Cristina Eisenberg

Cristina Eisenberg

Ecologist Cristina Eisenberg studies wolves, bison, and fire in Rocky Mountain ecosystems and works to empower native people to use Traditional Ecological Knowledge to restore nature and create a resilient, sustainable Earth. She is the former chief scientist at Earthwatch Institute where she developed strategic initiatives to explore key environmental sustainability issues and establish partnerships with principal investigators. She is a Smithsonian Research Associate, a Boone and Crockett Club professional member, and the nonfiction editor of the literary journal Whitefish Review. She serves on the board of directors for the Society of Ecological Restoration, the board of trustees at Prescott College, and the editorial board of Oregon State University Press. She holds a PhD in forestry and wildlife from Oregon State University. Her books for Island Press include The Carnivore Way: Coexisting with and Conserving America's Predators and The Wolf's Tooth: Keystone Predators, Trophic Cascades, and Biodiversity. She lives with her family in a remote, wild corner of northwest Montana.

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Human Impacts on Natural Systems

As a conservation biologist, I study the ecological effects of wolves on food webs, focusing on their primary prey (elk) and the foods their prey eat (aspens). My work takes place in Waterton Lakes National Park, Alberta, which has many bears in it.
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Wolves and the Ecology of Fear in Action

Recently, I spent time with a friend in a northern part of the Rockies with thriving wolf population. My friend was skeptical about how wolves affect ecosystems—was—because an event that morning rapidly changed his mind. We visited a large meadow ringed with aspens, which were in peak of their turning. A bull elk’s ragged bugle cut through the morning stillness. This particular aspen stand had burned in a 2003 wildfire.
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Combating Global Warming with Wolves

I recently attended the Ecological Society of America’s annual meeting in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where the theme was global warming. Eminent ecologists presented models that projected climate change into a bleak future where species that require unique habitat may be unable to persist. According to conservation biologist Paul Ehrlich, with an extinction rate 200 times normal expected to continue apace, 20 years from now biodiversity will plummet.