Kate L Sheehan

Hi! I'm an ecologist that studies the interactions between wildlife and their symbionts with an emphasis on parasitic worms that infect birds. I have assessed 87 avian species for general health, feeding interactions in local food webs, and parasitic infections.

I use techniques in community ecology to differentiate between groups of wildlife, and I do this with parasite community assemblage data. We have used parasites to link the feeding ecology of birds and their local prey (based on parasites as evidence) to define subspecies, sex, and age classes.

I also use landscape ecology to understand the impacts of human-induced alterations to ecosystems on the behaviors of wildlife and how parasites are destributed.

Finally, I document the incidence of plastic consumption in the wildlife that I study. Sometimes the hosts themselves have eaten plastics, but often it is their prey that consumed it or were entangled in it. This has spurred a whole new area of research in our lab and that is what my current campaign is seeking funding for.

December 2020