Postdoc Taylor Craft
We nurture talent. Many PhD students and early-career researchers contribute to our research along the flyways. Their diverse backgrounds, nationalities, and skill sets allow us to apply a glocal perspective: combining international insights with local expertise.
One of these researchers, PhD student Taylor Craft, has already organized a very promising postdoctoral research project before completing his PhD. After defending his thesis in January, Taylor will spend four years on connecting remote sensing and tracking data to better understand and support godwit conservation along the East Atlantic Flyway. Taylor aims to link local land management with godwit habitat use throughout the year, describing when and why the birds move between breeding and non-breeding sites. His goal is not only to produce scientific publications, but also to create lasting, user-friendly datasets and tools that empower researchers and conservationists alike.
Taylor’s postdoc supports our goals of providing egalitarian access to research and stimulating collaborative work along the flyway. For example, it will help local conservationists in Senegal see where the godwits are in their region at the press of a button. In West Africa, Taylor will study how godwits occupy different sites during the non-breeding season, focusing on the influence of natural seasonality and human-made wetlands such as rice fields. In the Netherlands and Germany, he will use satellite imagery to map mowing events and grassland management intensity, examining how these factors shape habitat selection. The insights gained will inform management recommendations and lead to practical tools like a “mow calendar” and long-term grassland intensity maps.
Taylor sees the people of BirdEyes as the most valuable part of his postdoc. “We have built a truly supportive and collaborative environment, where — even as a non-ornithologist — I have always felt that my opinions and contributions are valued. I am really looking forward to working on active habitat restoration efforts, mentoring students, and finding creative new ways to explore our growing dataset of bird tracking and environmental information.”
A graph from Taylor’s research: Post-breeding GPS tracks and location densities of Dutch and German-breeding godwits in 2022, depicting main breeding sites (a), stopover sites (b), and wintering sites (b and c).
