What kind of job do you have?
I have a great job as a wildlife biologist, working for the Alaska Science Center of the U. S. Geological Survey. I’ve studied birds all over Alaska, including puffins on the oceans, sandpipers on the mudflats, geese on coastal tundra, and songbirds in the forests. My studies help answer questions about what things might hurt or help birds that live up here. Were there any childhood events that influenced your decision to become a biologist?
I grew up in a large family (with 13 brothers and sisters!) in Ohio and other states in the midwestern U. S. We were always playing outside, maybe because our house was so small for all of us! But I remember one special house in Missouri that had a huge yard with a forest and a creek behind it. We used to explore the woods and the creek for hours each day, building tree forts and looking for critters.
I studied really hard in school because I loved to learn about new things. I liked to solve math problems because they were challenging—it was like a one-on-one contest with each problem, and I liked to win. I remember the first time I looked through a microscope in biology class—there was a tiny paramecium swimming around in the water. It looked like a microscopic hairy shoe swirling around. I was amazed that any creature could be so small and so simple. Creeks became even more magical places because now I knew how much life was hidden in them. Biology is the study of living things, so I guess I was really a biologist even as a young child!

Was there a particular person or role model that greatly influenced or inspired you?
I had several great teachers who really changed my life. One I liked a lot was Mr. Cavanaugh. He taught me 9^th grade English and AP English my senior year in high school. He was a really hard teacher but he gave us great books to read. He taught us how to write. He made us spell all our words correctly, taught us the crazy rules of English grammar, and showed us how to construct an essay that made sense. I didn’t know it then, but now I realize that being able to write well can help a person no matter what he or she decides to do in life. Mr. Cavanaugh also opened up the world of literature to me. It’s like another dimension of the universe where one can escape for a while by simply opening the covers of a book. No one can reach you while you’re there.
Another great teacher I had was Dr. E. O. Wilson, who taught me biology when I was a freshman in college at Harvard. He loved to study ANTS! He taught us that every animal species has its own social world, complete with sex lives, specialized jobs, friendships, and battles. Insects are some of the most amazing creatures on the earth and it was fascinating to learn about their behavior and social customs. Up until then, I had thought I was going to become a medical doctor. But this animal world had become so fascinating that I changed my mind.

How did you become interested in ornithology? Chickadees?
My first experience with birds didn’t come until my junior year in college. Sure, I’d grown up surrounded by flashy red cardinals and squawking blue jays, but I never really paid attention to them as a kid. During spring break several of us drove down the Atlantic Coast from Boston to the Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia. This was an incredible place! We rented some canoes and paddled through the tea-colored waters of the swamp, which was filled with alligators, snakes, chest-high ferns, and buttressed bald cypress trees. I felt like dinosaurs might emerge from behind any tree! Then I saw my first Prothonotary Warbler—a brilliant yellow wisp of a bird that flitted through the lush green foliage. One of my friends let me look through his binoculars and I was hooked on birds!
Chickadees live across most of the United States, so I’ve been around them all of my life. They’ve always been cheerful, comfortable companions in the woods with their sweet little “chick-a-dee-dee” call. I didn’t really start studying them until I discovered that many of our chickadees in Alaska were showing up at people’s bird feeders with grossly deformed beaks. Twisted, crossed, immensely long. The birds couldn’t eat properly. They couldn’t preen their feathers properly. They couldn’t peck out nesting cavities. Something was terribly wrong, so I began a research study to determine what’s been causing these problems.

Do you have a favorite work story or experience to share?
One of my favorite studies was of Black Turnstones on the coast of the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta in western Alaska. These are handsome black-and-white sandpipers that nest on the ground and hatch out chicks that look like little speckled balls of fluff on a pair of giant legs! Within 24 hours of hatching, the chicks leave their nest and run around the tundra looking for insects. Their parents don't have to feed them but do have to keep them warm by sitting on them! I studied about 30 turnstone “couples” each year for five years, putting colored “bracelets” on their legs so I could tell them apart. It was fun seeing which couples were able to chase away all the gulls and foxes that wanted to eat their chicks and to see who would come back each summer to nest again. I found out that most turnstones mate for life, but that sometimes mates would “divorce” each other and pair with a new mate. Our turnstones would fly down to their own winter beaches between Washington and Mexico, but mates would go to different places. That made it even more amazing that they would nest together again the following summer. Divorces usually happened when one of the birds was really late in returning during the spring—the mate that was there finally gave up waiting and paired with someone new. We realized that these birds would have no way of knowing if their former mate had died, since they wintered in different areas. Newly formed pairs were not as good at raising young as parents that had been together for a while. From this I learned how important it can be to understand the social lives of birds. Knowing where they live and what they feed on is important, but knowing how they choose mates and raise young successfully is also important to ensuring their survival!

What advice do you have for a student who might be interested in pursuing your occupation someday?
Be curious! Be observant! Follow your interests! Have fun! Learn how to write! If you do all of these things, you will learn how to be a good scientist. You will find that you’ll study what you need to learn because it is fun and satisfies your curiosity. Writing will help you tell your fascinating stories to the people who want to hear them.

Have a question for Dr. Colleen Handel? Click here to send her a question.

Chickadee expert #2: Dr. Susan Sharbaugh