The Wildlife Professional May/June Issue
May 5, 2025
©Madeleine Wrazej
Communications
Chair: Amanda Veals Dutt, amveals@gmail.com
Nominating
Chair: Tom Decker, thomas_decker@fws.gov
Membership is available to all current TWS members. You may join our Working Group by logging in to your TWS account.
John McDonald is an Associate Professor in the Department of Environmental Science at Westfield State University in western Massachusetts and Past President of The Wildlife Society. From 1995-2000 he was the Deer Project Leader for the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife and from 2003 to 2012 he was a Wildlife Specialist with the Wildlife and Sport Fish Restoration Program of the US Fish & Wildlife Service in the Northeast Region where he administered Wildlife Restoration and State Wildlife grants to 13 state fish and wildlife agencies. John is a TWS Fellow and Associate Editor for the Wildlife Society Bulletin and the Journal of Wildlife Management. He was one of the founders of the Northeast Section’s Wildlife Field Course and has served as the organizer and one of the lead instructors for the course since 2009.
Geriann Albers is the furbearer biologist for the Indiana Department of Natural Resources. She is a board member with the Indiana Chapter of The Wildlife Society, past board member of the Wildlife Damage Management Working Group, and past president of University of Illinois and West Virginia University Student Chapters of The Wildlife Society. Prior to joining Indiana DNR, she worked as the Assistant Black Bear and Furbearer Biologist in North Carolina, and the Assistant Furbearer Biologist for Wisconsin DNR. She received her M.S. from West Virginia University in 2012. In her free time, she enjoys crocheting, reading fiction, basket weaving, and watching British murder mysteries.
Val is the Program Manager for Wildlife Resources Management at Hocking College in Nelsonville, Ohio. She has been hunting and fishing her entire life, and has started to learn more about trapping. She’s a certified hunter safety instructor, as well as a Conservation Leaders for Tomorrow instructor. Her research has focused mainly on the conservation and management of reptiles and amphibians and wildlife health, but she has recently started to dabble in game species and human dimensions work. She is an active member of TWS, having held a number of positions at the state, regional, working group, and recently served as the NE Representative to Council before moving to OH. She is an alum of the Leadership Institute and is a TWS Fellow. Val completed her PhD in Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior at Binghamton University in 2013.
As the Program Manager for Trapping Policy and Human Wildlife Conflicts for the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies (AFWA), he helps lead the efforts of the Sustainable Use of Wildlife and Wildlife Resource Policy committees, and the Furbearer Conservation, Human Wildlife Conflict, and Feral Swine working groups. He leads efforts to develop Best Management Practices for Trapping in the United States and Best Practices for human-wildlife conflict resolution. He also engages with CITES, the IUCN, the International Wildlife
Management Congress, the International Union of Game Biologists, and other domestic and international wildlife conservation groups. He also represents the United States as a member of the Joint Management Committee for the Agreement on International Humane Trapping Standards. He has authored numerous peer reviewed scientific publications on furbearer management and human-wildlife conflict resolution. Bryant has also served as an instructor for the Conservation Leaders for Tomorrow program since 2010 and he is passionate about hunter and trapper education.
