CLARION – The BIOS Club at Clarion University, now known as the Pennsylvania chapter of The Society for Conservation Biology, will host a presentation by Ron Gagliardo from Amphibian Ark, a global leader in amphibian research and conservation. The presentation will take place on Thursday, Sept. 23 at 7:30 p.m. in the auditorium of the Joseph P. Grunenwald Center for Science and Technology. The presentation is free and open to the public.
Gagliardo will present an overview of Amphibian Ark’s mission and the current status of global amphibian populations. Attendees will find out about  local efforts to track and conserve amphibians.
Gagliardo spent his early years growing up near the Everglades National Park in south Florida, where he developed what has become a lifelong passion and interest in herpetology. Although he was trained as a chemist and received his undergraduate and graduate degrees in botany from North Carolina State University in 1987 and 1992, he has maintained a deep interest in amphibians and reptiles.
In 1993, Ron joined the Atlanta Botanical Garden where he worked until 2008 developing the Garden’s tropical plant collections as Curator and also manager of the Garden’s Plant Tissue Culture Laboratory. In 2001, Ron began to put the techniques of captive breeding to use in the conservation field and developed an active amphibian conservation program. This program included components of fundraising, education, captive-breeding research and support of range country partners in Costa Rica, Panama, Ecuador, and Peru.
For more information about this event, contact the BIOS club advisor, Dr. Andrew Keth, aketh@clarion.edu.
