Native Plant Society of New Mexico Native Plant Society of New Mexico

Research Ecologist and UNM biology professor Gavin M. Jones, Ph.D will address how and why fire regimes are changing, how plants and animals are responding, and what can be done to conserve sensitive species, with an emphasis on his work with the spotted owl. Meetings are free and open to the public.

Wildfires are a natural and important process in ecosystems. But land use change and climate change are driving larger, more severe fires that can threaten native plants and animals in the American Southwest. In this talk, I will discuss how and why fire regimes are changing, how plants and animals are responding, and what can be done to conserve sensitive species going forward. I will focus heavily on my work on spotted owls in California, Arizona, and New Mexico, using the owl as an example of the delicate balance between forest ecosystem restoration and sensitive species conservation.

Bio: Gavin (he/him) is a Research Ecologist with Rocky Mountain Research Station – Wildlife Ecology Program (USDA Forest Service) and holds an appointment as an adjunct Assistant Professor in the Biology Department at the University of New Mexico. He completed his M.Sc. and Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the Department of Forest and Wildlife Ecology, and did postdoctoral research in the Department of Wildlife Ecology and Conservation at the University of Florida. Gavin is an Associate Editor at Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment and Fire Ecology which are the flagship peer-reviewed scientific journals of the Ecological Society of America and the Association for Fire Ecology.