Reed F. Noss, a Conservation biologist since the beginning of the field in the early 1980s, is a writer, photographer, and speaker, retired in 2017 as Provost's Distinguished Research Professor, Pegasus Professor, and Davis-Shine Professor at the University of Central Florida. He is President and Chief Scientist for the Florida Institute for Conservation Science, Chief Science Advisor for the Southeastern Grasslands Initiative, and an editor for the Journal of Natural History Education and Experience. Noss' published work consists of over 335 published or in press scientific articles, book chapters, and major reports and eight published books, with another book in preparation.
Education
Noss has a B.S. in Education from the University of Dayton, a M.S. in Ecology from the University of Tennessee, and a Ph.D. in Wildlife Ecology from the University of Florida. Noss earned his Ph.D. in the Department of Wildlife and Range Sciences in the school of Forest Resources and Conservation at the University of Florida in 1988 under the co-advisory of Larry D. Harris and Ronald L. Labisky and completed his dissertation: Effects of edge and internal patchiness on habitat use by birds in a Florida hardwood forest.
Career
Noss has put in over 30 years of work in developing the ideas of conservation biology and has become an important figure in conservation planning and management as well as his work promoting naturalist education. Noss has been the Editor-in-Chief of the journal Conservation Biology, President of the Society for Conservation Biology, President of the North America Section of the Society for Conservation Biology, Governor-appointed member to the State of Florida’s Acquisition and Restoration Council, and the Vice Chair of the Adaptation for Climate-Sensitive Ecosystems and Resources Advisory Committee at the Climate Change Science Program. Noss was professor of conservation biology and ecology, as well as the Director of Science and Planning in Conservation Ecology Laboratory at the University of Central Florida. His work encompasses the ideas of species and ecosystem vulnerability to sea-level rise, disturbance ecology, climate adaptation strategies, and ecosystem conservation and restoration. Noss has testified three times before U.S. congressional committees, most recently to the House Committee on Natural Resources Oversight Hearing on “Defining Species Conservation Success: Tribal, State and Local Stewardship vs. Federal Courtroom Battles and Sue-and-Settle Practices,” on June 4, 2013.
Noss has been publishing on conservation biology since the early 1980s, shortly after the first texts that used the name appeared. He is especially well known for his work developing concepts and approaches for regional and continental-scale conservation planning and reserve network design. By the late 1990s, he was collaborating with conservation biologist, Michael E. Soulé to refine the conservation idea of rewilding. According to their paper "Rewilding and Biodiversity: Complementary Goals for Continental Conservation" Soulé and Noss identified the driving factors of rewilding as "cores, corridors, and carnivores". In more recent decades, Noss has spoken about the decline of educational opportunities in natural history, and the diminishing exposure that students have to it.
