David Willard

My research interests focus on community structure and migration of birds. Before coming to the Field Museum in 1976, I studied the feeding ecology of herons at Brigantine National Wildlife Refuge in New Jersey and the avian fish-eating community of a Neotropical forest in Manu National Park. Since my arrival in Chicago, my research interests have focused on a local scale while continuing international research. At the local scale, I have spent the last 18 years gathering a large database of spring and fall migrants from along the Chicago lake front. In collaboration with Doug Stotz, I am using this database to study the patterns and timing of bird migration in this region. At the international level, I have continued to conduct studies on the elevational distributions of tropical montane birds. Over the years, this research has lead me to do field work in the Andes and Tepuis of South America, the mountains of Sibuyan Island in the Philippines and the Ruwenzori Mountains of Uganda.