim and Rich Daugherty and Kathy and Bestor Ward. All are invited to participate in HBF’s free Zahner lectures which will be held at the Highlands Nature Center, 930 Horse Cove Road, on Thursday at 6 p.m. between June 15 and Aug. 10. To preview HBF’s full Zahner lecture lineup, please visit www.highlandsbiological.org. The Highlands Nature Center is part of the Highlands Biological Station, a multi-campus center of WCU.