The graduate students associated with the Peloncillo Project spend several weeks to a few months each year gathering data for diverse projects in the Peloncillo Mountains and often from the surrounding Madrean Sky-Islands. Each gains invaluable experience in designing and executing research projects that can be carried out in a remote field location and adapted to the vagaries of desert heat, monsoon rains, and the ever present unwillingness of nature to cooperate with even the best laid plans.
Kristen Bliss
Thesis: A Helminth Parasite Survey of Kinosternids Across Varying Hydration Regimes
Parasitism is one of the most common lifestyles among plants, animals, and fungi. Parasite-host relationships have been documented across many taxa and its implications are far-reaching with the potential to drive host population health, individual fitness, and to influence aspects of biodiversity such as community structure. Typical parasite-host interactions may be altered in extreme, highly unpredictable, or highly disturbed habitats and increasing evidence suggests that diversity among parasites and average parasite loads are negatively influenced by these conditions. Kristen's question is aimed at understanding the contributions of the external environment and the host-specific biology to parasite suppression and parasite-host relationships. Kristen is examining parasite loads within populations of three semi-aquatic turtles: the Sonoran Mud Turtle (Kinosternon sonoriense), the Yellow Mud Turtle (Kinosternon flavescens), and the Eastern Mud Turtle (Kinosternon subrubrum). Beside, inhabiting characteristically different environments (desert, temperate), these species also vary in their use of aquatic habitats and the length of time they remain in estivation (i.e. a physiological state of decreased metabolism). Kristen's CV.
Jeremy Massengill
Thesis: Stochastic & Deterministic Factors Shaping Macroinvertebrate Assemblages in Ephemeral Environments
Jeremy's research aims to provide new insights into the spatial and temporal dynamics of ecological communities in hyper-variable environments. Jeremy is examining aquatic macroinvertebrate assemblages from permanent impoundments and ephemeral pools. Jeremy's CV.
Recording body mass of an adult Sonoran mud turtle (Kinosternon sonoriense).
Laura Kimmel
Thesis: Phylogeography of Sonoran mud turtles in a fragmented landscape
Laura is conducting a phylogeographic study of Sonoran mud turtles (Kinosternon sonoriense) in the Madrean Sky Islands of the Chihuahuan and Sonoran Deserts. The Madrean Sky-Islands are geographically isolated mountain ranges that are characterized by ecological gradients in elevation and moisture. Each Sky-Island range is separated from the others by wide desert basins that likely serve as dispersal barriers for many species. Within each Sky-Island range, large mountain ridges and canyons divide the range into drainages that are further divided by fields of smaller mountains and canyons. To add to this interesting geographic complexity, the Madrean Sky-Islands were once separated by large playa lakes that dwindled after the last glacial maximum, and are now only barely present during heavy monsoon seasons. Together, this context of geographic complexity and hydrological history is the ideal setting for a local-to-regional phylogeographic study of dispersal limited species. Laura has chosen the Sonoran mud turtle (Kinosternon sonoriense) as her study species and will characterize its phylogeography at three nested levels: among mountain ranges, among drainages, and within drainages. Laura's CV.