Thank you for reading Limnology News! As always, I’m excited to share some of the happenings at the Center for Limnology (CFL) from the past year, and provide a look ahead to the coming year.
This last year, our very own Steve Carpenter was awarded the Ramon Margalef Prize in Ecology from the Government of Catalonia – this prestigious and well-deserved international award recognizes exceptional contributions to the environmental sciences. Our new Trout Lake Station Director, Gretchen Gerrish, took the helm of the Station in June of 2019, and is already leading the charge on some exciting initiatives.
On a more melancholy note, two long-serving members of the CFL community retired in 2019 – the Limnos and its captain and CFL facilities guru Dave Harring. The Limnos plied the mighty waters of Mendota in service of the CFL for an impressive 52 years, and was an iconic part of the Lake Mendota lakescape. Ultimately, mechanical problems become too much to manage. On July 25, 2019, we christened the Limnos II, which promises to serve the teaching, outreach, and research mission of the CFL for many years to come. We are grateful to the College of Letters and Sciences for helping to make this happen.
Looking forward, there is much excitement for the coming year! We are pleased to announce that Dr. Olaf Jensen, currently an Associate Professor at Rutgers University, will be joining the CFL as our newest faculty member in summer of 2020. What’s more, we are currently in the midst of a faculty search to add a new limnologist as part of a UW-Madison cluster hire in Freshwater Sustainability.
And finally, some of you may know that Madison is hosting the Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography – Society for Freshwater Science joint summer meeting, to be held June 7-12, 2020 at the Monona Terrace Convention Center. Needless to say, several of us at the CFL are involved in planning this meeting. The CFL will be hosting several events, so we hope to see you there.
I’ll close with a sincere ‘thank you’ to the many generous alumni, friends, and donors who have supported the CFL over the past year. Your generous support allows us to expand our impact and train the next generation of freshwater leaders. We couldn’t have done it without you. Please don’t hesitate to drop me a note and an update!
Jake Vander Zanden
Wayland Noland Distinguished Chair and Director
Center for Limnology, University of Wisconsin-Madison