Nutrient cycling is crucial for proper functioning of aquatic ecosystems. Animals play an integral part of this process, especially in nutrient poor ecosystems such as the high elevation ponds at the Mexican Cut Nature Preserve. Nutrients such as nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) are both limiting nut

For many animals, group living is an effective strategy to mitigate predation risk and ensure survival. However, in yellow-bellied marmots (Marmota flaviventer), increased sociality is associated with lower female reproductive success, decreased female longevity, and increased over-winter mortality

Blood parasites affect numerous species of birds across the world and can cause serious population declines. Haemosporidian blood parasites in Mountain White-crowned Sparrows (Zonotrichia leucophrys oriantha) are known to affect certain behavioral and morphological characteristics of hosts, includin

This study examines whether climate change alters patterns of local adaptation in Boechera stricta (Brassicaceae). A common garden experiment was established in sites around the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory in Colorado. In the fall of 2017, Dr. Jill Anderson and her lab planted seeds from a

On a global scale, bees are important pollinators but face declining populations. In order to monitor the health of bee populations and communities, accurate sampling methods are needed. One common sampling protocol utilizes a combination of pan-trapping and sweep netting. While pan- trapping has it

Ants are important members of most terrestrial ecosystems, and often forage in plant canopies where they occasionally participate in mutualisms with either the plants, or aphids that live on the plants. To participate in these mutualisms, the ants must first find them, and it is not clear how ants d

Climate warming affects the phenology, abundance and distributions of plants and pollinators. Despite this, there is still limited knowledge on how temperature affects plant- pollinator mutualisms. The ongoing project with Dr. Rebecca E. Irwin in collaboration with David Inouye has been gathering da

Parasite-induced changes to host dispersal potentially influence the distribution of parasites and infection risk for hosts. Gasteromermis is a castrating endoparasitic nematode that infects both males and female mayflies (Baetis bicaudatus) but feminizes male hosts and manipulates them to disperse

1. Changes from historic weather patterns have affected the phenology of many organisms worldwide. Altered phenology can introduce organisms to novel abiotic conditions during growth and modify species interactions, both of which could drive changes in reproduction. 2. We explored how climate change

1. The leaf economic spectrum (LES) describes consistent and strong correlations among plant functional traits in a multidimensional trait space, which reflects fast or slow rate of return on carbon investment in leaves. These relationships between LES functional traits are strong at global scales a

Shifts in the timing of life history events have become an important source of information about how organisms are responding to climate change. Phenological data have generally been treated as purely temporal, with scant attention to the inherent spatial aspects of such data. However, phenological