Background
I received my B.S. in Wildlife and Fisheries Biology from the University
of California at Davis in 1992. Upon graduating, I worked
on a variety of university research projects in such diverse places as
southern Chile and Tanzania, East Africa. More recently, I was employed
by the Department of Marine and Wildlife Resources in the U.S. Territory
of American Samoa and monitored populations of forest birds and two species
of pteropodid fruit bats throughout the archipelago. I received my M.S.
in Biological Sciences from California State University Pomona in 2002.
For my M.S. thesis, I studied habitat utilization and territory requirements
of Coastal Cactus Wrens (Campylorhynchus brunneicapillus), a
large wren species inhabiting coastal sage scrub areas of southern California
and
Baja California. I am currently a 2nd year Ph.D. candidate in the laboratory
of Dr. Vincent Resh at U.C. Berkeley.
Research Interests
I am interested in food web ecology and trophic interactions, particularly
in urban riparian systems. My interests stem from a growing body of
literature on food web dynamics and reciprocal food subsidies between
aquatic and terrestrial systems. I specifically would like to investigate
the relationship between avian and arthropod communities utilizing
these perturbed urban systems. Little is known about the composition
and abundance of arthropods in urban areas and how these relate to
bird populations. Riparian habitat areas are regarded as some of the
most productive natural systems on earth and, although accounting for
less than 1% of the western landscape of the United States, support
very high numbers of plant and animal species and provide critical
breeding and over-wintering habitat for many species of resident and
Neotropical migrant birds. In southern California, it is estimated
that over 90 percent of the riparian habitat has been lost from water
diversion and land development projects.
I
am currently working on the San Gabriel River, a predominantly
urbanized watershed located Los Angeles County of southern California.
The San Gabriel River flows from the San Gabriel Mountains in
the Angeles National Forest and empties into the Pacific Ocean
at Long Beach. The upper portion of the watershed and its main
tributaries remain in a relatively natural state, but the middle
and lower reaches have been extensively modified for flood management.
Several dams and reservoirs line the main river channel.
Birds
and arthropods are useful biological indicators for studying
the ways in which urbanization influences ecosystems. Arthropods
are critical food resources for many species of birds and are
well suited to studying the effects of urbanization since they
are biologically diverse, represent a broad spectrum of trophic
levels, and have relatively short generation times so that they
may respond quickly to habitat changes. Since the process of
urbanization affects the resources that are linked to bird abundance
and distribution, changes in the system should be mirrored in
individual bird species and the avian community as a whole. Species
richness is also linked to ecosystem productivity, although the
mechanisms and spatial scales are poorly understood. Through
my research, I hope to determine if seasonal shifts in aquatic
arthropod abundance, such as the timing of emergence of aquatic
insects, are reflected in the abundance, foraging patterns, and
reproductive biology of the avian community.
This
research is being funded by the San Gabriel Mountains Regional
Conservancy, a non-profit land conservancy based in the Los Angeles
area.
Contact
Information
Christopher Solek
University of California at Berkeley
Environmental Science, Policy, and Management
Division of Insect Biology
201 Wellman Hall #3112
Berkeley, CA 94720-3112
Phone: 510.642.5913
Fax: 510.642.7428
csolek@nature.berkeley.edu
