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AMES, Iowa — In 2021, Iowa licensed nearly 270,000 anglers, whose pastime is estimated to represent more than $500 million annually in economic activity.  

Michael Weber, associate professor in the Department of Natural Resource Ecology and Management, studies a variety of issues that impact fisheries and success for anglers, with help from dedicated graduate students and state biologists. One component of their research seeks to better understand the factors that influence survival rates of stocked fish.

Among the sought-after game fish that attract anglers to the state’s reservoirs and lakes are Walleye and Muskellunge. As these species do not naturally reproduce in Iowa reservoirs, their existence here depends entirely on the success of stocking.

AMES, Iowa – Birds captured Adam Janke’s imagination years ago.

Janke recalls how he and his brother fashioned their own makeshift trap to net dark-eyed juncos, a species of small gray sparrow, that visited their mother’s feeder during their childhood in northwestern Indiana. The young brothers built a contraption that resembles a bownet trap, a common device used to safely snare various species of birds.

The homemade trap never worked, which Janke calls a blessing today. But the desire to study birds up close never diminished. Janke followed that passion to Iowa State University, where he serves as an assistant professor of natural resource ecology and management and a wildlife specialist for ISU Extension and Outreach. He studies the conditions that help birds thrive on the Midwestern landscape, and he works with Iowans across the state to protect wildlife and natural resources. Janke’s work equips Iowans to take better care of soil, water, plants and animals for generations to come.

His passion for birds has led him across the Corn Belt, and his experiences in the outdoors have taught him lessons that go far beyond ecology and biology. Hunting and camping expeditions with his friends and family reinforce his most important relationships, and the solitude he finds in nature provided him with clarity on his identity as a gay man.  

Wherever his love of the outdoors takes him, he never goes long without looking up, his eyes scanning the skies for flapping wings and his ears attuned to birdsong.

“Birds, specifically, bring me joy everywhere I go,” he said.

AMES, Iowa – It looks like the risks are paying off.

Lisa Schulte Moore, a professor of natural resource ecology and management at Iowa State University, has made some unorthodox decisions in pursuit of her vision of agricultural systems that meet the demands of a growing global population while protecting the environment. She’s reached far outside the confines of her discipline to bring new perspectives to long-term problems. She’s led grant applications where all of the funding supported research outside her lab, and she’s taken it upon herself to spend a lot of time on outreach, far beyond the expectations of her appointment.

All that sometimes comes at the cost of more conventional measures of a career in science. For instance, Schulte Moore said her leadership and engagement activity took up time she could have spent with her own lab and working on journal articles.

But her team’s pioneering research into prairie strips has contributed to the adoption of the conservation practice in more than a dozen states. And in late September, she received a MacArthur Fellowship, a prestigious award sometimes referred to as a “genius grant.”

Sixteen miles down a gravel road, surrounded by state and federal lands, in a place where one can hike for five days and not see any roads lies the perfect location for students to gain hands-on learning in the areas of forestry, fisheries and wildlife. And it’s the quintessential spot for outdoors-loving faculty.

Jennifer Schieltz, assistant teaching professor, joined the faculty in Iowa State’s natural resource ecology and management department in March 2017. She was hired to be the camp director of the Rod and Connie French Conservation Education Camp, otherwise known as the Montana Camp, located approximately 50 miles west of Missoula, Montana. Schieltz spends her fall and spring semesters teaching courses on Iowa State’s campus in Ames, Iowa, and her summers instructing students at the Montana Camp.

AMES, Iowa – Lisa Schulte Moore, a professor of natural resource ecology and management at Iowa State University, has been named a 2021 MacArthur Fellow. The prestigious awards, sometimes called “genius grants,” identify scientists, artists, entrepreneurs and others who have demonstrated exceptional creativity and who show promise for important future advances.

Schulte Moore is the first ISU faculty member to receive a MacArthur Fellowship. She's conducted groundbreaking research as a landscape ecologist working closely with farmers to build more sustainable and resilient agricultural systems.

Dr. Ann Russell is part of the leadership in the Midwest Big Data Innovation Hub Learning Innovation Fellows program, housed at the University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability. This program enables teams to form for work toward better understanding of the intersections of the Hub’s “Cyberinfrastructure and Data Sharing” and “Data Science Education and Workforce Development” themes.

As fall 2020 approaches, the following plans and guidelines are available for Science II:

Science II Guidelines

Based on recent recommendations from both the CDC and Governor Reynolds, the decision has been made to cancel this year’s NREM Recognition Banquet.

The Iowa Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at Iowa State University is leading research on two projects focusing on oxbow restorations and the federally endangered Topeka shiner.

AMES, Iowa – Dense urban areas use up more energy, water and food resources than they can produce themselves, forcing them to rely on external sources. But a team of researchers is imagining bold new ways to make Midwestern cities more self-reliant.