Meet Outstanding Senior Liam Doski

Liam Doski, a graduating senior with a major in wildlife and minor in aquatic sciences, was named as Forestry and Natural Resources’ Outstanding Senior.

“Being selected for this award means a lot to me,” the Bloomington, Indiana, native said. “It feels like recognition of the hard work I’ve put in throughout my college career and my involvement in extracurricular activities. It’s really rewarding to see that effort acknowledged. It feels very humbling. There are so many outstanding students in my cohort who could have filled this role, and I see this recognition as a reflection of the group as a whole. I’m grateful to represent a class full of talented and hardworking individual.”

Liam has been involved in several clubs and organizations as an undergraduate student. He served as vice president of the student chapter of The Wildlife Society, secretary and vice president of the American Fisheries Society and secretary and vice president of the FNR Student Council. Liam spent two years as part of the FNR Ambassador team. He also has acted as the undergraduate representative for the College of Agriculture’s curriculum and student relations committee for the past year.

Over his FNR career, Liam also has assisted Indiana Fishery biologists with sunfish population surveys, conducted electrofishing surveys and bluebird nest box surveys, assisted with eastern hellbender reintroduction research, assisted with mysid shrimp research and husbandry and supported the rehabilitation and husbandry of native bat species.

He has gained experience with various electrofishing techniques (barge, backpack and boat), fyke, gill and hoop netting, small and medium animal trapping and tagging, bird banding and surveys, bat surveys and radio telemetry. He also has participated in vegetation surveys, habitat management planning, wildlife rehabilitation, endangered species handling, bear cub tagging and also working with technology such as R Studio, Program MARK, Program Populus and more.

He worked as a wildlife rehabilitation intern at Wildcare Inc., in Bloomington during the spring and summer of 2023. He helped care for ambassador animals, helped rehabilitate an endangered Kirtland’s snake, raised and fed more than 100 Virginia opossum juveniles, reared eastern box turtles and rehabilitated native bats.

Liam acted as teaching assistant for Dendrology class in the falls of 2024 and 2025, teaching native and invasive woody and herbaceous species, tree and twig ID and more.

In addition to the Outstanding Senior Award, Liam also was honored for his research efforts with the L. David Mech Distinguished Undergraduate Research Award. The Mech award was established by the wildlife faculty to recognize a senior who has, by virtue of contributions made independently, or in conjunction with ongoing studies, shown the greatest potential for future success as a research scientist. Selection is based on the student's curiosity, intellect, perseverance, problem solving and communication skills because excellence in these areas is necessary for conducting wildlife research of the highest quality.

Liam is wrapping up his undergraduate research with Dr. Pat Zollner, through which he has been studying the influence of weather patterns on North American river otter harvest in Indiana as well assisting three graduate students with their individual research projects. He has presented his research at the 2025 national conference for The Wildlife Society and the 2026 Midwest Fish and Wildlife Conference.

Beginning in July 2025, Liam has worked as an autonomous recording unit technician on a research project under Griffin Broviak. In that role, he deploys and retrieves ARUs for avian acoustic monitoring, manages and uploads large datasets and processes the data using BirdNET software.

Concurrently, Liam also has been working as a technician in Dr. Jason Hoverman’s lab. He performs water quality assessments, conducts macroinvertebrate and crayfish surveys, monitors captive eastern hellbenders and conducts periphyton and decomposition surveys. 

As a junior, Liam was selected as the recipient of the Durward Allen Memorial Award, which is presented to an outstanding junior majoring in wildlife. He served as a teaching assistant for Summer Practicum that year in addition to his research in the Zollner lab.

After graduation, Liam will be acting as the Summer Practicum wildlife and aquatic science teaching assistant crew lead. He will then take a position as a hellbender technician with extension wildlife specialist Nick Burgmeier.