Michael Parker (he/him) is an ecologist and recently retired professor of biology who, for the past three decades, taught courses in natural history, ecology, conservation, and environmental ethics at Southern Oregon University. He also taught writing in SOU’s freshman colloquium. From giant salamanders in coastal rainforest streams to pupfish and creeping water bugs in Mojave Desert springs, Michael has studied a wide array of freshwater species and the habitats that sustain them. A former student once quipped that “… Michael Parker is like the Will Rogers of freshwater ecology – he’s never met an organism he didn’t like (or at least find interesting)…” Michael is actively engaged in conservation activities in the Klamath Mountains ecoregion, including efforts to establish, expand and protect the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument. He has published widely in academic journals including Science, Ecology, Ecological Monographs, and Copeia and is associate editor of the Northwestern Naturalist, journal of the Society for Northwestern Vertebrate Biology.