About Me

My name is Dr. Zachary Steele and I'm a post-doctoral associate in the Wildlife Ecology and Conservation Department at the University of Florida (UF). I am a member of Dr. Marcus Lashley's lab group working on the wild turkey initiative. This initiative is dedicated to learning more about the behavior, ecology, public perception, and physiology of the wild turkey to improve management and conservation efforts. For my part of the team, I am developing survey instruments to gather more information about hunter behaviors and hunter perceptions of fall and spring turkey hunts. I will also be analyzing the triple oxygen isotopes of distilled body water samples of turkeys to assess their water intake and metabolism. In addition, I am teaching several courses at UF and helping to develop extension and outreach tools.

For more information about the wild turkey initiative, please check out the wild turkey science podcast or Dr. Lashley's Instagram/Twitter account:

http://nrupodcast.extension.msstate.edu/wild-turkey-science

https://www.instagram.com/drdisturbance

Before beginning my Post-doc position, I earned my PhD in Ecological Sciences at Old Dominion University (ODU) studying a novel approach to estimating animal water intake and metabolism by conducting field and lab-based research with model species such as the Rocky Mountain mule deer. This novel research is based upon the relatively predictable relationship of the three stable isotopes of oxygen (16O, 17O, and 18O) that creates unique "signatures" in the water that animals rely upon. I was a member of the Animal Ecophysiology Lab in the department of Biological Sciences at ODU under Dr. John Whiteman.

https://sites.google.com/site/whitemanecology/home?authuser=0

Current Animal Ecophysiology Lab member Zachary David (right) and I (center) while conducting research on the giant panda in China, along with our colleague Stephanie Wong (left).

Before starting my PhD at ODU, I completed my MSc at the University of Florida (UF) where I studied Florida residents’ understanding of the ecological, economic, and human welfare risks associated with non-native and invasive species, and their support for management interventions (prevention, eradication, and containment). This research involved distributing questionnaires to Florida residents to examine how their support for management interventions varied depending on the physical appearance, negative impacts, and invasive range associated with different examples of invasive animals in Florida. While at UF, I was a member of the Human Dimensions of Wildlife Management Lab in the department of Wildlife Ecology and Conservation under my advisor Dr. Elizabeth Pienaar, who is now at the University of Georgia.

https://sites.google.com/view/pienaarlab

With some of the Pienaar Lab members. [from left to right: Dr. Ben North, Diane Episcopio-Sturgeon, myself, and Andrew Glass]

Before graduate school, I completed my BS at the University of South Florida (USF) in Tampa. While at USF I worked for various zoological facilities in the state of Florida including ZooTampa at Lowry Park, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay, Disney's Animal Kingdom, and Disney's SeaBase at Epcot. After graduating from USF, I studied behavioral stereotypies in giant pandas in Ya'an, Sichuan, China and then researched threatened and endangered birds with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Working with dolphins at Epcot