Desert Museum Science and 保护 through the Decades

1950s

博物馆创始人, Bill Carr and Arthur Pack, both followed and contributed to advances in desert 生态 and natural history, and championed many conservation causes.

1960s

威廉Woodin, the Museum’s second Director published herpetology research in herpetological and natural history journals and books.

Museum 策展人s and keepers contributed to captive breeding research, 兽医科学, natural area designations and native plant horticultural introductions. They helped to document thick-billed parrots, 沙漠pupfish, San Esteban Island chuckwallas and cactus pest management.

副主任, 卢沃克, monitored birds on islands in the Gulf of California, and advocated for their protection, ultimately winning protection for Isla Rasa, the nesting site for 95% of the world’s elegant terns and Heermann’s gulls.

Museum staff collaborated with University scientists on extensive natural history collecting, 研究和写作.

1970s

The first full-time researcher at the Museum was Dr. Richard Felger, a botanist who established an Office of Ecology in 1975. Felger coordinated research teams working on Seri ethnobotany, the conservation of sea turtles in the Gulf of California, desert-adapted crop plants and he flora of the Gran Desierto in Sonora. Felger played a major role in efforts to protect the sea turtles of the Pacific coast of 墨西哥, publishing a major article in Science about winter dormancy in green sea turtles in the Gulf. Field studies by 卢沃克, 比尔Woodin, Carlos Nagel and Richard Felger helped lay the groundwork for protection of the Sierra Pinacate (Sonora, 墨西哥).

1980s

Dr. Thomas 范Devender helped establish the climate and vegetation history of the Sonoran Desert using pack rat middens as proxies for paleo-environments, including co-editing the seminal book on the topic.

Museum botanists and zoologists continued foundational natural history research in herpetology, 生物地理学, 珍稀植物生物学, 植物种类, 和人类植物学.

1990s

Dr. 加里Nabhan, 科学部主任, led the science staff and curators in documenting the relationship between 今天’s Sonoran Desert vegetation and ancestral biotic communities in the Tropical Deciduous Forest to the south — in southern Sonora, 墨西哥.

范Devender, Nabhan and collaborators updated our knowledge of the plants of the Rio Mayo, fungi of the Tropical Deciduous Forest 和人类植物学 of the Mayo, Guarijio and Mountain Pima tribes.

They investigated the biodiversity of the northern Sierra Madre Occidental, 墨西哥, and established it as a mega-center of plant diversity, as recognized by the Internatational Union for the 保护 of Nature and the World Wildlife Fund.

The Museum’s science team initiated the Forgotten 传粉者 Campaign, which included field studies and rapid dissemination of scientific knowledge to policy makers and the public regarding declines in pollinators and the threats posed to desert plants. They explored the role of native pollinators in agricultural production.

The Forgotten 传粉者 Campaign morphed into the Migratory 传粉者 Program, documenting major flyways for lesser long-nosed bats, 白翅鸽, 黑脉金斑蝶, and rufous hummingbirds.

策展人, 霍华德Lawler, 领导努力学习, protect and breed the San Esteban Island (Gulf of California, 墨西哥)大型蜥蜴, in order to establish assurance populations of this endemic lizard.

博物馆的地质学家, Ron Ratkevich and Dave Thayer led the excavation and description of a new genus of Brachiopod dinosaur — Sonorasaurus. Sonorasaurs was named Arizona’s State Dinosaur in 2018.

博物馆的受托人, 贝丝Woodin, argued for and helped win approval for the reintroduction of the Mexican gray wolf.

2000s

Museum botanists and ecologists, led by Director of Natural 历史, Dr. 马克Dimmitt, 约翰·恩斯, and 范Devender compiled the biological survey of Ironwood Forest, helping to establish the 129,000 acre Ironwood Forest National Monument.

科学主任，博士. 理查德Brusca, along with 马克Dimmitt and Tom 范Devender, initiated work to establish the >10,000 acre private nature reserve, Rancho Ecológico Monte Mojino位于索诺拉州阿拉莫斯附近. The project is a partnership with Nature and Culture International, Pronatura, and the Mexican National Park Service (CONANP), to protect the largest remaining tract of endangered Tropical Dry Forest left in 墨西哥.

The Desert Museum supported the formal approval of the Sonoran Desert 保护 Plan Advisory Team, and several stakeholder meetings were held at the Museum.

Rick Brusca created the searchable, on-line, 大型生物海湾海湾 database — the only complete all-taxon inventory that exists for any region on earth. He established the ASDM 可持续海鲜 Program, in partnership with Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch; development of the Southwest 可持续海鲜 Guide.

The Museum supported founding the non-profit, SABCC (Southern Arizona Buffelgrass Coordination Center), in partnership with Brown Foundation and USGS.

Brusca established the University of Arizona Press-ASDM Press joint science book series, ASDM Studies in Natural 历史, with 6 volumes published.

Director of Natural 历史, 马克Dimmit, and botany staff compiled and disseminated >25 years of plant phenology data for the Sonoran Desert Region. This resource was one of the largest and longest-running datasets ever made available to the National 物候学 Network housed at University of Arizona), which tracks phenological changes in response to climate change.

2010年至今

Brusca and partners at the University of Arizona documented every coastal wetland and estuary in the Gulf of California, including data on size, biological diversity and conservation status.

The Museum hosted the largest-ever research conference on the Gulf of California.

Dr. Brusca worked with Desert Archeology on the coastal shell middens of Sonora, resulting in the most extensive published research to date on the archeology of coastal Sonora.

Jesus Garcia and Rick Brusca founded the Kino 传统果树 Project, to document and conserve heritage varieties of fruit trees brought to the region from the Mediterranean during the Spanish colonial period.

布鲁斯卡博士. 金正日富兰克林, 保护 Science Manager, partnered in the Arizona Sky Island Arthropod Project, a multi-disciplinary research program at the University of Arizona that combined systematics, 生物地理学, 生态, and population genetics to study origins and patterns of arthropod diversity in the Sky Island Region. The Museum’s role focused on ants and botany.

In partnership with the University of Arizona, the team produced the first complete inventory of aquatic animals in the Santa Cruz River in Santa Cruz County.

保护 Scientist, 塞尔吉奥·阿维拉, trained managers of natural protected areas in Northern 墨西哥, as well as community garden managers throughout the Tucson Basin, on protecting and restoring monarch butterfly habitat.

The Museum absorbed the functions of the Southern Arizona Buffelgrass Coordination Center, 包括它的研究, 恢复, fundraising and outreach activities, including the annual “Save our Saguaros” (formerly “Beat Back Buffelgrass”) month, and new citizen-mapping initiatives in Tucson and Hermosillo. Franklin founded and continues to lead the Sonoran Desert Cooperative Weed Management Area, which coordinates buffelgrass and other invasive weed management among over 30 participating organizations, businesses and jurisdictions. She is partnering with University of Arizona social scientists on an NSF-funded study of cross-jurisdictional governance issues.

Franklin developed and secured initial funding for a ten-year research and demonstration project to remove buffelgrass from infested slopes of Tumamoc Hill.

The Museum’s buffelgrass team is examining the effectiveness of 20-years of buffelgrass treatment in Saguaro National Park. We will use these findings to provide future treatment recommendations and cost estimates for different environmental 条件.

The Museum is a founding partner of the Tucson Bee Collaborative (with the University of Arizona Insect Collection and Pima College Biology Department), to understand and protect the tremendous diversity of native bees in our region. 高中, college and university students and community 志愿者 work with researchers to study local bee diversity, abundance and 生态 over time.

Franklin and collaborators at 保护 Science Partners have published the first analyses of 40 years of phenology data collected by Museum botanists at the Museum and Saguaro National Park to look at varied desert plant responses to climate change.