The WVU community is invited to attend a Nature Connection Series talk at the WVU Core Arboretum’s woodland amphitheater at 6 p.m. Tuesday. This week's speaker is Madison Ball, conservation program director at Friends of the Cheat, and her talk is titled “Eastern Hellbender Environmental-DNA Monitoring in the Cheat River Watershed.”
The Cheat River has a history of water quality impairments due to resource extraction, and it was thought that Eastern Hellbender (Cryptobranchus alleganiensis) may have been extirpated from sections of the river. Now, water quality improvements have been documented in the Cheat River Watershed and there have been angler reports of accidental captures and sightings of hellbenders in the river.
In order to better understand the current distribution of Eastern Hellbender in the Cheat River Watershed, Friends of the Cheat collected environmental-DNA samples in 2020 and 2021. The information gathered from environmental-DNA monitoring will help inform Friends of the Cheat's long term conservation strategy.
Ball manages restoration, monitoring and preservation efforts on behalf of the Friends of the Cheat. She was raised in Marne, Michigan, and graduated with honors from nearby Grand Valley State University with a bachelor’s degree in natural resource management. In 2014, she moved to West Virginia to start her career in watershed and fisheries management and joined Friends of the Cheat in 2018, serving as the monitoring coordinator and restoration program manager before transitioning into her current role.
The Nature Connection Series is a series of public talks by local and regional experts on a variety of nature-related subjects that takes place at the WVU Core Arboretum every Tuesday evening through August. This summer, talks will cover topics such as birds, trees, geology, elk in West Virginia, butterflies and many other things.
The talks are free and open to the public. No registration is required. All talks are outdoors, so dress for the weather. Talks will be canceled and rescheduled if the weather is inclement. Free parking is available at the WVU Core Arboretum Parking Lot and the adjacent WVU Coliseum Parking Lot.
The 2022 WVU Core Arboretum Nature Connection Series is supported by the WVU Department of Biology, the WVU Core Arboretum Endowment and donations from the public. All speakers are volunteers. The WVU Core Arboretum is Morgantown’s place for nature connection.