Dr. Julie Jedlicka, assistant professor of biology at Missouri Western State University, and faculty colleagues at Humboldt State University in California have won a $250,000 National Science Foundation grant to study the roles of birds, insects and climate change in the ecology of coffee production in Kenya. The International Research Experiences for Students grant will allow the researchers and students from each university to travel to Kenya for five weeks each year for the next three years.
“This is another shining example of Missouri Western’s commitment to providing our undergraduate students with applied learning opportunities that are often not available at larger universities,” said Dr. Robert Vartabedian, Missouri Western’s president. “This project has the added benefit of allowing students to broaden their horizons by traveling outside the country to live and work for weeks at a time. I congratulate Dr. Jedlicka and her colleagues for this recognition of their commitment to both the advancement of science and the education of our students.”
Dr. Julie Jedlicka, assistant professor of biology, will share a $250,000 NSF grant to study the role of birds on coffee farms in Kenya. Photos by Patrick P. Evenson | Coverage Photography
The three-year grant for $249,424 will fund a research project by Dr. Jedlicka and Dr. Tim Bean and Dr. Matthew Johnson of Humboldt State titled “Birds, Beans and Bugs: Modeling a Warming Climate’s Effect on the Natural Enemies Hypothesis.” It will allow two of the three principal investigators, one Missouri Western undergraduate student, and undergraduate and graduate students from Humboldt State to travel to Kenya in December and January for the next three years. Students will take courses before and after their field experiences and work in the laboratory to help analyze samples collected in the field.
The goal is to investigate the effect of rising temperatures on insect pests and their natural enemies in coffee farming landscapes. Because Kenya has a great deal of geographic diversity, researchers will be able to look at coffee farms grown in the sun and in the shade and from low elevation to high, enabling them to simulate changes in the climate. The project will be a very valuable experience for students, Dr. Jedlicka said.
“Students need to look at ecological problems from a global perspective,” she said. “They’ll have the opportunity to benefit from collaboration with U.S. and foreign mentors while being fully immersed in the research process, from field work to analysis to writing for publication and presentation.”
The Missouri Western student selected for the project’s first year is Justin Ross, a senior from St. Joseph pursuing a Bachelor of General Studies with concentrations in biology and business.
The field work in the first year will involve site selection and a census of species in Kenya. Subsequent years will involve the trapping of birds by mist net to collect their droppings for analysis. Dr. Jedlicka is a pioneer in the application of “molecular scatology” in birds.
“Molecular scatology allows us to get the DNA of everything an animal ate,” she said. “Previously, most of what we knew about bird diets came from the analysis of stomach contents 100 years ago, when birds were killed and prepared for display in museums. The DNA analysis of their fecal matter allows us to know much more precisely what kind of bugs the birds are eating, and in this case whether they are eating insects that are pests to the coffee farmers.”
Dr. Jedlicka published a paper last fall in the journal The Auk: Ornithological Advances that analyzed the droppings of bluebirds nesting in California vineyards to determine if they helped grape growers by eating pests or hurt them by eating beneficial insects. They found in that case that the birds dined mostly on mosquitos and herbivorous insects, meaning their presence is likely a net positive for the vineyards.
Missouri Western State University is a comprehensive regional university providing a blend of traditional liberal arts and professional degree programs. The university offers student-centered, high quality instruction that focuses on experience-based learning, community service, and state-of-the-art technology. Missouri Western is located in St. Joseph, Mo., and is committed to the educational, economic, cultural and social development of the region it serves. Visit www.missouriwestern.edu.