I had a great visit to Eastern Michigan University!  I caught up with Kristi Judd, presented a seminar, and talked with lots of folks about the cool work going on there.  It was also fun to see Ann Arbor in its role as the 6th snowy city in the US this year – it looked beautiful!

Our response to Lockwood, Reiners, and Reiners is now available at Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment (Throop et al letter (2013)).  We discuss flaws in their analysis and interpretation of how female and male ecologists view aspects of their jobs.  One of the most interesting aspects we found was how similar male and female ecologists are in what they like about their jobs (field work!) and what they dislike (administration).  As ecologists we have more that unites us than divides us, it’s a good thing to remember!

Our paper “Dispersal, niche breadth, and population extinction/colonization ratios predict range size in North American dragonflies” from McCauley, Davis, Werner, & Robeson was accepted at the Journal of Animal Ecology.  Our finding that dispersal behavior and extinction-colonization dynamics at the landscape-scale are critical predictors of species range sizes opens up new questions on how processes link across spatial scales.  The early-online paper (not typeset) is available at the JAE website: DOI: 10.1111/1365-2656.12181. This is the first paper from the lab looking at species distribution patterns at continental scales – hopefully the first of many!

Had a great visit to the Pymatuning Laboratory of Ecology!  I was able to give a seminar to a great group of students and researchers, to see the beautiful area and excellent facilities of PLE, and had a chance to catch up with Rick Relyea and his lab.  All around – a wonderful trip!

The lab has been awarded funding from NSERC including a Discovery Grant that will help us build the lab by supporting students and funding research projects in Ontario.  The awarding of an NSERC RTI will allow us to build a network of RFID readers and antennae at KSR to further studies of movement biology in a variety of animals including dragonflies. This RTI is a collaboration with Ken Welch (UTSC), Marty Krkosek, and James Thomson (U of T, St. George). Finally, a Connaught New Researcher Award from the University of Toronto will help jump-start the research program here at UTM.

Just came back from a great visit to the Yee lab at the University of Southern Mississippi where I gave a departmental seminar. I got to see some of the cool research happening there and enjoyed weather 80F higher than it was in Toronto!