AFS Cal-Neva: The Winter Edition!
AFS Cal-Neva Newsletter
9 February 2020
In this edition you will find highlights of the upcoming 2020 Annual Chapter Meeting, messages from the President and Past-President, call for Officer nominations, Small Grant research, reflections on Travel Grant experiences, call for 2020 award nominations, upcoming meetings, and opportunities and jobs.  See the highlights here, and use the links to delve deeper into the topics that interest you!
Axe throwing team building activity at the Western Division mid-year retreat in Boise, ID. The Cal-Neva Chapter brought home the gold!
President Rob Titus's Message

Greetings everyone in Cal-Neva AFS and beyond. I am excited about writing this column, especially because it is my first since stepping up to the presidency in October. I am happy to have this opportunity to address the membership, recap briefly what we've been up to recently, and where we are headed over coming months.

Assuming the post of chapter president has been an amazing journey. It all started with literally being pulled in out of the rain by Ramona Swenson and Kelly Souza at the San Luis Obispo meeting in March 2018. No sooner had I soggily stumbled into the banquet room and been informed that I was the new President-Elect was I swept into the initial stages of planning the behemoth Reno meeting. What lay ahead was 18 months of intense planning, site visits, and arrangements working with Chapter and Division volunteers, AFS and TWS staff, and fishery professionals all around the country. While daunting but awesome at the same time, we did it (!!!) and the meeting was a huge success. We had nearly 2,100 attendees on the AFS side and not only met the Chapter's baseline payout of $50,000 but are also looking at additional profit sharing between parent society, Western Division, and the Chapter. A huge thanks to everyone that stepped up and contributed to making this meeting a very enriching and memorable one! A special shout out to Shawn Johnston at AFS headquarters for navigating us through the process and making sure that our joint social with the Sacramento-Shasta Chapter of TWS was the perfect networking capstone of the meeting!

Read more from Rob here
Past-President Steve Brumbaugh's Message

The time has come (and gone) for passing the torch to the next Chapter President, Rob Titus. This message may be a bit belated, but it is sincere none the less. It has been an honor carrying the title of Chapter President and I am proud of what we achieved during my tenure. The Chapter kicked off a new small grants program to help members pursue relevant and important research regardless of the stage in their career. We formed the Diversity and Outreach Committee to work toward broadening our membership. And, of course, we were integral in pulling off the largest meeting of fish and wildlife biologists ever with the 2019 AFS and TWS Joint Annual Meeting in Reno. And all of this while continuing our regular Chapter business of travel grants, comment letters supporting science-based policy, and supporting science programs for all ages via programs like the Nature Bowl in Placer County.
ace article copy here. Be sure to make the articles short and concise as people tend not to read much more than a couple of paragraphs.

Read more from Steve here
Highlights: AFS Cal-Neva Chapter 2020 Annual Meeting!

Here's a few of the features you won't want to miss at this year's Cal-Neva Meeting -

A great lineup of Continuing Education classes on Sunday, 3/15

Our Plenary Session: "Fisheries Success Stories". We have some speakers who will remind us that there are good things happening in our fisheries world too, it's not all doom and gloom.

Student Opportunities and a Student-Mentor Lunch

Poster Session and Reception

Banquet (included in the cost of your registration) with our ever-popular raffle and Chapter Awards

A Fish T-Shirt Contest-with prizes for two categories: Most Outstanding AFS T-Shirt and Most Outstanding All-purpose Fish Themed T-shirt. Stay tuned more details on this contest.

Spawning Run

Chapter Business Meeting

Our usual offering of outstanding contributed presentations and symposia

The Lake Natoma Inn is located in Historic Old Folsom, in proximity to the scenic American River Bike Trail, a large array of eating and drinking establishments, and some local history museums and parks.

Don't miss it - this will be an AFS gathering worth your while!

Registration is now open!  A room block has been booked at the Lake Natoma Inn.

Abstracts for oral presentations and posters may be submitted through February 28, 2020

Get information about the Chapter meeting here
Seeking Cal-Neva Officer Nominations


Are you looking to expand your network, grow personally, develop skills, make a difference for fisheries, and make lasting connections with other passionate professionals and students? Then consider joining the leadership of the AFS Cal-Neva Chapter!
 
The Executive Committee is pleased to invite nominations for Officers for the AFS CalNeva Chapter. Nominations can originate from chapter members as well as self-nominations.  This year, we are seeking qualified candidates for President-Elect (3-year term) and Secretary (2-year term), to serve terms commencing August 2020.
 
All officers are reimbursed annual dues and registration to Chapter Meetings, and President-elect/President have expenses paid to attend the national Society meeting. More info about responsibilities can be found here.
 
Nominations and candidate statements are due February 12. Election will be held by electronic ballot and results announced at the Annual Meeting March 16.
 
Questions? Please contact any officer or Ramona Swenson (Bylaws and Nominations Chair, rswenson@esassoc.com).

Get information about Chapter elections here
Trophy winner by PhylB is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
Trophy winner by PhylB is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
Call for 2020 Cal-Neva AFS Award Nominations
!

Nominations are now open for the 2020 Cal-Neva AFS Chapter awards. Deserving individuals may be nominated for the following awards: 
  • The Chapter Award for Scientific Journalism
  • The Conservation Achievement Award
  • The Chapter Award for Distinguished Professional Achievement
  • The Chapter Award of Excellence 
The accomplishments of the award recipients will be highlighted in the Cal-Neva AFS newsletter, and they will be publicly recognized and awarded a plaque at the 2020 Cal-Neva Chapter of American Fisheries Society Conference in Folsom, CA. The conference will occur from March 15th to 17th, 2020. 

The nomination deadline is February 14th, 2020 @ 5 PM PST

Read more about the awards and how to nominate someone here
Chapter Helps Fund Cal Poly Rockfish Research!

Long days were the norm this past summer for graduate students Theresa Bersin and Ellie Brauer of California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly), San Luis Obispo, as they conducted research on Pacific rockfishes supported in part by a Small Project Grant from the AFS Cal-Neva Chapter. Assisted by undergraduate students Katie Saenger and Grace Willett also from Cal Poly, Theresa and Ellie collected blood from wild juvenile blue rockfish (Sebastes mystinus) with intent to derive growth rate measures from the amount of insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF1) present in each fish. 

In fish, the hormone IGF1 is released into the blood stream to stimulate growth after food is consumed.  The concentration of IGF1 in blood circulation relates positively to a fish's recent foraging success and rate of growth, such that quantifying IGF1 in just a single sample of blood can provide a non-lethal, relative measure of a fish's growth rate. This novel physiological approach hasn't yet been applied broadly to wild fish populations but has the potential to provide growth rate data useful to fisheries management.

Read more from Theresa and Ellie here
Sierra trout growth and terrestrial carbon loading study funded by Cal-Neva Small Grants Award!

I am a second year PhD student in Dr. Jonathan Shurin's lab at the University of California, San Diego. I study ecology and evolution through the lens of freshwater fishes of the Eastern Sierra. High elevation lakes in this region were formed by glacial recession. Without viable dispersal conduits for downstream fishes, these lakes were historically fishless. Beginning in the mid 1800's, many previously fishless lakes were stocked with a variety of trout species for recreational fishing. While stocking was halted in Yosemite National Park in the 1970's, wild reproducing populations continue to support a robust recreational fishery. There now exists in the Park a mosaic of fish-filled and fishless lakes spanning large elevation gradients. Our lab uses comparative studies of these lakes to understand how introduced predators and environmental variability affect lake food webs. For my work supported by California-Nevada AFS Small Grants Program, I am taking a food web approach to investigate how terrestrial carbon loading to lakes affects trout growth rates.

Read more from Henry Baker here
Tahoe-Reno Report from the Sac-Davis Student Subunit!


In October of 2019, the Sacramento-Davis AFS student subunit attended the joint American Fisheries Society and The Wildlife Society's national conference in Reno, Nevada. Thanks to the generous student travel grant provided by the Cal-Neva parent chapter, the student subunit was able to fund four individuals' full experiences at the conference and bring many more members along. In the span of less than a week, the subunit's members had the opportunity to present their research, meeting professionals in the industry, learn applicable skills, and make connections with like-minded peers.

Trawl for a meeting that interests you
150th National Meeting of the AFS

The Ohio Chapter invites you to attend the 150th Annual Meeting of the American Fisheries Society in Columbus, Ohio from August 30 th to September 3 rd , 2020. Come celebrate 150 years of fisheries ecology, conservation, and management with fisheries students and professionals from across the world.

Get more information here

Join us for the AFS Western Division Meeting, hosted by the WA-BC Chapter in 2020.

April 12-16, 2020, Pinnacle Harbourfront Hotel, Vancouver, BC.

Get more about the 2020 Western Division meeting here
Angle for opportunities and jobs
 
 
AFS Cal-Neva Chapter | afs.calneva@gmail.com | afs-calneva.org
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