Ph.D. - Cornell University - 2002
M.S. - Cornell University - 1998
B.Sc. - McGill University - 1994

Conservation biology - Evolutionary Ecology - Herpetology - Behavioral Ecology

Research

I am interested in understanding how organisms respond to anthropogenic disturbances and in devising novel management tools to ensure the long-term persistence of populations. Although I have worked primarily with amphibians and reptiles to date, I tend to be driven by questions and a desire to understand ongoing evolutionary processes. My lab is currently pursuing three general lines of research:

• How do native prey respond to changes in selective regime that occur when they are confronted with evolutionarily novel predators? In particular, we are asking how lowland leopard frog tadpoles can alter their tail morphology and behavior to cope with non-native predators such as green sunfish.
• Given that we know that evolutionary processes can take place over relatively short time frames, can we develop novel conservation strategies and management practices to help native species persist independently and indefinitely?
• What are the effects of the wildlife trade on wild populations of amphibian and reptiles? Can one develop guidelines for determining sustainable harvest levels when little or no information about wild populations is available?

Teaching

I teach two courses, a graduate level course in Applied Evolutionary Ecology, and an undergraduate course in Evolution.

Select publications (complete list here):

• Schlaepfer, M.A., P.W. Sherman, B. Blossey, and M.C. Runge. 2005. Invasive species as evolutionary traps. Ecology Letters 8:241-246. pdf
• Schlaepfer, M.A. 2003. Successful lizard eggs in a human-disturbed habitat. Oecologia 137:304-311.   pdf
• Schlaepfer, M.A., M.C. Runge, and P.W. Sherman 2002. Ecological and evolutionary traps. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 17:474-480. pdf 
• Schlaepfer, M.A., C. Hoover, and K. Dodd, Jr. 2005. Challenges in evaluating the impact of the trade in amphibians and reptiles on wild populations. BioScience 55: 256-264.  cover photo pdf

Interested in joining our lab? Information for prospective graduate students and postdocs can be found here.

1 Forestry Drive
Illick Hall
SUNY-ESF
13210 Syracuse, NY
USA

Tel: 315.470.6783
Fax: 315.470.6934
Email