Insect Drift Research, Santa Cruz Island, CA
Dr. Laurie Furlong:

This research takes place or a couple weeks during the summer and is made possible with the help of a grant funded through the school. Typically, island streams lack fish and the hypothesis is that there will be a different drift pattern exhibited by the aquatic insects than there would be on a mainland stream since there are fish found there. Each year, Dr. Furlong takes a number of students out to the island, located off the coast of Santa Barbara. The research consists of setting pitfall traps and checking those traps every couple of hours. Thus far we have been collecting the baseline data, and soon we will be testing the insect behavior using fish odor. Email lfurlong@nwciowa.edu for questions or further information.

Avian Research, Orange City, IA
Dr. Todd Tracy

Dr. Tracy and his avian ecology students recently finished compiling a checklist of the birds of the Orange City area.  Dr. Tracy also studies avian song dialects and repertoires and is currently studying the song dialect patterns of House Finches in the Orange City area.  House Finches are not native to the eastern United States; a captive population of House Finches (imported from California) was released in NYC in 1940, and the birds have since successfully enlarged their range to include pretty much all of the eastern U.S.  Dr. Tracy hypothesizes that eastern birds, because of their recent range expansion, would not show the distinct geographic song differences found at distances of as little as 5km in Colorado (where House Finches are native).  Email ttracy@nwciowa.edu for questions or further information.