I am an international master’s degree student, originally from Long Beach, California, although most of my professional studies involving Marine Biology were accomplished in La Paz, Baja California Sur, Mexico. My main interests in Biology have always been evolution, macro-invertebrate taxonomy and ecology of biofouling assemblages. I have worked as an independent biofouling consultant for marine fish farms in Mexico, and now I am excited to start a new project focused on antifouling effectiveness of UV radiation. This antifouling technology may be the next big step towards cleaner and more efficient maritime transportation, but until then I will put it to the test and analyze its effectiveness in depth through my work in the Wyeth Lab at StFX.

Grace Walls is a first year PhD student in the St. FX and Memorial University joint program looking to unravel the mysteries of lobster foraging ecology. She completed her B.S. in Biology with minors in Natural Resource Conservation and Psychology from University of Massachusetts at Amherst in 2013. From there she developed 6 different marine education programs for different NPOs and school systems of her native Cape Cod. Drawn to research, she went aboard the NOAAS Henry B. Bigelow which started off the adventure of hundreds of sea days spent on both fishing and research vessels around the globe. The majority of her time was spent with the Alaskan fishing fleets based the Aleutian Islands, sailing in the Bering Sea and the Gulf of Alaska. Migrating to the Baltic Sea for her masters in Biological Oceanography her thesis monitored the effects of changing environmental conditions on plastic ingestion and feeding ecology of benthopelagic fish. Now switching gears once again and settling benthically to work with invertebrates, Grace is excited to see where the next 4 years will bring her.

I graduated from Oregon State University with B.S. degrees in wildlife science and psychology, interested in animal cognition and using wildlife behaviors to help solve conservation problems. I’ve worked on projects with wild rodents, mule deer, elk, tree swallows, violet-green swallows, captive gray wolves, drafting a Conservation Efforts Assessment Plan, and investigating canine understanding of probability.

 I have also worked for the US Forest Service as a summer wildlife technician for two seasons, USGS and BLM as a feral horse and burro research technician, and contracted with the Oregon Department of Forestry as a marbled murrelet surveyor. I was accepted into the StFX Biology MSc program, and will be investigating lobster bait preferences and behavior around food sources. After I complete my master’s degree, I hope to move on to a Ph.D. in wildlife behavior and conservation.