December 2023 Welcome Kamya Patel! Kamya will be doing a PhD on the impacts of sleep disturbance on birds.
August 2023 Margaret is on Research and Study Leave until 1 Feb 2024.
August 2023 Welcome Ella Speers! Ella will be joining the lab group to do her MSc on Darwin’s ant behaviour and detection.
July 2023 Congrats to Juli – on successfully defending her PhD ‘The importance of sleep for avian vocal communication’ and becoming Dr Juliane Gaviraghi Mussoi!
July 2023 Congrats to Theo on successfully defending her PhD ‘Rat and Possum Dynamics in an Eradication Landscape: Novel Tools, Movement Patterns and Device Interactions and becoming Dr Theo O’Malley! Theo has a postdoc at the Max Planck Institute in Germany – congratulations Theo!
June 2023 Congrats to Abi Cunninghame on her first class MSc: ‘Ecological Condition and Utilisation of Greenspaces in Primary Schools’
June 2023 Congrats to Rosie on successfully defending her PhD ‘The Social and Ecological Benefits of Community-led Backyard Pest Control in Urban Auckland’ and becoming Dr Rosie Gerolemou!
May 2023 Congrats to Cathy – on successfully defending her PhD ‘Effects of landscape connectivity on feral cats in agricultural ecosystems’ and becoming Dr Cathy Nottingham!
7 December 2022 Congrats to Cathy Nottingham who submitted her PhD thesis!
9 December 2022 Congrats to Theo O’Malley for winning best student talk at the Australasian Wildlife Management Society Conference
2 December 2022 Congrats to Olivia Rooke-Devoy for winning best student poster at the NZ Ecological Society Conference
15 November 2022 Welcome to Ella Speers and Bella Perham who are summer students funded by Bioprotection Aotearoa CoRE to work with Diana on multiple weed impacts.
31 October 2022 Congrats to Rosie Gerolemou who submitted her PhD thesis!
1 September 2022 Great news! Diana Borse finally made it to Aotearoa and started her PhD today studying the impacts of multiple weeds as a part of a larger Bioprotection Aotearoa CoRE project focusing on mānuka/kānuka ecosystems.
23 August 2022 Rosie wrote a great OpEd in the NZHerald focused on her research on community backyard trapping.
17 August 2022 Juli was busy with media talking about her new paper on how important sleep is for bird song, and featured in NZ Geographic, Newshub, Karyn Hay Nights, and Morning Report RNZ
1 August 2022 Congrats to Dr Yen Yi Loo on successfully defending her doctoral exam – ‘Examining the origins of vocal learning using the oldest passerine; fundamental studies on the vocal communication of the titipounamu’
23 June 2022 Congrats to Becky MacQueen on her first class MSc – ‘Personality and sex: stress physiology effects on vocal performance in the common myna’
21 June 2022 Cathy Nottingham was interviewed by Stuff, 95bFM and featured on TV3’s Newshub talking about her recent paper on feral cat home ranges.
July 2023 Congrats to Sandy Huang on her first class MSc: ‘Auckland street tree ecology: current status and future potential’
6 June 2022 Congrats to Dr Daria Erastova on passing her PhD exam – fantastic thesis on the effects of sugar-water feeding on native birds in urban backyard.
1 May 2022 Congrats to Jess Peart on her first class MSc – ‘Personality and sex: stress physiology effects on vocal performance in the common myna’
3 March 2022 Congrats to Dr Ines Moran on successfully defending her doctoral exam – ‘The evolutionary roots of vocal learning: exploring vocal learning abilities in vocal non-learners in birds’
10 February 2022 Great news! Rosie Gerolemou won best poster prize at the Australasian Ornithological Conference! Click here to learn more about Rosie’s research.
30 November 2021 Congrats to Makenzie Vitasovich who submitted her MSc thesis!
19 November 2021 Margaret had a fun time as part of a panel discussion at the Science communicators of NZ conference – talking about her experiences during her Drawing Science collaboration with illustrator Pepper Raccoon. It was published in The Spinoff in February!
8 November 2021 Congrats to Yen Yi Loo who submitted her PhD thesis today!
1 November 2021 Welcome to our two summer students, Bella Perham and Liam Ivanov, they’ll be working with Abi and Juli over the summer.
29 October 2021 Several of our students presented at the NZ Ecological Society conference this week (Rosie, Olivia, Sandy, Juli) – and Juli took out runner up best poster prize!! Congrats!
29 October 2021 Juli won best poster at the SBS Showcase day!
26 October 2021 Congrats to Daria Erastova who submitted her PhD thesis today!
22 October 2021 Congrats to Yen for her first publication from her thesis – in Frontiers no less!
31 August 2021 Congrats to Ines Moran who submitted her PhD thesis today!
23 July 2021 Daria Erastova published her first paper from her PhD research! Congrats Daria!
30 June 2021 Rosie Gerolemou and Cathy Nottingham both gave talks on their PhD research at the Joint Graduate School seminar day, and then again at the NZBI virtual conference (29 July 2021).
16 June 2020 Margaret gave a webinar on ‘Conservation connectivity: from backyards and farms to landscapes’. Watch the recording HERE.
16 June 2020 Congratulations to Sandy Huang who was awarded her MSc (First Class) for her thesis: ‘Auckland street tree ecology: current status and future potential.’
28 Feb 2020 Congratulations to Sandy Huang who submitted her MSc thesis on the ecology of Auckland’s street trees!
Feb 2020 Read about Cathy Nottingham’s PhD research in the Bioheritage newsletter: https://bioheritage.nz/do-feral-cats-like-trees-just-as-much-as-our-natives-do/
16 September 2019 Congratulations to Dr Ellery McNaughton on being awarded her PhD! Ellery is working in the Biosecurity Team at Auckland Council.
1 September 2019 Welcome to Rosie Gerolemou, starting a PhD on ‘The Ecological Effectiveness and Social Benefits of Urban Backyard Trapping’.
1 April 2019 Welcome aboard Cathy Nottingham! Cathy who finished an MSc in the lab last year, is starting a PhD today. Watch this space.
29 March 2019 Congrats to Ellery McNaughton who submitted her PhD thesis today!
15 March 2019: Congrats to Dr Carolina Lara Mendoza – who was awarded her PhD. Carolina is now working as an avifauna specialist for Wildlands.
25 February 2019: Congrats to Dr Anna Probert – who was awarded her PhD. Anna is off to Switzerland for a postdoc working in Sven Bacher’s lab.
31 October 2018: Congrats to Carolina Lara and Anna Probert – both submitted their PhD theses!
26 October 2018: Congrats to Cathy Nottingham who was awarded her First Class Masters on the impact of hedgehogs
6 August 2018: Daria Erastova was awarded $5500 by Birds NZ for her project on the effect of sugar-water feeders on native bird behaviour and welfare.
1 August 2018: Daria Erastova was awarded $4500 by JS Watson fund (Forest & Bird) for her project on the effect of sugar-water feeders on native bird behaviour and welfare.
26 February 2018: Congratulations to Anna Probert (Postgraduate Student Research Communication Award) and Margaret Stanley (Research Communication Award) – winners at the School of Biological Sciences annual Research Awards
15 May 2017: Congratulations to Josie Galbraith who won the Marion Cranwell prize ($3 000) for best 2016 MSc or PhD thesis on an ecological or environmental issue.
9 May 2017: Margaret Stanley, Carolina Lara, Ellery McNaughton & Josie Galbraith showcased their Wild Cities Urban Ecology research at the University of Auckland Celebrating Research Excellence function on 8th May. They did a marvellous job of explaining their research to the Minister for Science Paul Goldsmith and various other dignitaries.
19 December 2016: Josie Galbraith has been awarded a place on the Dean of Graduate Studies List (Dean’s List) in recognition of excellence achieved in her PhD thesis.
1 December 2016: Lizzy Lowe took the prize for best speed talk at the UoA science postdoc symposium
1 December 2016: Josie Galbraith won runner-up student talk prize at the Australasian Wildlife Management Society Conference
25 November 2016: Josie Galbraith won a student talk prize at the joint conference of the Society for Ecological Restoration Australasia (SERA) & the New Zealand Ecological Society (NZES)
17 November 2016: Congrats to Robert Vennell – who won an Enderby Trust scholarship to visit the subantarctic islands in December.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/86284510/golden-ticket-for-subantarctic-islands-adventure
2 September 2016: Carolina Lara was awarded $4000 by the JS Watson Trust for her project on the effectiveness of ecological corridors in maintaining bird movement and seed dispersal.
1 September 2016: MSc student Robert Vennell was awarded ‘Runner Up’ in the finals of the University of Auckland ‘3 Minute Thesis competition’.
August 2016: Anna Probert was appointed one of NZ’s ‘Biosecurity Champions’ by MPI. https://www.mpi.govt.nz/protection-and-response/biosecurity/biosecurity-2025/
9th June 2016: Anna Probert was awarded $8000 – from Todd Foundation Awards for Excellence (Universities).
18 May 2016: Jessica Devitt won the Marion Cranwell prize (joint winner) for best 2015 MSc or PhD thesis on an ecological or environmental issue.
16 May 2016: Anna Probert has been awarded $1000 by the Royal Society’s Hutton Fund for her PhD research on using exotic ants as a model to assess risks to native ecosystems.