
Jordan Giese, Ph.D.
Chair
Jordan grew up in eastern Nebraska and has long been interested in the relationship between wildlife and agriculture. His enthusiasm for research was sparked by his first experience as a wildlife research technician at the University of Nebraska, tracking songbirds around corn and soybean farms. After graduating, Jordan moved to Texas to pursue a M.S. in wildlife biology, where his research focused on the nest ecology of White-tipped Doves (Leptotila verreauxii) in the Lower Rio Grande Valley along the U.S.-Mexico border. During his Ph.D. work at Iowa State University, he investigated the impacts of prairie restoration on grassland birds and other wildlife. Throughout his time in graduate school, Jordan devoted a considerable amount of time to teaching labs and mentoring undergraduate researchers. One such project on the wildlife impacts of oxbow wetland restoration in north-central Iowa, involved his first foray into wetlands research. After finishing his Ph.D. in early 2023, he accepted his current position at the Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute, where his work is focused upon examining wildlife use of freshwater and saline wetlands throughout the Texas coast.

Ethan Massey, M.S.
Vice Chair
After graduating from Louisiana State University with a B.S. in Natural Resource Ecology and Management with a Wetland Science focus, Ethan earned his Master’s degree from the University of Arkansas at Monticello. During his time at UAM, he conducted research on the diet and body condition of Arctic-nesting geese. He joined The Wildlife Society during graduate school and became a member of the Wetlands Working Group. After graduating in 2017, he began his career with Ducks Unlimited where he has held various biologist positions focused on wetland restoration projects across the southeastern United States. Currently, he serves as an easement program biologist with DU, working as a federal contractor to support the Natural Resources Conservation Service in implementing the Agricultural Conservation Easement Program. This program helps protect and restore wetlands and associated uplands on private lands through long-term conservation easements. When he’s not working, he enjoys duck hunting, birding, and fishing in the marshes and swamps of South Louisiana.

James Morel, M.S.
Past Chair

Paul Taillie, Ph.D.
Secretary-Treasurer
Paul has been involved with TWS and the North Carolina chapter ever since he started graduate school at NC State University back in 2011. His early work was focused on topics of disturbance ecology and spatial ecology primarily in upland environments, but he later began applying these concepts to wetlands as part of his dissertation research. He joined the Wetlands Working Group in 2017, when he applied for the student travel award to cover costs associated with attending the national meeting in Albuquerque, New Mexico. For the past few years, he has been an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography and Environment at UNC Chapel Hill, where his research aims to integrate field ecology and remote sensing to understand global change and conservation of various wildlife taxa across broad spatial and temporal scales, with a particular focus on wetlands and coasts. He also teaches several undergraduate classes related to environmental conservation, global change, and spatial data science.

Emma Weber
Social Media Liaison
Emma is from Newton, Illinois and earned her B.S. in Geological Sciences and Biology from the University of Miami. After graduating, she worked on research projects involving common loons, acoustic bat monitoring, and soundscape monitoring. She is currently a master’s student at the Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute at Texas A&M-Kingsville. Her research focuses on developing methods to survey waterfowl using acoustic recordings and understanding how waterfowl use wetland sanctuaries on the Texas coast.
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