Current students

Taline Almasian

Program: MS Lake Management
Project description: My thesis work involves researching and creating a lake management plan for Weiden Lake in Narrowsburg, NY. In addition to studying the general limnological aspects of the lake, I hope to create a baseline dataset for macroinvertebrate diversity within Weiden Lake and its surrounding watershed.

Billy Benedict

Program: MS Biology
Project description: The goal of my thesis work is to characterize the ecological value of Hudson River tributaries. We plan on sampling multiple trophic levels and calculating biological productivity, with the hope that this work will provide rationale for future restoration projects within the Hudson River watershed.

Adam Bonemery

Program: MS Biology
Project description: My thesis work involves using automation and computer modeling to get a better understanding of the invasive round goby (neogobius melanostomus) and their invasion dynamics. I will be using historical and current field survey data to create an abundance model of round goby in the Hudson River. Additionally, I am developing an AI neural network that can rapidly and automatically age round goby otoliths. When I am not working on exciting schoolwork, I am a fish and wildlife technician with the NYSDEC.

Bryce Davis

Program: BS Computer Science
Project description: My name is Bryce Davis and I am a senior from Kingston, Jamaica, majoring in Computer Science with a minor in Math. My primary role on the Anadrofish project was to develop a friendly and interactive user interface. I used the R Shiny framework to build this web application, with the goal of making the complex anadrofish population model accessible and easy for biologists and researchers to use.

Ciara Gunderson

Program: MS Lake Management
Project description: I graduated from Cazenovia College in December 2022. I have a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Biology and I am currently working towards a Master of Science in Lake Management here at SUNY Oneonta. What I hope to obtain out of this is more in and out of field experience that will get me one step closer to working in restoration and fisheries science!

Nicholas Jordan

Program: MS Biology
Project description: The focus of my thesis is on the cold-water fishery of Otsego Lake, NY, using current and historical data to better understand lake trout (Salvelinus namaycush) population size structure and fish condition. Through the years there has been dynamic shifts in the lake food web and trophic status that affect lake trout as the top predator of the cold-water fishery. I will be using gill net surveys of lake trout form the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) collected over the past 3 decades coupled with modern hydro acoustics methods to help quantify current population status.

Richard Shafran

Program: MS Lake Managemnet
Project description: I am currently a PSM Lake Management student at SUNY Oneonta. I enjoy hiking, backpacking, fishing and other outdoor activities. Mainly I just enjoy spending time outside learning about and exploring nature.

Amanda Simmonds

Program: MS Biology
Project description: My research focuses on conducting a spatiotemporal analysis of the blue crab (Callinectes sapidus) population in the Hudson River using datasets from the NYSDEC blue crab, alosine beach seine, and striped bass beach seine surveys. By examining 21 years of data, I aim to identify trends in population size and geographic distribution of blue crabs within the Hudson River estuary. I aim to establish how projected impacts of climate change such as warming water temperatures, shifting salinity levels, and changing habitat use may affect the future distribution and abundance of the blue crab population in the Hudson River estuary.

Former graduate students (chronological)

Cael Atkins: MS Lake Management (2026)
Caleigh Millette: MS Biology (2026)
Alexander Javitz: MS Lake Management (2026)
Elijah Creedon: MS Lake Management (2026)
Andrew Adams: MS Lake Management (2025)
Alex Allen: MS Lake Management (2025)
Asia Rose: MS Lake Management (2025)
Kari Minissale: MS Biology (2025)
Benjamin Thomas Cuppett: MS Lake Management (2024)
Jessica Casey: MS Lake Management (2024)
John (Danny) Skelton: MS Biology (2024)
Derek Shea: MS Lake Management (2024)
Brandon Guerrero: MS Biology (2023)
Matthew Best: MS Biology (2023)
Sinead Comerford: MS Lake Management (2023)
Lucas Le Tarte: MS Lake Management (2022)
David Pfuhler: MS Lake Management (2020)
Samantha Carey: MS Lake Management (2020)
Cindy Sosa: MS Lake Management (2020)
Hayley Dower: MS Biology (2020)
Erin Gilligan: MS Biology (2020)
Stradder Caves: MS Lake Management (2019)
David Andrews: MS Lake Management (2019)
Joseph O’Reilly: MS Lake Management (2019)
George Smith: MS Lake Management (2019)
Ryan Elliott: MS Lake Management (2019)
Joseph (Ben) Casscles: MS Lake Management (2018)
Edward Kwietniewski: MS Lake Management (2017)
Christian Jenne: MS Lake Management (2017)
Alejandro (AJ) Reyes: MS Lake Mangement (2016)