The staff and volunteers at Hawks Aloft come from a wide variety of backgrounds. Each member of the Hawks Aloft team brings valuable knowledge, insight, and vision to the organization.   Gail Garber, Executive Director  My background for this position is non-traditional. I am an artist and a writer, have written two books in another field and published numerous articles, including peer-reviewed manuscripts. Back in 1988, I met and fell in love with an educational Red-tailed Hawk. I began working as a volunteer for a local conservation organization, and it wasn’t long before I became a staff member writing training manuals, grants, editing their newsletter, etc. However, it was education that was my first love, followed by field research. Today, I  thoroughly enjoy all aspects of Hawks Aloft, from working in the field studying nesting raptors along the Rio Grande bosque and songbird surveys to education programs to working with our large cadre of non-releasable education birds. I have been thrilled to  write not only technical papers, but also articles about birds and nature for the general public.  A selection of these can be found on my blog, and I hope that it will soon include articles by other Hawks Aloft staff.  In my other life, I am a professional quilt maker (Gail Garber Designs) and often travel to teach and lecture methods that I have developed in this media. My leisure time is often spent outdoors, searching for birds and more birds, but my dog and I also enjoy the peace and quiet of our mountain home (and the birds).   Sharon Auriene, Office Manager Born and raised in Chicago, I migrated out west in my early twenties where I discovered my love for all things western. I am an animal lover at heart. I have raised or cared for purebred Persian cats, Dobermans, various orphans, chickens, quail, parakeets, horses and various reptiles. My love for animals carried over into a small business marketing animal cages to the pet industry. I designed and created custom-sized cages for all types of animals, purebred dogs and cats, and birds, to be used in organizations such as humane societies, boarding facilities, veterinarians, and zoos. New here to Albuquerque, I recently moved here this winter from Florida, and after discovering Hawks Aloft, I feel as though I have come home again. I have a background in office administration, marketing and bookkeeping, and hope that I can utilize these skills to contribute to the continued success of the organization.     Trevor Fetz, Biologist  I grew up in northeastern Oregon and received a B.A. in English from Whitman College. Upon realizing that my baseball career was not going to advance beyond college, and that I didn’t want to teach English, I decided to pursue my interest in nature. I received an M.S. in Environmental Studies from Southern Oregon University, and it was during that time I discovered my obsession with birds. After completing my M.S., I spent several years working for the Oregon Cooperative Wildlife Research Unit studying Spotted Owls in southwestern Oregon and two years as the project coordinator of a MAPS station for the Medford, Oregon, district of the Bureau of Land Management. For the past 5 years, I have been working on a Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at New Mexico State University. If all goes well, I will complete my Ph.D. in the spring of 2006.    Sarah Keller, Education Program Coordinator I was raised in rural Maryland by a family with a strong connection to the land and a reverence for wildlife. My journey into environmental education began in high school where I thumbed my nose at conventional schooling and became my own educational guinea pig. As a homeschool brat, I had a vested interest in how people best learn, especially outdoors, because that’s where I spent a lot of time. Since I was outside anyway, I discovered the obsessive pursuit of birding. I was earning my Ecology B.S. at the University of Montana when I returned to public school as a teacher for a National Science Foundation program to improve ecology education. On the science side, I’ve worked at field stations in Virginia and Colorado studying pollination biology and cavity nesting birds; in Arizona as a raptor migration counter; and here in New Mexico on a study of zoonotic diseases in small rodents. While I’ve been involved in research and education, my motivation for both is conservation; I’m thrilled to be part of an organization where both disciplines co-exist for that common goal.   Ron Kellermueller, Raptor Projects Coordinator  Born in Queens, New York, and graduated from Colorado State University with a B.S. in Zoology. I left for Seattle, Washington to pursue a Masters degree in Marine Biology but became a commercial salmon fisherman in Alaska instead, along with doing seasonal work as a biologist for the Washington State Department of Fisheries on various salmon enhancement projects. I decided that the soggy, overcast winters of the Pacific northwest was not for me so my wife Sarah and I fled for New Mexico with no jobs and little money. I continued commuting to Alaska for the salmon season and eventually stumbled onto Hawks Aloft quite by accident. It did not take long before I became enraptured by the raptors and had the pleasure of working in areas that would make old whisky sodden Edward Abbey jealous. I currently live in Albuquerque with Sarah and our son, Malcolm.   Stephanie Russo, Outreach and Education I grew up on the Midwestern soils of Missouri and Arkansas. Most of my youth included running around barefoot in the woods and streams adjacent to my house, taking in all of the sights and sounds. In high school, I interned with the Missouri Department of Conservation as a naturalist, and decided that I wanted to pursue a career in the environment. After graduating from HS, I ventured out west to achieve my B.A. at Prescott College. I earned my degree in Environmental Studies with an emphasis in Agroecology. This is the study of the agricultural sciences and ecology. After finishing my senior project at the Grand Canyon Chapter of the Sierra Club, titled “Environmental Outreach” I discovered that I love getting people involved in environmental issues, especially young adults and children. One of my favorite activities is helping brighten up a child’s life by having them learn something new. Now that I have transplanted my roots here in New Mexico, I hope that through Hawks Aloft, I can enlighten more children through Education and Outreach to the wonders of our environment. Especially our feathered friends!   Mike Stake, Biologist  As part of a campaign to lure his students away from the television, my sixth-grade teacher led a field trip to a local California creek to identify birds. My first scribbled bird list included unheard of species like "Buffalohead" and "Gazebo" along with more correctly recorded "Great Blue Heron" and "Belted Kingfisher". Despite learning that the "gazebo" was where we ate lunch and not actually a bird, I was hooked. My interest in birds later took me to exotic places like Australia, Africa, South America, and the Caribbean. I also lived in St. Petersburg, Russia for two years and developed an interest in everything Russian. Less exotic, but perhaps no less foreign, I settled down in Texas from 1997-2001 and worked for The Nature Conservancy monitoring endangered Black-capped Vireos and Golden-cheeked Warblers. I moved to the University of Missouri in 2001 to pursue a Master’s Degree, using time-lapse video cameras to study nest predators. In 2008, I begin my 5th year at Hawks Aloft, managing a variety of songbird research projects. My research interests include Gray Vireos, Willow Flycatchers, Purple Martins, and the Albuquerque Isotopes.