If you weren't able to attend the January 2019 Northern California Botanists Symposium, but would still like to watch Dr. Byrne's talk "Restoring a population of Applegate's milkvetch: lessons learned for conservation," you can watch a recorded version here.

Congrats to former lab member, Allison Young (OIT Biology Health Science major), who was just accepted to her top choice for pharmacy school!  Way to go, Allison!

Students from Chico State and HSU completed a hot week of sampling at the ORIDE project. We collected data on plant stress (for the 2 dominant sagebrush species), species composition, and aboveground net primary production (ANPP) in the treatment plots. See a few photos below,

New Byrne lab graduate student Ashley, recent HSU grad Stephanie, and continuing HSU student Roxana are all in Klamath Falls, OR for the next five weeks collecting data for several projects. Here are a few photos from the first week of field work last week!

The lab is hiring two field assistants for summer field work in Southern Oregon.  See attached flyer for more information!

CSU-Chico collaborator (and fellow Colorado State GDPE grad) Kristen Kaczynski and I finished up the 2017 field season yesterday at the ORIDE project on the Modoc Plateau (just in time- see photo above - I'm nearly 7 months pregnant!). Thanks so much to summer field assistants Allison, Nate, and Aaron (all Oregon Tech undergrads) for braving the rain and darkness to help us finish up before winter (and baby Prairie) hits! My new HSU undergraduate research assistant, Stephanie, will be processing root samples for the project in my lab on campus. Thanks Allison, Nate, Aaron, Stephanie, and collaborator/friend Kristen for making this trip such a success!

Congratulations to undergraduates Chloe Smith, Allison Young, and Nathan Connell, who presented posters at the Oregon Tech Annual Project Symposium yesterday. Chloe presented a poster about the campus vegetable garden she and the sustainability club started this year, and Nate and Allison presented their Applegate's milkvetch germination study.  Everyone did a fantastic job! 

Congratulations to Aaron Miller, undergraduate Environmental Science student in the lab.  Oregon Tech's Resource Budget Commission funded his proposed study, study, "Phenological changes of important forb species in a changing climate." He will study phenology at the ORIDE climate change experiment this spring, and determine if changes in phenology affect fitness of forb species important for sage-grouse and other wildlife species.

Dr. Byrne has been invited to participate in the InTeGrate (Interdisciplinary Teaching about Earth for a Sustainable Future) and QUBES (Quantitative Undergraduate Biology Education and Synthesis) faculty mentoring network to adopt and test interdisciplinary modules that address sustainability and climate change in some of her courses.

My collaborator Kristen Kaczynski and I will be presenting preliminary findings from the first year of our new climate change project (ORIDE) at the Northern California Botanist Symposium poster session on January 10, 2017.  Please stop by if you're attending, or see a copy of our poster here.