Wisconsin Phenological Society
Department of Geography U.W.
Milwaukee
P.O. Box 413 µ
Milwaukee, WI 53201
µ
Tel: (414) 229-3740 µ
Fax: (414) 229-3981
µ
Email:
mds@uwm.edu
µ
Homepage: www.naturenet.com/alnc/wps
Contents:
Spring
Meeting
Message from the President
Natural History Workshops
Phenology on the Web
Membership
WPS
Annual Spring Meeting
Please join us
for our Annual Spring Meeting
on
Friday,
April 14th, 2006
From 10:00 a.m. until Noon
Bolton Hall
Room 410D
UW- Milwaukee Campus
For directions
contact:
Mark D. Schwartz mds@uwm.edu
(414) 229-3740
Message from the President
I would first like to officially welcome new members of the WPS Board of Directors, Edward C. Luschei (Department of Agronomy, UW-Madison), Gretchen Meyer (UW-Milwaukee Field Station), and Cheryl Rezabek (WI Department of Administration), as well as thank outgoing members Karen Delahaut and Wellington “Buddy” Huffaker for their past service.
Nationally, planning for a USA National Phenology Network (USA-NPN) continued at a brisk pace over the last year. A first implementation workshop was funded by the National Science Foundation, with additional support from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), National Park Service (NPS), U.S. Department of Agriculture-Forest Service (USDA-FS), National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Around forty scientists met as part of this workshop during the third week of August 2005 in Tucson, AZ. An Implementation Team (IT) was formed in late 2005, along with publication of a short summary of the workshop proceedings and overall plans for USA-NPN in the journal EOS. During the third week in March 2006, IT members gathered again in Tucson to start intensive work on drafting the USA-NPN Implementation Plan. Please visit the NPN web site at http://www.npn.uwm.edu for more details, and consider registering and participating in NPN as well as WPS.
The NPN pages also allow access to lilac data collected across the USA since 1956, complete instructions and guidelines for observing lilacs or appropriate native species in all parts of the USA, as well as web-based data submission forms that make sending in phenological data quick and easy. Closer to home, we would very much like to include a geographically distributed set of sites in Wisconsin as a subset of NPN that could contribute long-term observations. If you are associated with a nature center or other similar organization in the State and are interested in this, please contact me.
I completed and published a co-authored paper reporting on changes in the onset of spring across the entire temperate land area of the Northern Hemisphere earlier this year, entitled “Onset of Spring Starting Earlier Across the Northern Hemisphere.” This paper can be accessed through my personal web page, http://www.uwm.edu/~mds and then “clicking” on “Research Projects” and then the paper’s title. Highlights of the results include that changes in the start of “early spring” has progressed at -1.2 days/decade, “late spring” at -1.0 days/decade and last spring freeze date at -1.5 days/decade over the 1955-2002 period.
Lastly, I’d like to once again stress that your observations are extremely useful to the scientific community. Please consider becoming a fully active member of the Society, by recording and reporting phenological observations. As always, your support of the Society and its objectives is greatly appreciated.
Mark D. Schwartz
WPS President
2004 Natural History Workshops
at the UWM Field Station
The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Field Station conducts a series of Natural History Workshops.
These workshops offer an opportunity to study focused topics at college-level instruction under the guidance of noted authorities. Most workshops present two full days of instruction, with housing and meals available at the Station.
Enrollment is limited to 20; the atmosphere is informal and instruction is individualized. Workshops may be taken for graduate or undergraduate credit by enrolling in UWM, Topics in Field Biology.
Please contact the Field Station for more information and a registration form, or visit our website at www.uwm.edu/Dept/fieldstation for full descriptions of each course, fee information, and a downloadable Registration Form.
The 2005 workshop schedule includes the following courses:
µ
Field Herpetology
Instructor: Josh Kapfer
June 2 & 3 (Friday & Saturday)
µ Vegetation of
Wisconsin
Instructor: James Reinartz
June 5 - 10 (Monday—Saturday)
µ
Sedges: Identification & Ecology
Instructor: Anton Reznicek
June 16 & 17 (Friday & Saturday)
µ
Plant-Insect Interactions: Ecology & Evolution
Instructor: Gretchen Meyer
July 14 & 15 (Friday & Saturday)
µ
Dragonflies and Damselflies: Identification & Ecology
Instructor: Robert DuBois
July 21 & 22 (Friday & Saturday)
µ
Aquatic Invertebrates: Identification & Ecology
Instructor: Jerry Kaster
Aug. 4 & 5 (Friday & Saturday)
µ
Mushrooms and other Fleshy Fungi: Identification & Ecology
Instructor: Alan Parker
September 16 & 17 (Saturday & Sunday)
To Register:
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Field Station
3095 Blue Goose Road
Saukville, WI 53080
Phone: 262 675-6844
Fax: 262 675-0337
email: fieldstn@uwm.edu
Contact: Gretchen Meyer
Phenology on the World Wide Web:
The world wide web is full of phenological possibilities. Check out the following links:
- WPS Website Homepage
- National Phenology Network
- ATTRA - from the National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service
- Phenology in the classroom - Journey North
- Phenology for children and families - DNR's EEK! Website
- Resources for educators & families throughout Wisconsin - Nature Net - sign up for a free seasonal on-line newsletter for parents & grandparents!
- Earth Alive - Nature Net's kid-orientated database of phenological events. Enter observations as a family or classroom!
Membership Information
Please support the Phenological Society’s objectives by paying annual dues or becoming a life member. Annual dues are used primarily to defray the mailing cost of our Newsletter.
Please send your name, address, and which of the following actions you would like to take:
Please send to:
$2 for 2006/07 dues
$___ as further contribution to the work of the Society
$50 Lifetime Membership
Please delete my name from the membership list
Please send me information regarding programs of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters
Nancy Dernehl, Treasurer
Wisconsin Phenological Society
UWC—Waukesha
1500 University Drive
Waukesha, WI 53186
ndernehl@uwc.edu
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