October 2020 E Newsletter

the power of PLACE

On the Shoulders of Giants

Standing on the shoulders of the giants that came before me, I know my place and I’m sticking to it.  It gives me a view to the past, and more importantly, to the future.

It can be hard to appreciate the great scientists that have passed through RMBL.  A member of the Oklahoma Hall of Fame, Harriet Barclay inspired generations of botanists at RMBL, including Jean Langenheim, a founding faculty member at UC-Santa Cruz and former President of the Ecological Society of America.

Ian Billick - Director RMBL

Ian Billick | PhD
Executive Director, RMBL

sciencestories

Scottie Willey, PhD

Keeping a Secret

There’s a place near Gothic that is one of the best kept secrets among RMBL field scientists. It’s the Mexican Cut Preserve. A cirque (bowl-shaped basin) on the side of a mountain, it was originally a site explored for gold and silver and later abandoned. Since then, it has remained a virtually undisturbed blanket of native plants dotted with ponds. As a resource for studying intact ecosystems, its value to science far outweighs any precious metal.

 

news
RMBL science video from Dancing Star Foundation
The Experiment
RMBL scientists in the Telluride Daily Planet
Groves of Gold