Date: 11/9/26 8:00 pm From: Dottie Boyles <ctboyles...> Subject: Fwd: November ASCA Presentation - Mason Dillard - Prescribed Fire and Grassland Birds
Just a reminder, ASCA's monthly meeting in Thurs, Nov. 12, by way of Zoom. All are welcome to join in. See details below.
-------- Original Message -------- Subject: November ASCA Presentation - Mason Dillard - Prescribed Fire and Grassland Birds Date: 2026-11-01 4:42 pm From: Kevin Krajcir <kjkrajcir...>
Good evening!
Join the Audubon Society of Central Arkansas on Thursday November 12th at 7 PM to hear Mason Dillard talk about how prescribed fire management impacts breeding and wintering grassland bird communities in Arkansas. Mason is currently a master's student finishing his degree at Arkansas Tech University in Russellville.
Publicly owned grasslands and savannas in Northwest Arkansas are managed with varying intentions and burned at varying intervals, often opportunistically. As a result, the specific mechanisms driving avian community responses to this management remain poorly understood. Mason will present findings from his thesis research, which seeks to identify the vegetation characteristics that shape these bird communities and how management actions influence those characteristics. He studied these systems across both the breeding and non-breeding seasons, with the goal of using his findings to inform the continued management of these habitats.
Mason Dillard began his career in ornithology at Texas A&M University, where he studied neurobiology and attention capture in captive Indian peafowl. After graduating in 2021, he held a series of field jobs across the continent-- from Colorado to Illinois, and even a short stint in the Arctic in Nunavut, Canada. Along the way, he's worked with a wide range of species, including wild turkey, prothonotary warblers, Northern saw-whet owls, several species of waterfowl, and grassland birds. He is currently pursuing a MS at Arkansas Tech University, where he is set to graduate in December 2026.
