Debbie sitting shotgun in a helicopter

ABOUT ME

Biologists Love Life

Growing up in Maryland, I was more of a bookworm than a play-in-the-mud kind of kid, but living in the suburbs of D.C. and Baltimore meant that I had ample opportunity to explore these cities’ museums, zoos, and aquariums. Consequently, it was a high-school internship at the National Aquarium in Baltimore that helped convert this would-be primatologist to an aspiring marine biologist. As an undergrad at Penn State University, I learned how to do research in a physiological ecology lab and, after graduation, I spent the next years exploring conservation-oriented career paths in science education, wildlife research, and animal husbandry. Along the way, across the country, I discovered new ecosystems, met all sorts of people, and learned a lot about myself. (more…)

Using vocal dialects to assess the population structure of Bigg’s killer whales in western Alaska

Bigg’s killer whales (Orcinus orca; i.e. ‘transient’ ecotype), as apex predators, are important to the dynamics of marine ecosystems, but little is known about their population structure in western Alaska. Currently, all Bigg’s killer whales in western Alaska are ascribed to a single broad stock… 

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A New Discovery at Shark Bay World Heritage Site

This month I took a trip to Perth, Australia to present a poster at the 25th Biennial Conference on the Biology of Marine Mammals. While there is always so much to learn and get excited about at these conferences, the highlight of my trip turned out to be my post-conference excursion to the Shark Bay World Heritage site. Hoping to […]

Studying Harbor Seals in Churchill, MB

After the disappointment of last summer’s field season (failing to capture any ringed seals), I have spent a lot of time working out how to improve our chances for this coming summer. In that spirit, I jumped at the opportunity to join the field crew of a harbor seal research project and gain more experience capturing seals. Based out of […]

PhD Project on Ringed Seals in the Canadian Arctic

Ringed Seals & Vessel Noise Climate change is driving unprecedented changes in sea ice coverage throughout the Arctic, causing shifts in predator and prey distributions, and altering the underwater soundscape: as the duration and extent of ice-free periods increase, so is vessel noise.  Ringed seals (Pusa hispida) are an ice-obligate species that produce low-amplitude vocalizations year-round in the relatively quiet […]