Sue Crispin passed away on November 15th, 2009 after a long battle with cancer. She had been director of the Montana Natural Heritage Program since 1998. She grew up in Michigan, where she earned her M.S. degree in Botany and served as Botanist and Coordinator for that state’s natural heritage program. She worked for several years in Canada, helping Canadian provinces establish similar data centers, and also worked regionally with 8 states and two provinces to document areas of biological significance around the Great Lakes. Altogether, she spent over 29 years working with natural heritage programs, their customers, and partners.

Read Sue's obituary in the Helena IR

Read article about Sue at NatureServe

Bryce Maxell has served as the Montana Natural Heritage Program's Senior Zoologist for the past 5 years and is the acting Interim Director. Read more...

Darlene Patzer has been with the Natural Heritage Program since July 2004. She supports the Heritage Project Managers with grants and finance administration. Darlene earned her Associates Degree in Business Administration from Carroll College while working full-time and raising two daughters.

Prior to joining the Heritage Program, Darlene spent a great 16 years with the Helena Branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. She learned everything from running check sorters to being the lead accounting analyst and finally the check transportation coordinator in Montana.

A native Montanan, Darlene enjoys working with the Heritage staff to support responsible stewardship of Montana’s natural resources. Her own time is spent pursuing her interest in horses with her daughter and learning new things.

Leslie Berg has been assisting with financial and office duties on a part-time basis since November 2007. As a support staff person, she aids in the day-to-day financial and office operations and assists in keeping the waters running on an even keel. Leslie earned her B.S. degree in Business Administration, with emphasis in Accounting, from the University of Montana. She lived and worked in Missoula, Montana for 42 years. During that time, she was the Controller of Missoula Aging Services—a not-for-profit organization which helps senior citizens. In that capacity, she handled the facets of accounting for an organization with over thirteen individual programs and nine fiscal years all encompassed under one umbrella.

Leslie values the contributions made by those involved with the Natural Heritage Program. Born and raised in Montana, she grew up on a dude ranch in the Benchmark area near Augusta. She still has fond memories of fishing along Ford Creek, leading guests on horseback rides into the Bob Marshall Wilderness, and participating in high school rodeos. Leslie enjoys spending her semi-retirement days traveling the world. She has hiked the Inca Trail, bicycled in Tuscany, toured the ruins of Rome, walked the canals of Amsterdam, and golfed in Canada. She is planning to visit children’s clinics in Africa with her son in 2010.

acox@mt.gov
406 444-3989

Karen Walker has been the Biological Data Systems Coordinator for the Montana Natural Heritage Program since September, 2004. She coordinates species and habitat data from submission by field biologists to data exchanges with NatureServe. Karen has a B.A. in Environmental Studies from Oberlin College, and an M.S. in Forestry (emphasizing GIS) from the University of Minnesota. Karen was at the University of Minnesota from 1994 to 2003 working as a data manager and forest ecology technician prior to receiving her M.S. From 2003 to 2004 she was a GIS technician for the Chippewa National Forest in Minnesota.

Scott Blum's current focus is reviewing Heritage database records for animal observations: if you’ve submitted an animal observation to NHP, there’s a better than good chance that Scott has given it the once over. Scott was born and aged in Oswego, New York on the shore of Lake Ontario (Official Town Motto: "Oswego, where the water never ends." Unofficial Town Motto: "At least we’re not Fulton."). In fits and starts, he completed a B.S. in Zoology (SUNY Oswego) and an A.S. in Zoo Animal Technology (SFCC Gainesville, Florida); subsequently launching and crashing a brief career as a zookeeper at the Racine Zoo in Wisconsin and the Brookfield Zoo in Illinois. After a nine year sabbatical at Pet Pals pet store (Liverpool, NY), he returned to school to chase mountain lions for his M.S. in Ecology from Idaho State University, Pocatello. During and after graduate school he spent time as a technician on various research projects including tracking lynx and coyote around Seeley Lake and collecting bear hair in the Swan Valley. Scott spends his time in and around Helena hiking with his dog, Bug, and honing his bread baking skills. View Resume

Martin Miller's formative years were spent in the San Joaquin Valley in central California. He has a B.S, in Atmospheric Science from the University of California, Davis. After moving to Helena to work for ASARCO as an air pollution meteorologist, he worked for two years in Logan, Utah assisting with the weather modification project at Utah State University. Then, it was back to Helena for a stint with Hydrometrics, Inc. as a computer programmer.

Martin has been wrangling data for the Montana Natural Heritage Program for more than ten years. The early days included working with the Point Observation Database (POD) from very near its inception, and plotting Element Occurrences on paper quad maps using adhesive dots, map margin notes and a mylar overlay to calculate the latitude and longitude. Needless to say, the advancement of GIS capabilities have made those activities seem like relics of the Stone Age. Somewhere along the line, he acquired the responsibility of responding to requests. This is another process that has been evolving, from paper reports provided via snail mail to large zip files accessed on the ftp site.

When it’s time to get out of town, the preferred mode is ultramarathon running. Over a 15 year period, Martin has participated in over 50 ultramarathon events, ranging from 50 km to 100 miles, and include a 24 hour track run and a 48 hour event. Some of the hundred milers he has completed include Western States, Leadville and Hardrock (twice). View Resume

Dave Ratz ("Ratz") was an Air Force Brat, born in Okinawa, raised everywhere, finally settling down in the Rocky Mountains.  He has worked in computers for 20+ years, but has tried his hand at everything.  At age 25, Ratz suffered a quarter-life crisis: sold everything, bought a backpack, and lived in the woods for eight months.  Alas, for every time there is a season, and now he can't get by without his 80's music, internet scrabble, cell phone, and golf clubs.

Certified Mensa Member.

Voted:  Most likely to have a mullet.

Motto:  Arms Up, Eyes Wide.

Scott Mincemoyer started at the program in May 2004. Since that time, he has focused on increasing the data content of botany program databases, improving spatial data accuracy and precision, reviewing species’ ranks and rank criteria, improving data tracking methods and increasing efficiency of rare plant data entry. In the field, the focus has been on globally rare vascular plant species, including Silene spaldingii and Spiranthes diluvialis, and on plant Species of Concern in several large geographic areas with a focus on shrub and grassland systems of eastern and south-central Montana.

Prior to working at Heritage, Scott spent 8 plus years working on various fire ecology research projects at the Fire Sciences Lab in Missoula. These projects included the effects of fire on invasive weeds, the ecology and restoration of whitebark pine in the Northern Rockies and the mapping of vegetation and fuels in large areas of New Mexico and Utah. In 2003, after leaving Missoula, he completed a thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail. Afterwards, he continued his affiliation with the Firelab, working for a short while on the interagency LANDFIRE national fuels mapping project, before coming to the Heritage Program. Scott has a B.S. in Forest Resource Management from the University of Montana (1995) and a diverse background and interest in botany and plant ecology. Botanical interests include many different vascular plant families and genera with a particular interest in Montana Salix.

Linda Vance has a Ph.D in Conservation Ecology from the University of California, Davis, where her dissertation research examined watershed-level factors affecting the distribution of steelhead and coho in coastal rivers. Prior to joining the MTNHP, she was an aquatic ecologist with the Pacific Southwest Research Station in Albany, California, studying frog, fish, and reptile interactions in the Sierras. Her work with MTNHP involves multiple-scale watershed and wetland assessments, and developing GIS- and field-based approaches to characterizing watershed ecological integrity. Her current projects include analyzing the extent and condition of geographically isolated wetlands in Montana, and identifying the landscape factors that predict wetland health.

Area of Expertise: Watershed and wetland assessment, monitoring and analysis; landscape ecology; geospatial analysis; environmental law and policy. View Resume

David Stagliano is the first Aquatic Ecologist for the Montana Natural Heritage Program and has been in this position since 2003. In that time his boots have been in 100’s of Montana’s streams and rivers from the Yaak to the Powder, the Big Hole to the Big Muddy. He came over from Moscow, Idaho after working at an environmental consulting firm. He received a M.S. degree in aquatic ecology from Kansas State University on prairie streams (2000), and his B.S. from Cornell University in Ecology (1992), minoring in fisheries. In between those degrees, he worked professionally for the USGS in Denver, CO, the TVA in Tennessee, the University of Alabama, and after the master’s, 2 field seasons with the Michigan Natural Heritage Program. But now he doesn’t plan to leave Montana, which has the perfect mix of outdoor opportunities (fishing, hiking, skiing, hunting, biking, etc.) to stay busy outside the field season.

David has 15 years of professional experience in stream & river ecological studies. Principal areas of expertise include the field collection, ecology and taxonomy of aquatic invertebrates, mussels and fish communities for use in environmental assessments of stream and river integrity. Additional expertise includes landscape-level ecological studies and conservation of aquatic ecosystems, including work with threatened & endangered species. View Resume

Karen Newlon has an M.S. in Biology from Montana State University and a B.A. in Biology from Hiram College. She joined the Montana Natural Heritage Program in May 2008 as an Ecologist/Project Manager. Since then, she has developed a fondness for the wetlands and grasslands of eastern Montana after conducting hundreds of wetland assessments and vegetation surveys throughout that portion of the state. Her current projects include conducting wetland assessments and vegetation surveys, refining and validating assessment methodologies, refining ecological system descriptions for Montana, and integrating data into spatial and tabular databases. Prior to coming to the Heritage Program, she worked in the more topographically varied parts of Montana. During her most recent position as an ecologist at Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge, she developed a refuge vegetation map, established a landbird monitoring program, assisted in writing conservation plans, and developed, maintained, and organized refuge geospatial data.

She spent many years as a "bio-gypsy" throughout the West working on various projects focused mainly on avian breeding biology and habitat studies. Her areas of expertise include wetland and upland assessments and monitoring, identification of vegetation communities, avian identification and ecology, geospatial analysis, and aerial photointerpretation. View Resume

Meghan Burns began working for the Montana Natural Heritage Program December 2007 as a Wetlands Digitizing Technician. After receiving a B.S. in Biology and an M.S. in Geographic Information Science from Michigan State University, Meghan worked as an Environmental Health Specialist at the Ingham County Health Department in Lansing, Michigan and then returned to the Center for Global Change & Earth Observations at Michigan State University to study Buruli Ulcer, an emerging infectious disease. Additionally, Meghan was employed with the Michigan Natural Features Inventory, from 2002 – 2004, where she updated the database of threatened and endangered species.

Catherine “Cat” McIntyre moved to Montana in 2006 to attend the University of Montana. This fall she will defend her thesis, “Predicting Amphibian Occurrence Based on Local and Landscape Level Factors in Montana”. Cat received her B.A. from Hampshire College where her studies focused on aquatic ecology and environmental chemistry. She completed an undergraduate thesis that compared the concentration of heavy metals in the soils, water and tissues of Diamondback terrapins (Malaclemmys terrapin) from two locations in New Jersey. Through this project she gained an interest in both herpetology and wetland ecology. Following college, she worked as a wetland scientist for an environmental consulting firm in Massachusetts for four years where she served as a project manager responsible for coordinating all aspects of environmental permitting including wetland delineations, habitat assessments, and wetland mitigation and restoration. Since moving to Montana Cat has worked on a variety of projects including the Montana Department of Environmental Quality’s Wadeable Stream Reference Study as well as help develop, manage and conduct ecological assessments for wetlands and riparian areas throughout Montana. She has also assisted in land cover mapping throughout Montana for the Natural Heritage Program.

Cat has spent the past 11 years working in wetland systems. Her areas of expertise include wetland plant identification, soil taxonomy, wetland hydrology, amphibian ecology and geospatial analysis. View Resume

Tara Luna has worked as a botanist, ecologist, and restoration biologist in Montana for the past 19 years. In recent years, she has worked with American Indian tribes, the Forest Service and the National Park Service in identifying species and habitats for monitoring and conservation efforts, and developing and improving native plant nurseries to support habitat restoration. In collaboration with the US Forest Service, she has developed native plant nursery and propagation handbooks, publications and short courses for American Indian and Pacific island conservation and restoration nurseries.

Tara has a particular interest in the ecology, biogeography and conservation of Montana plant species and their associated habitats. She is especially interested in identifying populations near the limit of their geographic distributions as well as populations occurring in edge environments within their range; in order to effectively conserve the adaptive genetic potential of species in response to regional climate change.

Larissa Pfleeger graduated from Washington State University with a B.S. in Forestry emphasizing GIS and Forest Engineering in 2008. She joined the Montana Natural Heritage Program in June of 2009 as a field technician assessing wetland and riparian sites. Prior to joining Heritage, she worked two summers with the DNR in Washington as a Forest Practice and Engineering Intern, and had a brief stint with Fish and Game in Washington as a Rangeland Technician. GIS became the focus as she took on projects within the Natural Resource department, the first focusing on home range assessments of cougars in north-central Washington. From there she worked with the bioengineering department on a large project analyzing reactions of crops to weather changes associated with climate change in Washington State, and also with the University of Idaho using satellite based remote sensing and METRIC to determine ET levels over large regions of Idaho. She also currently volunteers her GIS abilities to the Henry’s Fork Foundation, mapping macrophytes and the possible overwintering impact of swans, as well as with Idaho Fish and Game’s non-game department and their mapping needs.

This is Larissa’s first experience in Montana and probably not the last. The area seems a natural fit to support the outdoor distractions of fly fishing, wingshooting with her black lab, skiing, hiking, and photography.

Sloane Gray joined the Montana Natural Heritage Program in January 2008 to perform wetlands delineation for the Wetland and Riparian Mapping Center. Sloane’s interest in conservation GIS has allowed her to work in eight states for such organizations as Ducks Unlimited, the Smithsonian Conservation and Research Center and The Nature Conservancy. She has a B.S. in Biology from Metropolitan State College.

Erika Colaiacomo, originally hailing from New England, headed west after graduating with a B.A. in Geology from Colgate University in 2007. Her first stop was Arco, Idaho, serving as a Student Conservation Association Intern at Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve. Following a stint at the Good Food Store in Missoula, she traveled to the Rocky Mountain Research Station in Logan, Utah to provide GIS support for the PIBO Effectiveness Monitoring Program.

Erika joined the Montana Natural Heritage Program in October 2008. In addition to digitizing wetlands, she has used GIS to categorize streams for aquatic ecological classifications and looks forward to exploring her interests in fluvial geomorphology and the use of GIS in watershed management.

Robin Lium began working for the Montana Natural Heritage Program in January of 2009 as a Wetland Digitizing Technician. After receiving a B.A. in Biology at Boston University she returned home to Maryland. While there Robin volunteered at the National Aquarium in Baltimore and worked at various jobs including belaying people up the rock wall at the local YMCA and working with special needs students at the Maryland School for the Blind. Soon the urge to continue on with her education led Robin to receive an M.Sc. in Wildlife Conservation and Habitat Management from Newcastle University in Newcastle upon Tyne, England in 2008. Her dissertation looked at the habitat requirement for Northumberland bat species in the Newcastle area.

Jessica Clarke graduated from the University of Montana in 2008 with a B.A. in Biology with her concentration in botanical sciences. Upon graduation she took a field job with the University of Montana working on a food web project in the Blackfoot Valley, where she trapped small mammals and completed vegetation surveys. Jessica joined the Montana Natural Heritage Program in October 2008 to do field work in the Powder River Basin in Wyoming. Currently she is digitizing wetlands.

Bryce Maxell grew up dogsledding in the mountains of Utah, swam competitively in high school and college, and is passionate about natural history. Bryce completed a B.S. in Biology and a B.A. in Economics at the University of Puget Sound in 1994 where he studied the demography of kelp species in the Puget Sound and was an NAIA All-American in the 200-yard Breaststroke in 1992 and 1993. After undergrad, he received a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship for a year long independent study of the Natural History of Australia and New Zealand in 1994 and 1995. Bryce completed his Ph.D. in Fish and Wildlife Biology in the Wildlife Biology Program at the University of Montana where he completed a state-wide assessment of status and constructed predicted habitat models for Montana's amphibian and reptile species, as well as conducting research on the demography of Columbia Spotted Frogs. Bryce has spent the last 13 years conducting field inventories for a variety of animal species in Montana. During his time in Montana he has authored or coauthored two books, eight peer reviewed publications, and 30-plus professional reports on amphibians, reptiles, bats, small terrestrial mammals, birds, terrestrial mollusks, and fish. Bryce's main interests are natural history, conservation biology, biogeography, and the effects of exotic species. He is also interested in conducting broad based, statistically sound, baseline surveys for, and applying advanced techniques in conservation biology to, a wide variety of non-game taxa. Although interested in working with all taxa, Bryce is especially interested in working with amphibians, reptiles, mollusks, bats, and birds. He is also interested in raising awareness about the natural history and status of these species so that issues associated with their management are properly addressed in management plans and so that they can be properly appreciated by current and future generations. View Resume

Paul Hendricks has been a zoologist with the Montana Natural Heritage Program since 1996. After spending most of his formative years in Billings, Paul received his education at the University of Montana in Missoula (B.A. 1975, M.A. 1987) and Washington State University in Pullman (Ph.D. 1993). Paul has a broad interest in natural history, and his work for the Natural Heritage Program has allowed him to pursue this interest with a variety of invertebrates as well as the vertebrates he is most familiar with. He is co-author of the book “Amphibians and Reptiles of Montana” (Mountain Press 2004). When not working, he is dreaming of or pursuing birds and alpine experiences.  View Resume

Susan Lenard joined the Zoology program with a particular interest and experience in bird conservation and research. With degrees in biology and mathematics, she’s lucky enough have worked in the field in Indonesia, Arizona, Wyoming, California, and Pennsylvania, in addition to Montana. Because of the diversity of projects the Heritage Program allows, Susan’s particular interests have broadened beyond the avian, especially to those involving bat acoustics and forays in search of pygmy rabbits.

In her off-work time, Susan’s tries to find a balance between a love of being outdoors and a variety of recreational activities, an appreciation of fine food and drink, and her arts addiction – being involved in an assortment of hand crafts such as spinning (wool), weaving (fiber), throwing (pottery), and dyeing, especially experimenting with natural dyes (sometimes, by chance, rather malodorous ones), much to the dismay of both of her housemates – husband Phil, and dog Teasel.

Melissa Hart has an MS in Wildlife Biology from the University of Montana and a BA in Biology and Environmental Science from Willamette University. Her interest in GIS began in the early 90s when she worked as a spotted owl biologist on the Umpqua National Forest in southwestern Oregon. Forced to manually calculate acres of habitat surrounding owl nests over and over again as managers changed their minds about the size of the area to be analyzed, she decided there had to be a better way to capture and store information. And so she went to graduate school, learned GIS, and never went outside again. (Except on weekends.)

For the past 15 years, she has worked at the Spatial Analysis Lab on a variety of wildlife-related projects, from passerine birds to wolverines. She was project coordinator for Montana Gap Analysis, completed in 1998. Currently she is assisting with the development of an Ecosystem Management Decision Support system for the Northern Region of the Forest Service. Her most time-consuming project over the past 5 years has been Margaret (pictured).

Ute Langner has a MS in Earth Sciences (GIS) from Montana State University, and a MS in Biology from Kazan State University (former USSR). In the past few years she worked as a GIS analyst on a variety of wildlife, ecosystem and natural resource related projects at the Wildlife Spatial Analysis Lab at the University of Montana, and prior to that at the Landscape Biodiversity Lab at Montana State University. Before making Montana home for her family she worked in the Nature Conservation Department of a State Environmental Protection Agency in unified Germany and at the Institute of Landscape Research and Nature Conservation in the former East.

Claudine Tobalske is originally from France where she studied plant biology. Claudine fell in love with the Rocky Mountains in 1991 during a 5-months internship in Fort Collins, Colorado. She came back the following year to attend the Wildlife Biology program at the University of Montana, earning a Ph.D. in 1998; her dissertation involved developing woodpecked-habitat relationship models using atlas data from France and Switzerland. During that time she was also a research assistant for the Spatial Analysis Lab, becoming involved with Montana Gap Analysis and learning GIS in the process. In 1999 she moved to Oregon, where she was a GIS analyst for the Oregon Natural Heritage Information Center until June 2008. While employed at ORNHIC, Claudine worked primarily on broad-scale vegetation maps, such as the Sagemap and NorthWest ReGap ecological system maps; she also developed a variety of wildlife-habitat and rare plant predictive distribution models. When not stuck behind a computer, Claudine enjoys a variety of outdoor activities such as climbing, hiking, skiing, running, mountain biking, and gardening.

Marcus Reddish grew up camping, skiing, and canoeing around Montana. He received a BA in Anthropology at the University of Montana while studying human-environment interactions. After Wilderness EMT and Canadian Professional Avalanche training, he returned to the U of M for an MS in Geography; specializing in remote sensing, cartography, and GIS. Professionally, he collected high elevation fire scar data for the Rocky Mountain Research Station Forestry Sciences Lab and worked on a team developing airport and military GIS systems at GCS Research. More recently, Marcus joined the Spatial Analysis Lab in 2007 and now happily makes vegetation maps from remotely sensed images while doing just enough field data collection to appreciate the optimal climate conditions of his cubicle.