Evening Fireside Events

Join us each evening for small group conversations!

Sunday

BIPOC Wildlifers, 6:00pm – 7:00pm — All are welcome!
LGBTQIA+ Wildlifers, 7:300-8:30pm — All are welcome!

Monday

W.O.W. (Women of Wildlife), 5:00pm – 6:00pm — All are welcome!
Student-Professional Mixer, 7:00pm – 8:00pm — Students can hop around between breakout rooms to meet professionals representing many different interest themes within the field of wildlife biology.
GreenFire film screening and land ethics discussion, 8:00pm – 9:30pm — GreenFire is a must-watch (rite of passage) film for all who are interested in wildlife biology. Join Land Ethics Leaders, Don Yasuda and Cynthia Perrine, after the film to discuss the importance of land ethics in these changing times.

Tuesday

Section Leadership & Old-Timers Meeting, 5:00pm – 6:00pm
Conversation Topics with Colleagues, 5:00pm – 6:30pm. (1) Cat chat – Feral cats on the landscape; (2) Starting a new job during a pandemic; (3) Caregiving/Managing Work-Life Balance for Wildlifers
Chapter Meetings, 7:00pm – 9:00pm – Meet the Western Section members who live and work near you. Now is a great time to get involved!

Wednesday

HSU Alumni Mixer, 5:00pm – 6:30pm
Birds of a Feather Sessions, 7:00pm – 8:00pm – Informal gatherings of like-minded individuals who wish to discuss a certain topic without a pre-planned agenda. BoFs are a great place to meet other members of the community with similar interests.
- Observation and Nature Drawing with John Muir Laws – Grab some paper and pencils, and join John Muir Laws on Zoom to learn some tips for drawing wildlife. John (Jack) Muir Laws is a scientist, educator, and author, who helps people forge a deeper and more personal connection with nature through keeping illustrated nature journals and understanding science. His work intersects science, art, and mindfulness. Trained as a wildlife biologist and an associate of the California Academy of Sciences, he observes the world with rigorous attention. He looks for mysteries, plays with ideas, and seeks connections in all he sees. Attention, observation, curiosity, and creative thinking are not gifts, but skills that grow with training and deliberate practice. As an educator and author, Jack teaches techniques and supports routines that develop these skills to make them a part of everyday life.
- Wildlife Photography with Bobby Vogt – Learn tricks of the trade in finding, approaching, composing, and reading the behavior of your subject. We’ll discuss how to utilize your settings, play with light, and process your images with a few minutes for you to share your best images at the end for critiquing if you’d like. Hosted by experienced wildlife photographers – Ivan Parr and Bobby Vogt.
Film Screening — Deer 139 and Discussion, 8:00pm – 9:30pm – Join us to watch the fan favorite of the TWS meeting! The Deer 139 film is an adventure and conservation film detailing the 85-mile-long migration path of a Wyoming mule deer doe and the University of Wyoming biologist who has studied her. Watch biologists hike, packraft, and ski the migration route of a GPS-collared mule deer in search of a deeper understanding about the connection these animals have to the landscapes where they live. Join us in a Zoom room after the film ends to chat about the value of inerconnected landscapes. In between twisted ankes, David Attenborough impressions and mountaintop dance parties, the three women experience the challenges to long-distance migration in the modern world and gain new perspective about the value of interconnected landscapes. By considering the story of one specific animal, they learn to see the West’s backyard as not only a source of natural resources and a recreational playground, but also as a place where wild animals have honey their existence over millennia to perfectly synchronize with a rugged and unforging landscape.

Thursday

Conversation Topics with Colleagues, 5:00pm – 6:30pm. (1)Creative solutions to pandemic field conundrums; (2) Parenting in a pandemic (3) QTPOC Wildlifers Discussion.
“Wild” Trivia Game Night – As the 2021 virtual meeting of the Western Section of The Wildlife Society winds down, join us on Thursday night for a challenging but fun event! Brought to you by a group of Quiz Bowl nerds, all meeting registrants are invited to join us for Trivia Night! We hope you’ll have a beverage of your choice nearby as you tackle challenging questions about wildlife ecology, taxonomy, policy and recent events along with some general wildlife trivia. MODEST prizes will be awarded to randomly selected entrants after specific questions (registered meeting attendees only). We will use Zoom as our “platform.” If you’re not comfortable with that system, join us about 30 minutes early for a tutorial session. We dare you to “enter the room” for a challenge, and you just might leave with a prize! Rhys Evans will be your trivia host for the evening. He’s Past President of the Western Section of the Wildlife Society, and he currently chairs the “national” TWS Quiz Bowl subcommittee, where he and a team of co-conspirators challenge brave undergraduates, who demonstrate their knowledge of many aspects of wildlife management in public. Rhys is a taxonomy dork who is fascinated by etymology and entomology, is excited by eponyms and tautonyms, and he’s largely responsible for including at least one Monty Python related question into every Quiz Bowl (you have been warned!). Trivia Answer form (1) Use of this form is not required, but suggested.