Tatjana Beck

Tatjana recently graduated from UC Santa Cruz with an Ecology and Evolutionary Biology degree. She has always been interested in the natural world, something instilled in her by her parents who often took her hiking and on camping trips. As she grew older she became mostly invested in herpetology and fire ecology. The internships and projects she participated in really helped her grow as a naturalist. One of the internships that stands out was being an intern for Oikonos and helping with seabird conservation on Ano Nuevo Island. On these once a week trips she banded birds, monitored the sea bird chick population, and captured birds with mist nets.

Tatjana learned a lot about how to do field research during the California Super Course her junior year of college which inspired her to pursue a masters degree after college. She strongly believes that anyone can be a naturalist anywhere. There’s nature to be observed in cities and wilderness to be observed in the backcountry by anyone willing to take a step out the front door. By making natural history accessible and having a welcoming community we will soon be able to have many thriving naturalists who discover new species, different processes, and elevate our community.