OVEN Alumni
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Lauren Febbraro
Honours Student
Algoma University
Lauren joined the lab in the fall of 2018 as a Honours thesis student. She examined the vocal behaviour of Connecticut Warblers from autonomous recordings in collaboration with Kevin Hannah at Environment and Climate Change Canada.
Jake Alphonso
Work Study Student
Algoma University
Jake joined the lab in the fall of 2018 as a Work Study student. He worked on foraging behaviour of winter-resident birds. Jake is now working with Dr. Dew
Riley Gridzak
Work Study Student
Algoma University
Riley joined the lab in the fall of 2018 as a Work Study student. She worked on foraging behaviour of winter-resident birds in collaboration with Dave Brodbeck in Psychology. Riley is now an MSc student at Queen's University
2019 Fledgelings
Celeste Mathieu
Volunteer
Algoma University
Brooke Mortimer
Summer student
Algoma University
Kendriah Pearse
Honour's Student
Sault College
Brooke started in The OVEN in 2018 as a summer student working on white-throated sparrow singing behaviour. She stayed on as a volunteer working on a variety of projects including continuing with white-throated sparrow annotations, helping Lauren with Connecticut Warbler annotations mixed in with a bit of field work when it wasn't raining.
Kendriah worked in The OVEN as a summer student in 2016, 2017 and 2018 as an NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award holder. Kendriah's Hnours theis involved using a dataset of 24-hour recordings from Hiawatha Highlands to study temporal patterns of ovenbird primary and flight song vocalizations. She is still occasionally helps out with bird banding.
2018 Fledgelings
Brandon McMurray
Visiting NSERC USRA
University of Waterloo
Brandon was working in The OVEN on his co-op work term from the University of Waterloo. He was an NSERC USRA student working with Kristen on our RFID chickadee project. Brandon also learned bioacoustic techniques while he was here.
Celeste started in The OVEN in 2018 as a volunteer. She helped scan Lauren's Connecticut Warbler recordings and also helped with fall field work when the weather was good (which it almost never is on a Wednesday).
Samara Al-Ani
Honours Student
Algoma University
Samara began as a volunteer in The OVEN in 2014 and also worked in the lab as a work study student in the summer of 2014. Samara again worked in the lab in 2017 through the Algoma University Summer Employment Program. She completed her Honours thesis focusing on the dawn vocal behaviour of the winter wren in Hiawatha Highlands Conservation Area.
Tristan Clarke
Honours Student
Algoma University
Tristan joined the lab in the fall of 2014 as a volunteer on the night flight call project. Tristan went on a year long exchange in Denmark this past academic term. Tristan completed his Honours thesis looking at note composition of winter wren songs in recordings from Hiawatha Highlands Conservation Area.
Ayesha Ramput
Honours Student
Algoma University
Ayesha began her Honours research in the lab in the summer of 2017. She studied the intra- and inter-individual variation in the songs of the brown creeper using recordings collected from Hiawatha Highlands Conservation Area.
Holly Jansen
Volunteer
Holly joined The OVEN in the fall of 2017. She was interested in learning more about bird research so we are fortunate that she joined us between contracts at the local forestry labs.
Christopher Zayachkowski
Volunteer
High School Student
Christopher is a local high school student who is a keen birder and a member of the Sault Naturalists. Christopher joined the lab in the Fall of 2016 helping Mandy identify birds in autonmous recordings. We were happy to have Christopher's awesome ear help us ID species we have a challenge separating.
Kristen Marini
NOHFC Intern
Algoma University
Kristen joined the lab in the fall of 2017 as an NOHFC funded intern. Kristen comes from Kamloops BC where she completed her BSc Honours with Matt Reudink at Thompson Rivers University and then went on to do an MSc with Matt co-supervised by Ken Otter at University of Northern British Columbia. Kristen worked on a number of sound analysis projects in the lab including the brown creeper dawn chorus, and ovenbird flight song behaviour and ran our RFID feeder project.
Michael Jollimore
Research Technician
Algoma University
Mike started in The OVEN in 2018 as a summer student working and was co-supervised by Jennie Pearce of Great Lakes Wildlife Research.
2018 Fledgelings
Shannon started in The OVEN in 2017 as a summer student working and was co-supervised by Jennie Pearce of Great Lakes Wildlife Research. She worked on the Algoma Swiftwatch project studying roosting behaviour and analyzing video of swifts in the chimney. Shannon completed her Honours thesis on in-chimney behaviour of roosting swifts in Sault Ste Marie and is working on the swift project again for the summer of 2018
Shannon O'Brien
Research Technician
Algoma University
Tiana Visconti
Volunteer
Algoma University
Tiana joined The OVEN as a volunteer in the winter of 2017. She learned sound analysis skills scanning brown creeper recordings.
2017 Fledgelings
Mandy Ehnes
MSc Student
Nippising University
Blaine Landsborough
MSc Student
University of Windsor
Mandy used bioacoustics and a drone to detect avian community composition changes in response to emerald ash borer defoliation in collaboration with Jeff Dech (Nippising) and BioForest Technologies Inc. Mandy completed her Honours thesis in The OVEN studying individual identificaiton of ovenbird songs from different recording techniques. Mandy was an NOHFC Intern and set up a large transect of migration monitoring recorders across the Great Lakes in collaboration with Dan Mennill (University of Windsor).
Blaine was co-supervised by Jenn and Dan Mennill at the University of Windsor. He joined the lab in spring of 2015 and recorded passerine migratory behaviour across the Great Lakes using a transect of microphones to record nocturnal flight calls . Blaine stiudied how nocturnal flight calls vary among individuals of a species and analyzied nocturnal flight calls of species groups to identify species-specific characteristics of the calls.
Brandan Norman
NOHFC Intern
Algoma University
Algoma SwiftWatch
Brandan was an NOHFC intern co-supervised by Jennie Pearce. He joined the lab in January 2016 and was responsible for Algoma SwiftWatch public outreach and video monitoring of the Sault Ste Marie Chimney Swift roosts at the Post Office and Courthouse. Brandan has gone on to do a MSc degree at York University.
Jillian Marquis
Technician
Algoma University
Algoma SwiftWatch
Jillian volunteered with Algoma SwiftWatch in the spring/summer of 2016. Jillian went on to work as a technician analyzing videos of swifts taken by the video cameras in the Post Office and Courthouse chimneys.
Chris Hansen
Research Technician
Algoma University and
Great Lakes Wildife Research
Chris started in The OVEN in 2017 as a summer student working and was co-supervised by Jennie Pearce of Great Lakes Wildlife Research. Chris worked on the Chimney Swift project and watched roosting swifts, looked for nesting chimneys, and analyzed in-chimney swift behaviour. Chris is a Sault College student taking Fish and Wildlife Conservation.
Nadine Paul
Technician
Honours Student
Algoma University
Nadine worked on a bioacoustic analysis of Ovenbird flight song structure for her Honours thesis, completed in April 2016. She then continued to work in The OVEN on this project to expand the sample size of both birds and flight songs to study the largest sample of this elusive vocalization to date.
Homam Al-Ani
Honours Student
Algoma University
Homam worked on Ovenbird nocturnal vocal behaviour recorded using a microphone array for his Honours thesis. Homam was a long-time member of The OVEN and has been a volunteer, summer employment student, and work study student. He annotated a large volume of noctural flight calls recorded with the Great Lakes trasect.
Leon Barbeau
Honours Student
Algoma University
Leon stuided Piping Plover behaviour using nest cameras for his Honours thesis. He worked with Shannon Rowell-Garvon and Jason Garvon (Lake Superior State Univeristy) on the Great Lakes Piping Plover population and spent the summer at the Vermilion Point Nature Reserve monitoring plover nests. Leon investigated incubation behaviour of male and female plovers and monitoring predation attempts in exclosure protected nests.
Brendan Fera
Honours Student
NSERC USRA Student
Algoma University
Brendan studied predation pressure at the local chimney swift roost for his Honours thesis. After completing his Honours thesis in the Spring of 2017 he continued working in the lab for the summer as an NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award holder. Brendan has also worked in the lab as a volunteer on the night flight call project.
Leah Hodgson
Honours Student
NSERC USRA Student
Algoma University
Leah studied the timing of the dawn chorus in Hiawatha Highlands Conservation Area for her Honours thesis. She used a microphone array to examine how the start of the chorus is influenced by the songs of conspecific and heterospecific species. This project was in collaboration with Joe Waas (Waikato University). Leah completed her thesis in the spring of 2017 and continued to work in the lab for the summer as an NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award holder.
Sarah Nadon
Honours Student
Algoma University
Sarah studied the dawn chorus of Brown Creepers in Hiawatha Highlands Conservation Area for her Honours thesis. Sarah investigated whether Brown Creepers sing a dawn chorus and if so, how it varies seasonally. She worked on a dataset of dawn recordings spanning April-August. Sarah has also worked in the lab as a volunteer on the dawn chorus project.
Zahra Ghani
Internship Student
Algoma University
Zahra is a BIOL 3456 Internship in Biology student who is completing her internship in the lab in the fall of 2017. Zahra is learning to recognize the songs of birds in acoustic recordings and is examining morning recordings looking for brown creeper songs.
Brody HIll
Internship Student
Sault College
Brody is a Sault College student who is completing his feidl placement in the lab in the fall of 2017. Brody is learning to recognize the songs of birds in acoustic recordings and is examining morning recordings looking for brown creeper songs.
Celeste Kasa-Vubu
Volunteer
Algoma University
Celeste is a third year Biology student at Algoma. She started volunteering in the lab in the Fall of 2016 on the chimney swift project then went on to help Mandy annotate field recordings. Celeste will return to the lab this year to continue to learn new analysis techniques.
Jamie Lucio
Volunteer
Algoma University
Jamie Lucio is an Algoma University Psychology student who is also interested in Biology. She joined the lab in the Winter of 2016 as a volunteer and helped Mandy Ehnes annotate field recordings.
2016 Fledgelings
Dean Evans
NOHFC Intern
Algoma University
Algoma SwiftWatch
Rebecca Schroeder
Technician
Algoma University
Algoma SwiftWatch
Jessica Morin
Honours Student
Algoma University
Caleb Charlebois
Work Study Student
Algoma University
Eva-Louise Hyderman
Volunteer
Algoma University
Melissa Reed
Volunteer
Algoma University
Annika Sonntag
Volunteer
Algoma University
Dean joined the lab in July of 2015 as an NOHFC intern. Dean's project involved analzying a 10-year data set of chimney swift roost attendance to analyze population trends. Before coming to Algoma, Dean completed his undergraduate degree at Thomspon Rivers University in Kamloops where worked out a time-saving method for extracting nest watch data from video recordings. Dean has moved on to work on other ariel insectivores for his MSc at Western University with Greg Mitchell and Keith Hobson.
Rebecca joined the lab in 2014 as an Honours student examining how nocturnal vocalizations of White-throated Sparrows varied across the breeding season. Rebecca also worked in the lab analyzing recordings from Oakville, Ontario to examine how emerald ash borer defoliation influences bird community structure. Most recently, Rebecca worked in the lab with Jennie Pearce on chimney surveys ato identify Chimney Swift nesting habitat in Sault Ste Marie. Rebecca recently started work at the Invasive Species Center.
Jess completed her Honours thesis in 2016. Jess analyzed American Redstart nocturnal flight calls from the Great Lakes migration monitoring transect. She examined how the intensity of flight call activity varied among locations and with atmospheric conditions.
Caleb worked in The OVEN for the 2015-2016 academic year. Caleb annotated night flight calls from the Great Lakes migration monitoring transect.
Eva joined the lab in the winter of 2016. Eva volunteered on the dawn chorus project identifying the start of the dawn chorus of each species within chorus recordings.
Melissa joined the lab in the winter of 2016. Melissa volunteered on the dawn chorus project identifying the start of the dawn chorus of each species within chorus recordings.
Annika joined the lab in the fall of 2015. Annika volunteered on the migration monitoring project annotating night flight calls.
2015 Fledgelings
Heather Douglas
Honours Student
Algoma University
Heather graduated from Algoma in 2014 after completing her Honours thesis in The OVEN. She has recently returned from teaching in South Korea where she did some birding in North Korea (read more here). Heather later volunteered in the lab helping Mandy analyze recordings from Emerald Ash Borer invaded sites.
Laura Nanni
Honours Student
Algoma University
Laura completed her Honours thesis in 2015. Laura's thesis investigated seasonal variaton in Ovenbird nocturnal singing behaviour. Laura studied how song rate varied with atmospheric conditions, lunar phase and date.
Drake Martin
USRA Summer Student
Algoma University
Drake joined the lab in the fall of 2014. Drake volunteered on the migration monitoring project annotating night flight calls and continued this work over the summer as a NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award holder.
Matt Bruni
Technician
Algoma University
Algoma Swiftwatch
Matt joined the lab in the fall of 2013. Matt volunteered on the nocturnal song project annotating nocturnal song. Matt worked in the summer of 2015 as a swift monitoring asssitant. He filmed Chimney Swifts arriving at the roost and monitored predation behaviour around the roost.
Raisa Anise
Volunteer
Algoma University
Raisa joined the lab in the fall of 2014. Raisa volunteered on the migration monitoring project annotating night flight calls.
Alex DiCintio
Volunteer
Algoma University
Alex joined the lab in the fall of 2014. Alex volunteered on the migration monitoring project annotating night flight calls.
Romee Paudel
Volunteer
Algoma University
Reshma Pullambra
Volunteer
Algoma University
Kyle Snape
Volunteer
Algoma University
Romee joined the lab in the summer of 2014 as a work study student. Romee annotated White-throated Sparrow and Ovenbird nocturnal songs as part of the nocturnal song project. She then volunteered on the migration monitoring project annotating night flight calls.
Reshma joined the lab in the fall of 2014. Reshma volunteered on the migration monitoring project annotating night flight calls.
Kyle joined the lab in the fall of 2014. Kyle volunteered on the migration monitoring project annotating night flight calls.
2014 Fledgelings
Ashley Hunter
Honours Student
Algoma University
Ashley completed her Honours thesis in 2014. Ashley examined the daily cycle of ovenbird singing to examine temporal overlap in Ovenbird primary and flight songs. Ashley first joined The Oven in the fall of 2012 as a volunteer.
Jocelyn Moreau
Volunteer
Algoma University
Jocelyn joined the lab in the summer of 2013. Jocelyn volnteered in the lab working on the nocturnal song project annotating Ovenbird and White-throated sparrow songs. Jocelyn also volunteered on the migration monitoing project annotating night flight calls.
Olivia Pietrangelo
Volunteer
Algoma University
Ollivia joined the lab in the fall of 2013. Olivia volnteered in the lab working on the nmigration monitoing project annotating night flight calls.
2013 Fledgelings
Adrianna Bruni
MSc Student
University of Windsor
Adrianna completed her MSc at the University of Windsor in just one year and was co-supervised by Dan Mennill. Adrianna's thesis involved examining factors influencing the start time of the dawn chorus including light levels and weather. Adrianna also completed her Honours thesis in The OVEN where she examined the characteristics of the dawn chorus of the Eastern Phoebe and how they varied with breeding stage.
Kelin Longo
Honours Student
Algoma University
Kelin completed his Honours thesis in 2013. Kelin's thesis involved a dawn chorus experiment in Eastern Phoebe. Kelin was interested in how phoebes responded to conspecific playback at dawn.
Lynnea Lobert
USRA Summer Student
Algoma University
Lynnea was a visting NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award holder from Dalhousie University in the summers of 2012 and 2013. Lynnea worked in the field on Eastern Phoebe in Echo Bay and the dawn chrous and nocturnal song studies in Hiawatha Highlands. In the lab, Lynnea worked on Black-capped Chickadee song rates in 16-channel array recordings, Eastern Phoebe dawn chorus, and nocutrnal song in a temperate bird community.
Kerry Perrault
USRA Summer Student
Algoma University
Kerry worked for the summer as a NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award recipient. Kerry worked in the field and in the lab on the dawn chorus and nocturnal song projects.
2012 Fledgelings
Erica Palazzi
Honours Student
Algoma University
Erica completed her Honours thesis in 2012. Erica compared Eastern Phoebe songs recorded near Queen's University and Echo Bay to test for geographic variation in phoebe song.
Dan Vernelli
Honours Student
Algoma University
Dan completed his Honours thesis in 2012. Dan examined variaton in daytime singing behaviour of Eastern Phoebe recorded in Echo Bay, Ontario. Dan examined how phoebe breeding stage related to song rate and song type use.
Rob Mann
Technician
Algoma University
Rob joined the lab in 2011 as a volunteer annotating Black-capped Chickadee recordings. In 2012, Rob worked as a research technician testing a potential Canada Goose (and other wildlife) deterrent in the field.
Stewart Bentley
Technician
Algoma University
Stewart worked as a research technician testing a potential Canada Goose (and other wildlife) deterrent in the field.
2011 Fledgelings
Anastasia Greve
Volunteer
Algoma University
Anastasia volunteered in the lab (before there was a lab!) annotating Black-capped Chickadee recordings. All three of these early students in my lab shared a desk with me in my windowless office. Now we are lucky to have a new building and the students and I have a large and bright lab to share and I now have my office all to myself.
Michael Kendall
Volunteer
Algoma University
Michael volunteered in the lab (before there was a lab!) annotating Black-capped Chickadee recordings. Micheal is now a Medical Doctor.
Megan Lyon
Volunteer
Algoma University
Megan volunteered in the lab (before there was a lab!) annotating Black-capped Chickadee recordings.