Laura Baar, Nebraska Shortgrass Prairie Education Coordinator
Laura received her AS in Veterinary Technology from the University of Nebraska (1978), her BAAS from West Texas A & M University (2004) and her MS in Wildlife Biology (2006) also from West Texas A & M University where she studied the chronology and use of playas by migrating waterfowl and shorebirds. She has also worked on grassland bird studies, small mammal population studies, and taught Earth Science at the middle school level as well as college level biology. Laura coordinates the Nebraska education and outreach activities focusing on wildlife habitat of the ponderosa pine and shortgrass prairie ecosystems.
Contact: (308) 220-0052

Jason Beason, Special Monitoring Projects Coordinator
Jason received a BS from The Ohio State University (1990) where he majored in Natural Resources (Parks and Recreation). After college, he moved out west and took up the hobby of birding. He has worked on a wide variety of projects involving birds in 8 western states. He has conducted bird surveys in locations as remote as the Frank Church Wilderness Area in Idaho and as urban as "the strip" in Las Vegas, Nevada. He is the Special Monitoring Projects Coordinator and assists with other monitoring projects. Jason, his wife, Kerry, and their son, Otus, run Rain Crow Farm near Paonia.
Contact: (970) 527-4625

Jennifer Blakesley, Biometrician
Jennifer received her BS in Biology from Utah State University, her MS in Wildlife Resources from the University of Idaho, and her PhD in Wildlife Biology from Colorado State University. She studied the demography, habitat relationships, and breeding dispersal of Northern and California Spotted Owls for 18 years. Prior to owl research, she studied habitat relationships of songbirds in Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming. Jennifer joined RMBO in July 2006.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Bart Bly, Nebraska Prairie Partners Biologist
Bart received his B.S. (2001) in Aquatic Science from the University of Wisconsin – La Crosse, and earned his M.S. (2004) in Ecology and Evolution at the University of North Dakota where he developed various landscape and population viability models for various amphibian populations. He has a diverse background and has assisted with research in a variety of different ecosystems, and most recently conducted surveys on Northern Saw-whet Owls in the southern Appalachian Mountains. In cooperation with the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, Bart is responsible for the monitoring and research on birds of conservation concern in the Nebraska panhandle.
Contact: (308) 762-1131

Alison Banks Cariveau, Director, Division of Research
Alison became interested in behavioral ecology at the University of California, San Diego and went on to study Brown-headed Cowbird parasitism for a MS in Wildlife Biology at the University of Montana. Since then, she has worked on avian research projects in a variety of habitats, from desert riparian to Alaskan mudflats. At RMBO, she oversees projects investigating the interactions between habitat characteristics and bird use, including the Wetlands Monitoring and Evaluation Project and the Playa Survey Project.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Nancy Drilling, South Dakota Colonial Waterbird Project Coordinator
Nancy, a native Iowan, received her M.S. at Illinois State University and is finishing her PhD in Conservation Biology at the University of Minnesota. She has worked on many avian projects in all corners of the U.S., including research on forest passerines, shorebirds, waterfowl, and colonial waterbirds. She also has experience in Southeast Asia, including three years as a Peace Corps volunteer in Thailand, and several years working and conducting avian research in Indonesia and Malaysia. At RMBO, Nancy coordinates the statewide waterbird inventory and monitoring project in South Dakota.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Seth Gallagher, Outreach Division Deputy Director
Seth earned an AS in Wildlife Management from Minot State University-Bottineau, North Dakota (1997) and a BS in Wildlife Management from Lincoln Memorial University, Tennessee (2000). He went on to study nesting ecology of Red-shouldered Hawks in northern Michigan and is currently completing his MS in Conservation Biology through Central Michigan University. Seth joined RMBO in February 2004. His duties include assisting with outreach activities, private land bird inventories, and on the ground habitat enhancement projects.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Glenn Giroir, Senior Biologist
A native of south Louisiana, Glenn visited Colorado in 1991 and saw mountains and snow for the first time in his life. It was love at first sight; he moved here one year later and has lived here ever since. In 1998, Glenn graduated from Mesa State College, in Grand Junction, with a degree in Biology and started working at RMBO that same year. He works in both our education and monitoring programs. Glenn’s duties in our education program include running a bird banding station in Grand Junction, where more than 1500 students attend bird conservation field trips each spring and fall, and he helps with the On the Wing summer bird camp. His duties in our monitoring program include leading several bird inventory and monitoring projects for the National Park Service and providing field and office assistance for the Monitoring Colorado’s Birds statewide bird monitoring program. Glenn spends as much of his free time as possible on the tops of Colorado’s high peaks.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

David Hanni, Director, Monitoring Division
David has 8 years of professional experience conducting and managing large scale monitoring programs. Currently David and the Monitoring Division are monitoring avian populations in seven states for federal, state and private organizations. The goal is to provide natural resource managers with scientifically defensible population information to support informed decisions that will conserve Rocky Mountains and Great Plains birds and their habitats. David is currently participating in several local, regional and international efforts to conserve species and habitats in the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains. Education: Colorado State University, Wildlife Biology, B.S.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Lacrecia Johnson, Playa Project Leader
Lacrecia received a BS in Wildlife Conservation from Southeastern Oklahoma State University and in 2002 she earned a MS in Biology from Fort Hays State University in Hays, Kansas. She conducted critical species surveys for the United States Forest Service and Southeastern Oklahoma State University. She has a strong background in public education as well as avian and wetland research, which was fostered by her work with Oklahoma State Parks and Recreation and the Colorado Division of Wildlife.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Amanda Morrison, Assistant Education Division Director
Amanda moved west from Vermont in 1998 to pursue a wildlife career. She received a BS in Biological Sciences - Fish and Wildlife Management from Montana State University in Bozeman, Montana in 2003. Her background includes teaching outdoor education classes at Montana Outdoor Science School, working as a Teaching Assistant at Montana State University, and as a Field Educator for HawkWatch International in Texas. Amanda also worked in the field throughout the Greater Yellowstone Area, studying everything from elk-wolf relationships to invasive plant ecology and hawk migration.
Contact: (303) 659-4348

Starr Nicely, Biologist and Educator
Starr received a B.S. in Biology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2001. She studied Pacific salmon in Alaska and later worked for the Landbird Conservation program at the ManometCenter for Conservation Sciences in southeastern Massachusetts. Since joining the RMBO, Starr has operated banding stations throughout Colorado, monitored Bald Eagles at BarrLake, sampled American Kestrel and Burrowing Owl populations for avian disease, co-coordinated the Birds Beyond Borders educational program, and assisted with administrative duties of the organization.
Contact: (303) 659-4348

Arvind Panjabi, Monitoring Projects Biologist
Arvind received a BS in Wildlife Biology from the University of Vermont (1993) and an MS in Wildlife Biology from Louisiana State University (1999). He has worked across North America on bird conservation projects, including two seasons in the Republic of Panama. He began working for RMBO in the spring of 2000 and now coordinates the Black Hills Bird Monitoring Program. Arvind also manages the Partners In Flight Species Assessment Database.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Andrew Pierson, Shortgrass Prairie Coordinating Wildlife Biologist
Andrew received his B.S. in Biology from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 2005. Since, he has performed at-risk species monitoring for the U.S. Forest Service in central Idaho before moving back to his home state where he held positions in private lands conservation with the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission (NGPC) and Pheasants Forever, Inc. In cooperation with NGPC, Andrew currently uses the Landowner Incentives Program and other conservation program offerings, to implement stewardship activities on prairie, ponderosa pine woodlands, streams, and wetlands for the benefit of at-risk species in the Nebraska panhandle.
Contact: (308) 220-0052

Dana Ripper, Prairie Partners Biologist
Dana grew up partly in northern Illinois and partly in Hong Kong. She received a B.A. from North Central College in Naperville, Illinois in 1998. Dana studied Hairy Woodpeckers in the industrial forests of the Pacific Northwest for her Master’s degree, which was received at Arkansas State University in 2002. Dana’s research has focused on avian and habitat conservation in Arkansas, Florida, and Washington. In the spring of 2005, she was part of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker search team in the White River NWR. Dana moved to Colorado in September 2005 to assist with RMBO’s Prairie Partners program.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Chandman Sambuu, Information Technology Manager:
Chandman has B.S. in Computer Science degree from Colorado State University. He graduated in December of 2005 and joined RMBO as an intern as a database technician. Chandman’s background includes work in database administration, networking, web and graphic design, and an extensive amount of programming in Java and C++. Chandman administrates databases from many different projects at RMBO, builds web applications/interface for the databases, and administrates the RMBO's Fort Collins Office network.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Larry Snyder, Nebraska Prairie Partners Assistant
Larry Snyder is a lifetime resident of Kimball, Nebraska. Larry received an A.A.S degree in Production Agriculture from Northeastern Junior College in 1986, and has 26 years of experience in livestock and dry land crop production in the southern Nebraska Panhandle. Larry is an avid outdoorsman, and has an eye for watching wildlife. Larry began working with the Nebraska Prairie Partners as a seasonal field technician conducting special species surveys in 2002, and currently works full-time as the Nebraska Prairie Partners Assistant. Larry is responsible for implementing the Mountain Plover Nest Protection program and Wildlife Escape Ladder project, and is very involved in the Nebraska Prairie Partners Education and Outreach programs. Larry continues to help conduct special species surveys, and most recently has begun the implementation process of playa restoration projects in the southern panhandle.
Contact: (308) 762-2372

Rob Sparks, Information Management Specialist/Biologist
Rob received a degree in Botany from Miami University of Oxford Ohio in 1998 with a minor in Spanish. After graduation he hiked the Appalachian Trail and realized he wanted to work in the field of conservation biology. As a result of this decision he traveled to Costa Rica where he worked with the Great Green Macaw Conservation Project for a year and then as a naturalist guide for another year. Rob is also doing graduate work at the Geospatial Science Program at Colorado State University.
Contact: (970) 482-1707

Tammy VerCauteren, Director, Division of Outreach
Tammy, a native of Michigan, received a BS in Wildlife Management in 1995 from Michigan State University and obtained her MS in 1998 from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where she studied Sandhill Cranes. She began working for RMBO in 1999 as a specialist in GIS and landowner outreach for the Prairie Partners program. She serves as the Prairie Partners Coordinator and the Division Director for Outreach. She enjoys working with private landowners and encouraging proactive voluntary efforts for species conservation. She believes wildlife conservation and agricultural production go hand-in-hand.
Contact: (970) 482-1707