Samantha Zwicker is a master’s student at the University of Washington in the School of Environmental and Forest Sciences, where she is researching ecology and conservation in coupled human-environment systems. She received her bachelor’s degree with honors from the University’s Program on the Environment in 2012. In addition to teaching environmental studies and environmental science courses at the University, she is a member of Xi Sigma Pi Forestry Honor Society, a term member of the renowned Explorers Club, and the co-founder and President of the nonprofit Hoja Nueva.
She has considerable interest and experience studying the top-down effects of predators in both natural and human modified ecosystems. Samantha’s fieldwork is based primarily in the Amazon rainforest along the Las Piedras River where some of the last frontier forests can still be found in Peru. She is assessing the effects of land use change on felids and their prey using in-situ observation and camera trapping to determine what applied conservation measures can protect felids in a rapidly changing forest landscape. In addition to her fieldwork, Samantha is contributing to several other conservation ecology projects in the Madre de Dios region, including those involving eco-drone monitoring, permaculture, reforestation, and the creation of wildlife corridors between Manu and Tambopata National Parks.
Contributions to Humans & Nature:
- De-extinction in an Anthropogenic World
A response to “How far should we go to bring back lost species?”
Noteworthy Links:
- Hoja Nueva
Learn more about Samantha Zwicker’s non-profit.
