Tibisay Escalona

Tibisay is from Caracas, Venezuela and completed her undergraduate degree at the Universidad Central de Venezuela where she majored in Biology. She completed her Master's Degree in Conservation Biology at the University of Kent in Canterbury, UK at the Durrell Institute for Conservation and Ecology. Currently she is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Missouri-St Louis. She chose this program to strengthen her background in ecology, in particular biodiversity, extinction of species, evolution, applied management and conservation biology. She hopes this knowledge will enable her to approach ecological problems in her home country and abroad. Since 1988 she has been working with endangered species in Venezuela, specifically the Orinoco crocodile (Crocodylus intermedius), anaconda (Eunectes murinus), two species of freshwater turtles (Podocnemis expansa and P. unifilis) and the red-footed tortoise (Geochelone carbonaria). All projects involved the evaluation of factors that are responsible for their endangered status and the development of specific management programs.

Currently Tibisay is working on her thesis which investigates aspects related to nest site selection and reproductive success of a highly threatened South American freshwater turtle (Podocnemis unifilis). Moreover, her research evaluates the effects of humans on egg survival and female population structure by comparing beaches where humans are present and absent. The impact of this project will identify the quality of habitat needed for successful reproduction and offspring survival. Tibisay reports, the project involves Ye'kwana indigenous as research assistants. The fieldwork has provided training as they learned basic methods and techniques on to how to manipulate eggs and turtles. Gaining this knowledge increased their awareness of how susceptibility this species is to human exploitation and to natural events such as flooding. Currently the Ye'kwana community is developing their own conservation project in order to protect this species. This achievement from the project can be considered a preliminary conservation action that will have a great impact in the long-term conservation of this species if it is implemented. Consequently, Tibisay's Ph.D. thesis not only offers theoretical aspects of nest site selection involving trade-off in reproductive decision-making by females, but as well will contribute to the conservation of this freshwater turtle by creating management strategies involving local communities, in order to alleviate the species overexploitation.

Escalona is interested in methods and tools in conservation biology, as well as conservation biology both in-situ and ex-situ. She wants to be involved in conservation programs that work together with local communities living in and around protected areas in order to understand the value of natural resources for local inhabitants and work together with them in order to develop management plans that are designed to bring local needs into balance with natural ecosystems.