FLTWS 2010 Spring Conference

Plenary Presentation Information

Thursday, April 22, 2010, 8:00 am - 12:00 pm

 

Welcoming Remarks from the Assistant Executive Director of FWC – Greg Holder – Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

Greg Holder, M.S.

Greg Holder is employed by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) as the Assistant Executive Director.  In his role he is responsible for overseeing and managing wildlife programs and the staff of FWC.  He has served as the FWC’s Southwest Regional director for the past 17 years.  Previously he worked as a wildlife biologist, focusing on game animals, alligators, imperiled species and wetlands management in Central and South Florida.  He started his career with the Commission in 1980.

Holder earned his bachelor’s degree in forestry management and his master’s degree in wildlife ecology, both at Mississippi State University.

                                                                 

 

Longleaf Ecosystems:  Where we are, how we got here, where we're headed – Rhett Johnson – Longleaf Alliance

 

Rhett Johnson, M.S.

Rhett Johnson is a wildlife biologist and forester with degrees from North Carolina State University and Clemson University.  Rhett worked as a wildlife researcher at the Belle Baruch Forest Science Institute where he participated in studies on songbirds, red-cockaded woodpeckers, and feral hogs before he accepted the position as the first Director of Auburn University’s teaching and research forest, the Solon Dixon Forestry Center near Andalusia, Alabama.  In 1995, Rhett and Dean Gjerstad, another Auburn School of Forestry faculty member, co-founded the Longleaf Alliance.  After retirement from Auburn in 2006, Rhett continued in his role with the Alliance, eventually becoming the President of the Longleaf Alliance, Inc., the non-profit organization that the Longleaf Alliance became.  Rhett has served as the President of the Alabama Wildlife Federation, Chair of the Alabama Chapter of the Wildlife Society,  Chair of both the Alabama Society of American Foresters and the Southeastern SAF, and Chair of the Alabama State Board of Registration for Foresters.  He was named a Wildlife Conservationist of the Year in Alabama in 1985 and Forest Conservationist of the Year in Alabama in 2005.  He is an SAF Fellow and was elected to the Alabama Forestry Hall of Fame in 2005.

                                                                                                              

                                                                                        

Countering the Broadleaf Invasion: Financial and Carbon Consequences of Removing Hardwoods during Longleaf Pine Savanna Restoration – Francis E. (Jack) Putz – University of Florida

Francis E. “Jack” Putz, Ph. D.

  Francis E. “Jack” Putz is a Professor of Botany at the University of Florida and a Special Professor of International Conservation at Utrecht University in The Netherlands. As a conservation biologist he is somewhat unusual insofar as he conducts research on forests actively managed for timber with the goal of making this management more ecologically sound. Whether in the Amazonian lowlands of Bolivia or the pine savannas of Florida, he strives to assure that forests can provide income and at the same time protect species, biological communities, and ecosystem functions.  To promote forest conservation through sustainable utilization he focuses on economic mechanisms for paying for good management, including both forest-based carbon offsets and forest product certification. 

                                                        

Ecological Restoration of Longleaf Pine Systems at The Nature Conservancy’s Disney Wilderness Preserve – Monica Folk, Ph. D. & Jennifer Milikowski – The Nature Conservancy

 Monica Folk, Ph.D.

Monica Folk has been a biologist, planner and science manager with The Nature Conservancy since February 1992. Dr. Folk’s training is in wildlife ecology and management, with a specialty in conservation of natural systems and endangered species protection. Her experience includes several decades of work on the endangered Key deer, conservation and management planning for TNC preserves, mitigation project development, and leadership of a long-term ecological research program at the Disney Wilderness Preserve in central Florida. She has written numerous land management plans and scientific reports, as well as a watershed conservation analysis, restoration procedures manual and several other educational documents. She has been an instructor with the Natural Areas Training Academy since its inception in 1998. Her long-term research and conservation interests include restoration of ecological processes, listed species population restoration and management, wetland restoration monitoring and use of mitigation as a conservation tool. She currently manages permit compliance and science programs at the Disney Wilderness Preserve, where she has worked since it was established in late 1992.

                                                                                      

 

Shifted Baseline of Ecological Conditions on the Apalachicola National Forest – Chuck Hess – The US Forest Service

Chuck Hess, M.S.

Chuck Hess is currently a wildlife biologist on the Apalachicola National Forest.  He completed his BS and MS at Florida State University and is currently a doctoral candidate, studying the conversion of slash pine plantations back to longleaf.  He has been working and studying the red-cockaded woodpeckers of the Apalachicola National Forest since 1989 and was instrumental in the development of the translocation program for this woodpecker to other conservation lands in the southeast.   His primary areas of interest are red-cockaded woodpeckers, forest management and the importance of fire on the landscape.

                                            

Herbert Stoddard, Ecosystem Management, and the Effects of Lightning-season Burning on Breeding Birds – Jim Cox – Tall Timbers

Jim Cox, M.S.

Jim Cox is the Vertebrate Ecologist at Tall Timbers Research Station.  He received his M.Sc. from Florida State University and worked as a biologist with FFWCC for many years before moving to Tall Timbers. Most of his time at Tall Timbers is spent chasing Red-cockaded Woodpeckers, Bachman’s Sparrows, Brown-headed Nuthatches, and other declining birds associated with southern pine forests.  He also is engaged in land-conservation efforts in the Red Hills region that make use of conservation easements, Safe Harbor agreements, and other tools developed for private lands.  He taught a popular bird-watching class at Florida State University for several years and continues to try to lure new bodies into the birding community.

                                             

The Game of Risk: Balancing the Competing Habitat Needs of Species and the Military at the Landscape Scale – Kevin Hiers – Eglin Air Force Base

Kevin Hiers, M.S.

Kevin Hiers is currently the Prescribed Fire Program Manager for Eglin AFB. Eglin AFB applies prescribed fire to more than 100,000 acres annually and managers the largest tracts of contiguous tracts of longleaf pine remaining in the Southeast, including the largest old-growth remnants of longleaf pine in the SE. He has spent the last 15 years at the interface of fire science and management on both public and private lands. Prior to his current position at Eglin, he worked as a Research Fire Ecologist for the J. W. Jones Ecological Research Center in Newton, GA, and has more than 30 scientific publications on ecological forestry, restoration of longleaf pine ecosystems, fire effects on wildlife habitat, fire behavior, and forest ecology.

Additionally, he has held positions at Tall Timbers Research Station and The Nature Conservancy.  His interests include ecological monitoring, fire effects on wildlife at multiple scales, understanding the role of variability in maintaining diversity in longleaf pine ecosystems. He completed an undergraduate degree in environmental studies at the University of the South and received his MS in Conservation Ecology from the University of Georgia.