Forestry & Natural Resources

FNR Field Reports Heltzel

Story by Wendy Mayer, Communications Coordinator
June 29, 2020

Throughout the summer, Purdue Forestry and Natural Resources will be featuring various students and their work in the field.

Amanda Heltzel, a junior studying Wildlife and minoring in Fisheries & Aquatic Sciences, is working as a seasonal research technician at the University of Missouri. Her responsibilities consist of conducting avian point counts and vegetation surveys in the Mark Twain National Forest.

The data that she and her colleagues are collecting will be used to inform management of pine-oak woodland restoration by the U.S. Forest Service and brown-headed nuthatch reintroduction.

“I'm enjoying my time in the Ozarks where I have observed wildlife I don't normally see such as elk and armadillo,” Heltzel said. “My favorite experience so far was target netting for eastern whip-poor-wills that were previously equipped with GPS tags. This was part of a research project being conducted on whip-poor-will migration by a PhD student. I'm excited for the opportunity to gain further career experience while working in a different part of the country than what I have before.”

Heltzel was named as the wildlife junior academic merit award winner, the Durward Allen Memorial Award and Stanley Coulter Leadership award honoree for 2019-20.

Check back throughout the summer to see what other FNR students are up to as they take their studies from the classroom to the field.

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