Birds are my greatest passion in life - a love of birds and bird watching first inspired me to study science and this same love still drives me. I'm currently a senior undergraduate student and Biology major at Middlebury College in Vermont (graduating February 2013), passionate about conservation biology, environmental journalism, education, ecology, wildlife and natural areas.

I have lived, researched, traveled, and worked in Kenya, Mexico, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Brazil and I speak Spanish and Portuguese. All my life I've loved writing. In recent years I've delighted in telling stories from the field - quirky landscape-based pieces involving birds, remote wilderness areas, and the inevitable hilarity of life in the field.

Through scientific research and writing, my ultimate goal is to help change the way we approach conservation in the tropics by filling in knowledge gaps and inspiring more people to care about biodiversity conservation.