Searchlights descended on the forest floor—we were seeking the elusive Peters’ dwarf frog. I was an undergraduate in the Amazon studying how frogs find partners. The unsuspecting frogs were “teleported” to sound chambers for experimentation. The walls of the clinical chamber reverberated with otherworldly call variations to see which was attractive to the frogs. Their brains were then probed with futuristic instruments. When I recast the experiment as a sci-fi, alien abduction plot on social media, telling the story was easily the most engaging part of research.
Since that trip, fictional recasting has transformed into environmental communications as I’ve written about frog conservation, Texas parks, and carbon capture projects. Just as naturalist explorers brought home travelogues to be met with amazement and disbelief, I, a science writer, share the unfathomable, seemingly fictional with the curious.
In December 2017, four other science writers and I co-founded Austin Texas Science Writers (@ATXSciWri) to promote accurate, accessible, and ethical science writing in Texas. I was founding president of the first such society in the south-central U.S. I’m also a member of the National Association of Science Writers.
I hold a B.S. degree in biology: ecology, evolution, and behavior from the University of Texas at Austin. I am also a past fellow of Duke University’s Environmental Communications Planning.
My specialty is natural resource literature, immersion reporting, and environmental communication, developed for such outlets as the University of Texas at Austin, Texas Army National Guard, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, and a variety of agencies and independent outlets.
I’m also adept at multimedia.
