Date: 4/1/25 11:03 am From: Chuck & Lillian via groups.io <misclists...> Subject: [LACoBirds] SMBAS Zoom program Tues 1 April, 7:30pm: Resilience in Fire: Monitoring Bird & Bat Community Responses to Megafire in California Oak Woodlands and Shrublands, with Kendall Calhoun.
Santa Monica Bay Audubon invites you to tonight's program.
Resilience in Fire: Monitoring Bird & Bat Community Responses to Megafire in California Oak Woodlands and Shrublands, with Kendall Calhoun. Zoom Evening Meeting, Tuesday, 1 April, 7:30 p.m. Zoom Waiting room opens 7:15 p.m.
Fire regimes across the globe have undergone significant changes that challenge the resilience of ecosystems around the world. In recent years, California has experienced some of its worst fire seasons in recorded history, with megafires becoming more severe and more frequent. Despite these shifts, fire remains an essential component of California landscapes and the species that reside within them by creating new habitat and creating new food and nesting resources for animal species. We use acoustic monitors to understand how bird and bat species respond to the 2018 Mendocino Complex Fire to examine how these groups respond to fire in oak woodland and shrubland landscapes. We find that fire actually improves habitat and the presence of several bird species highlighting the key role fire continues to play in California ecosystems and its increasing significance in ongoing wildlife conservation planning.
Dr. Kendall Calhoun is currently a postdoctoral researcher at UC Davis (Department of Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology) and UCLA (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology). His research examines how ecological disturbances influence wildlife community assemblages and resilience. Building ecosystem resilience is an essential conservation strategy amidst ongoing global change. His work also seeks to understand the potential consequences of climate change and disturbances in altering dynamics of human-wildlife conflict. His aim is to inform future research and management decisions to create more resilient ecosystems now and into the future.
