Fourteen University of California graduate students have been awarded 2015-16 Mildred E. Mathias Graduate Student Research Grants from the UC Natural Reserve System. The students, from six different UC campuses, each received up to $3,000 to fund field projects at 24 different NRS reserves. Virtually all of this year’s successful proposals will study ecology, evolution, […]
Santa Cruz Island Reserve
UC Santa Barbara celebrates 50 years of the UC Natural Reserve System
Celebrating the UCSB Natural Reserves from UC Santa Barbara on Vimeo. Additional footage and aerials by Alexander Mark Romanov and NOAA Fisheries. Founders foresight “The founders of the reserve system wanted these places to have historical significance because they knew the state would change rapidly,” said Alagona, who is the faculty advisor for Kenneth S. […]
Marine Protected Areas aid Channel Islands fishes
by Julie Cohen, UC Santa Barbara More than a decade ago, California established marine protected areas (MPAs) in state waters around the northern Channel Islands off the coast of Santa Barbara. Several years later, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) extended these MPAs into the federal waters of the Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary. […]
NRS Fair marks 50th anniversary
The Natural Reserve System brought a taste of the science, art, teaching, and natural wonders of its 39 reserves to the heart of downtown Oakland this Tuesday, August 11, for the NRS Fair. Hundreds of visitors flocked to the outdoor terrace at UC’s Office of the President to attend. They chatted with graduate student researchers, […]
The NRS supercourse—“an amazing opportunity”
On a fine morning this coming autumn, 27 UC undergraduates, all strangers, will meet in a parking lot, assemble a small mountain of tents, sleeping bags, notebooks, and backpacks, and head out in a convoy of passenger vans to begin a true educational adventure. For the next seven weeks, the students of California Ecology and […]
Let it be
UC undergrads find Santa Cruz Island rebounding decades after imported grazer eradication On islands, imported plants and animals can spell ecological disaster. The Aleutians, the Galápagos, the Falklands, Hawaii, and countless other archipelagoes have seen species such as goats and brown tree snakes, exotic grasses and rats delivered by human visitors. Many of the newcomers […]
Historical ecology of California’s Channel Islands
By Julie Cohen, UC Santa Barbara Public Affairs, and Kathleen M. Wong, UC Natural Reserve System In order to plan for the future, sometimes you have to look to the past. More than two dozen scientists in disciplines ranging from anthropology to ornithology to history to geography did exactly that in a new study of […]
From the HMS Beagle to Barcroft Station
The Value of Natural Reserves and Field Stations In 1831, a young British naturalist by the name of Charles Darwin sailed to the New World on the research vessel HMS Beagle. Along the way, the ship put in at both mainland South America and the Galápagos Islands, landforms separated by over 1,000 kilometers of open […]