Catherine Rideout

Prior to this position, Catherine worked for the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, where she served as the state ornithologist for six years.  During this time, she worked extensively with habitat Joint Ventures and the international initiative, Partners in Flight.  She collaborated with a multitude of biologists on monitoring, research, land management projects for birds and assisted with the development of Arkansas’s first State Wildlife Action Plan.  Prior to her job in Arkansas, Catherine spent five years living a nomadic lifestyle travelling to work in various place as a wildlife technician in New Mexico, Arizona, and Hawaii and helped manage field stations in Far North Queensland, Australia and in Costa Rica.  Her travels instilled in her a joy and love for learning about new places and cultures, and also taught her that people everywhere seek connection with nature and with each other, no matter where they call home. 

Catherine received a BS degree in Biology from Davidson College in 1994.  She received and MS degree in Biology from Boise State University in 2001 studying the effects of habitat fragmentation on birds in the sagebrush sagebrush
The western United States’ sagebrush country encompasses over 175 million acres of public and private lands. The sagebrush landscape provides many benefits to our rural economies and communities, and it serves as crucial habitat for a diversity of wildlife, including the iconic greater sage-grouse and over 350 other species.

Learn more about sagebrush habitats of southeastern Idaho.  During that time, her most exciting adventures included scaring up a group of bedded down elk while hiking, setting up a bird banding station near a rattlesnake den (oops!), and being charged by an angry mother badger.  No animals or humans were injured in the making of those field seasons.  She currently lives in Atlanta, GA, and is inspired by native plant gardening and spreading the word on how amazing birds are to neighbors and anyone else who will listen.