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What you’ll hear in this episode:

• How Dr. Claudia Wultsch became a wildlife biologist and conservationist 
• All about how scatalogy – or “poop science” – helps us understand predators, prey, and their microbiomes
• How you can get involved locally in your community to help important conservation work

Prompted to discuss the challenges of her work, Dr. Claudia Wultsch references a research project that she initiated to understand the status of the jaguar community in Central America. She describes doing fieldwork in a tropical habitat where she and her team of researchers took out a pack of sniffer dogs trained to scout for wild cat scat. That’s right – Dr. Wultsch went out in the hot, humid, dense jungle to look for fecal samples from Jaguars and four other big cat species.

What was the hardest part of the job, according to Dr. Wultsch? Not the poop, but securing funding.

A Wildlife Biologist, Conservationist, and Research Fellow at CUNY and the American Museum of Natural History, Dr. Wultsch’s passion for her work was apparent from her early studies, and cemented during her time studying in Montana as an undergraduate. She describes her year going into the field in National Parks as a turning point in her career, and went on to earn her Master’s and PhD. She has studied in environments all over the globe, from the Americas to Europe to Asia. Despite the difficulty of her work – “there’s bad news everyday,” she explains, along with the lack of funding and limited resources – Dr. Wultsch is propelled forward by her passion for the diverse wildlife that she experiences, which validates the importance of her conservation efforts.

In addition to understanding more about the wildlife communities and how to aid and protect them, Dr. Wultsch’s research adds value to the scientific community at large. For example, her use of fecal samples revealed new and innovative data about microbiomes in predators and prey. Microbes carry a lot of functions and information in animals and humans, and might even prove to be indicators of diseases such as cancer one day. “I never thought I’d be doing poop science, but now I’m a very big advocate,” laughs Dr. Wultsch.

Dr. Wultsch also advocates for young people to get hands-on experience with wildlife biology through internships, research groups, or programs at their local museums, such as the Science Research Mentoring Program at the AMNH. “A lot of work needs to be done and it’s not going to get easier with all the challenges we are facing – climate change and forests disappearing at an alarming rate,” Dr. Wultsch explains, emphasizing the importance of being succeeded by the next generation of motivated, passionate scientists.

But even if you aren’t inspired to become a conservationist, you can get involved in your local community and understand how to cohabitate with predators. Everyone can do something, and from Dr. Wultsch’s perspective, “this is the most important work that we can do.”

Listen to the full episode to hear about the craziest thing that Dr. Wultsch has seen in the feld (24:28 – 26:04), the future of DNA and microbiome research 12:31 – 17:53), and how everyday people can make a difference in their local habitat (26:05 – 32:45). Don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share with an animal-loving friend!

rinaLAB is a founding_media podcast created in partnership with OST Austria.

Host: Dan Dillard

Guest: Dr. Claudia Wultsch

Transcript:

welcome back to the rina lab podcast the show that explores the science and the people behind the research and innovation that work Austria also known as Rita this week our guest is wildlife biologist and conservationist volume which what is currently a research fellow with the City University of New York the National Geographic explorer and is associated with the American museum of natural history resume alone sounds like an adventure but in our conversation we explore the fascinating world of scatological wildlife research yes it means we are going to talk about science we also to get the funding research and more let’s jump into a conversation with Claudio to Claudia will you tell me what you do now your title now and they will go back and talk about the inception of the arms I’m a research associate right now at the City University of New York and I’m also affiliated with the American museum of natural history I am a conservation biologist my work mainly focuses on frighten mammals feature impacted by humans and environmental change very interesting and intriguing before we jump into that I’d love to know where the inception was where did you know that you want to start doing this type of research work yeah when I first as a student back in Austria at the university of cross I started out studying all kinds of different tax a lot of invertebrates and I was always fascinated by nature but then I I go to great opportunity to a goal and spend one year brought

I left Austria and I went to Montana I was always fascinated by the landscapes there in the abundance of wildlife so I joined the wireless program there at the university of Montana in Missoula and I got to do a lot of amazing things we would go out to the field sometimes twice a week with two field trips to the Glacier National Park Yellowstone National Park and I would see hello I live in the wild like even a grizzly bear and that really changed my interest in perspective and I think that probably was the turning point for me to start this kind of career you inspired at the I was really influenced your age you can back then I was about twenty four wants nothing so you get your inspiration about twenty four into such items will be added I think that you’re really changed my life and then I I wanted to pursue that career and I I didn’t know how low will do it because he was definitely challenging going back to Europe Sierra I am where I am now you go over to Europe and started down the path I finished my master and then I I wanted to do more international work and I I took a leap and I I left to Asia for I was there almost a year I worked for local NGO in Thailand

The Thai society for conservation of wild animals and I I did what what I was told in Montana to go out and survey for the Connie worse back then my focus was bears song and dance to bear species in Thailand they are very difficult to find because there are not many of them in the wild the species are she had a black bears millions on mers and for the specific NGO we worked in an area close to the Combahee important we wanted to see if the animals are still there because the although he was protected on that specific national park the landscape was degrading so and people didn’t know how do I live was doing so I we use like some powerful methods to go in for instance if the animals you still there we didn’t want to disturb them who are captured them so we use we call it non invasive survey math methods so we would put up camera traps I don’t know if your if you heard of them they’re like remotely triggered I have the audience as I’m from Texas we do yeah but the only Serena yes so they’re they’re actually remotely trigger to have a detection sensor and some of them also need like a temperature difference anyway so we when we set them up in the forest we can images of various why life not only to be Connie wars but also the prey dear other things with the made so we can a sense of what’s out there without being really dare disturbing nature and of the protected area itself so that worked out really well and we started seeing what was in the forest and I that was my first I would say experience in the tropics and I fell in love with the diversity and I I wanted to continue that work in

after Thailand I joined one of my colleagues from the university of Montana he he actually he did his PhD are dumb in Malaysia in Sabha in Borneo and he worked on some bears two bottles of Bernard peaks that they can sympathize sympatric peak as in pressuring meaning they they eat the same things so as in a college is we want to study all of these species and see how you’re doing in that habitat so I joined him in the dom conservation area Borneo which is a fascinating protected area and it’s unfortunate surrounded by a lot of oil palm plantations when you fly in there you see all confrontations pretty much everywhere but then there’s some wild protected for years for still left and he was so important for me to see that and it was probably one of the most stunning areas are being we saw orangutans and I saw the all kinds of wildlife just being there for a couple months it really motivated me to do this work at the continued his work because I saw is so much out there but this at the same time the way life and fire diversity is really very frightened so we need to not only go and study them but also do more plight things to help them to conserve would still left in its just doing ling right now so yeah so that’s I would say that’s how I go into the field and that’s my main motivation to do this work is still spurs you everyday I would say so yeah it’s not easy to do what I do

mmhm there’s not a lot of funding specially for international work there’s a lot of bad news every day Tigers the daily basis it’s going to be emotional I would think it’s emotional and it’s but at the same time it just drives you even further and you just know it’s we need to do this work and with limited resources but yeah and then also tomb I think most importantly encourage and and train the next generation it’s also one of my motivations not only do the work myself but also spread the passion and train more young scientists mystery woman yes my daughter wants to be a veterinarian she loves animals you always want to know how do I how do I contribute I mean from the time she was I can remember she’s always love had a fascination with all kinds of animals so I’m really anxious to like share this with her because kids do need mentors thing you need to find out what the paths they can go because they have questions are like I don’t know what to do and how to get there so it’s fascinating how you do that how did you fund your your way is that something that that we talked about funding a second ago which is one thing is you find in your education but then there’s it appears to me that the work itself also needs funding

yes so that that’s a very good question and when I first started my PhD in the states here at Virginia Tech my my PhD was actually especially my feel work was not funded we started out with the plan to do a a country wide survey on jogos sexually in Billy’s Central America and we wanted to do something very near we wanted to see how Jack was so doing across the country looking at their DNA and also setting up camera traps but the main focus was the genetic work in so it was back then talking about two thousand sixty thousand seven was very cutting action because in order to get DNA in the past we had to capture animals and handle them it’s not easy to do that with jaguars and in order to study this kind of animal cross the country we would need like we wanted me to get the on many animals many individuals

so we we we took a leap and my adviser Masella Kelly who is an expert in Jack was Mindy Cameron shopping she was like let’s use his new method and it just came out but he hasn’t really been used in the tropics so we we wanted to use and not our DNA source which is not as back then was not as established and talking about fecal samples so we decided to do a genetic study based on fee could travel fecal samples and and I don’t know if you’ve been to police to just kind of forest habitat it’s beautiful but it’s also very thick and lush and days when you go out a lot of leaves on the ground so it’s it’s not an easy area to work so even when you actually want to find fecal samples on trails with two cats walk you would still have a very hard time to do that as a human so we decided to get some help and we started using a sniffer dogs who and also does talks where they were formally trained to detect drugs and bones and now for our project we train them on chat scattered because cat fecal samples and so we wanted to do the study on Jack was puts instills so they were for the four autres cat species we wanted to see how is this a cat community doing such as mountain lions jungle Randi’s Margie’s also laden to juggle so we train the dog on all five cats species the fecal samples in and that was the main objective to do this work and to get the funding was very challenging because back then nobody has really done it plus people told me all it’s in the tropics it’s going to be hold the dogs are going to be over heating and then when you find fecal samples in this kind of habitat and especially the claimant holding human is basically the worst DNA you would get real yeah because halt a heat and humidity degrades DNA and then plus we’re talking about we’re not taking blood samples we taking fecal sample so whatever we collect it’s already really degraded

so there were a lot of challenges and based on the challenges we had a hard time to get funding but we got it off the ground we had a successful pilot season and after that yeah it was easier to get funds but I had to do a lot of consummating and I think that was very challenging and he was definitely not a PhD where came in and everything was founded yes we was sued the review trailblazing I was yeah science yeah I like to hear the term science I never thought I I go to a full decides but now I’m a very big and we can do you own it you yeah I think a lot of people are using this method now and also by using the dogs it was just a wonderful experience it was very hard work but we called a lot of data and I think we know a lot of more a lot more about Jaguars to this point

so so what can you tell us about jaguars now other than so we know now for the areas where we worked in how many cats are there because we can when we extract the DNA from fecal samples we we actually can’t because DNA off the host with predator because it comes from sloughed off cells from the intestines intestinal system but then we can also learn over the last few years a targeted different DNA in a fecal sample so when we do extractions we can also look at the DNA of the prey what they eat so that that’s really important to have a large predators because these they have there it’s on the top of the food chain so we really need to monitor what seats in different areas because some they need certain prey and if the price is not there anymore the publication’s may be more frightened so it’s we can learn a lot from poop and recently I started looking at I call the old DNA which is also present in poop samples and and it gives us some indication what’s going on in the got so I don’t know if you heard of Michael by own research and that’s like it’s it’s a very new frontier for humans now we we know a lot about Michael biomes when we look at when you look it up the ideal body we actually have a large portion of the cells in us and on us are microbial

and so it’s now for over the last ten ten years of especially in human studies we found out that sixty area do not own only pathogens we have a lot of commensal bacteria good bacteria and they help us too especially in the gods help us to digest food help us to synthesize other nutrients vitamins but they also responsible for some diseases like they could show that certain microbes are present when you have cancer or many autistic so it’s Michael seven little function and functions and we are just at the beginning to learn and understand what they can do and I’m trying to use this new method now too and apply also full why life because in wild populations we noticed a lot of picks tearing down to similar to humans but they’re really understudied soul and since a lot of these carnivores and also small ones they’re facing so many friends right now so we really need to understand the biology for early and at this point now we noted the biology is driven by it not only the cat themself also by microbes living in an on them so so yeah so poop allows us to study that too yes I’m a big advocate of poop science and all continue using this sample source biological sample gives us a lot of information

how else would you test reduce microbial on things in humans it also enhances it other than to visit me out does a going back to human does any of the traditional in scanners oversee xrays wouldn’t do it yeah so that’s a good question so historically we cultured bacteria but some of the bacteria you cannot really cultures and now this is possible to do this research as possible because we had a huge advancement in technology so over the last it’s now fifteen years basically we have two is new type of sequence article next generation sequencers where we can generate millions of DNA reads in one sequencing run and we can put a lot of samples in school we pulled them together and then we generate millions of DNA reed San this allows us now to really examine complex samples thank microbiomes on for example a god can have anywhere between five hundred to one thousand different microbial species so we need to have yeah we need to have these kind kind of technology to really see what’s there in terms of how you asked me how we would what daughter Turner to start with something for humans now I mean you talked about gut microbiome but of course there’s many other environments on our body so we we can study different outside like different sites for example the arm Pete has very unique microbial community compared to to god to compare to the malls so in order to really understand our microbiome we need to really take swab samples from various sites and so that’s how we would do it for humans for animals that’s more difficult and we have been all collaborating with some researchers who are capturing animals so we get swab samples from different there is a one species and different sites are different body sites because for many of them we they have never been studied before and it’s fascinating because we seem to find a lot of new biodiversity

I have a question about funding is as we were talking early I’m an entrepreneur founder and I’m always problem solving in their own way one of the things that both in start ups and what I’m hearing here is funding is an issue it’s a big issue and so I’m trying to solve that somehow and by asking questions when how it’s done if a person like yourself is trying to do funding you said Mister grant writing is there a directory that you go through a similar rentals France or is there other things like crowd sourcing for example that’s very popular in in in front of a business is the things like that that people can do to help the cause yes so I would say crowd funding can be done but it’s more difficult I generally there’s certain bonds you can apply for there some directories you can look up different zoom grounds or some NGOs would have gone programs for graduate students or there’s different organizations today I would say there’s a wealth of knowledge all there can be very confusing when you first started with this work so I was fortunate when I was in graduate school my adviser she guided me and we would look for grants together and now I would say after all this time there’s new ways to do this and I would say I really want to highlight Twitter, the Twitter community

I’m a big fan of social media where we especially in this field we have a very strong science community where people share their experience was crowned writing help each other but also organizations with polls grind submission deadline so I think it’s this new new ways now to find out about these kind of resources and it’s I told you before it’s very complex is a lot of sources and things change sometimes every year people run out of funding and then describe his offered this year but many men up so it’s so it’s really good social media is very powerful in that way to kind of keep on top of things because he had as a lot there’s a lot out there but sometimes you just known song is if you were just disconnected I mean it’s an area that and it’s not just in this community I see it in other areas too there’s this the organization’s mission even though we have access the internet into it or social media how do you reach all people are interested in it seems like there’s not this one directory says here’s all the places that are willing to do grants and you know the one and here’s what a single form that you can just hit a button and everything is done and there’s other things across was was a lot of public and I imagine that in the audience were going to have people to I want to contribute how do I help and is equally as important to give them the tools to know where to go to be able to help it seems like there’s this and I may be wrong with this with that seems to me that there’s a disconnect there there’s a disconnect and I think some people they compile sources for findings and but things just change quickly so it’s really it’s really difficult to stay on top and the arm and I think social media is one good way to do a little has been helping a lot

so tell me what it’s like to work for the American museum of natural history in New York it’s a fascinating place this a lot of resources a lot of great minds at the same place it’s a hopping the CD for science and natural resource conservation management we get a lot of people from all over the world to be sitting still since I’ve been there met so many different people from different places studying all kinds of things so it’s it’s a it’s and then plus we have huge collections you can find pretty much anything you want we also have great initiatives for education so that has been very inspiring for me we not only do the research here but we’ve read to a lot of outreach and we work with students involved I’ve been part of a adjustment highlighted one program which I’ve been part of the last several years already its the science research mentoring program it’s it’s a program where the museum invites high school students and we have about sixty high school students every year joined the museum and they get paired two students always get paired with one museum researcher in the state with us from September all the all almost a year until June and they work with the scientists on research projects and and it’s all about mentoring as we discussed before is it’s it’s it’s a very powerful way to for these young people to do the first again expose for the first time to science and researcher and in very early age Seoul yes so there’s many many of really good things about the museum in but the ID cation is is very important and has really had a big impact on me too is a mentor and I I hope to continue similar work wherever I go next yeah so this this program of mentorship for the high school kids in the I would imagine the local program because it’s a local program

yeah on the one on one basis yeah they’re all based in New York City and we have it’s very diverse we have a lot of minority students all we have a lot of female students does today’s it’s very diverse and the kids are very smart date they have been the Michael by own research which is explained to you before my students are working with me on this kind of very complex genomic data and they’re doing this an age of seventeen and they get to do their own research project and we have a symposium at the end of the year where they present a poster and give a talk and it’s here and then many of them go on to college and here continues similar puff so it has been a great experience working museum for many reasons

so what is the most fascinating thing you’ve seen out in the jungle when you’re doing your work I’m that’s that’s a good question I I’ve seen a lot of things I would say probably the most fascinating thing was in two thousand ten I I was fortunate to to join these filming expedition actually with PVC I got this call one day invited me and my detector dog Bruiser to join a fuming expedition to Bhutan which is the small kingdom in the Himalayas the main goal was to study Tigers not a big cats and Bruiser my dog cruise and I were invited to help the camera team find these big cats old into a tropical part of Bhutan which is the self vitaminas national park so I joined the team and we spend many days out in the field and one day we would actually across the river we would see a and a she usually had a collector female with her Cup climbing up the hillside and move it was probably one of the fascinating fascinating things I’ve ever seen because this usually don’t get to see in the wild and it was just a stunning area where we had to rich diversity of animals in yen we just came across this site and yet it still stays with me a lot all the time that’s amazing really hoses in my mind I was kind of lost because yeah imagining what you think

okay impact at the end of the day I’m hearing the work that you’re doing in the science and in the learning that you’ve done with with these animals but one of the impacts that humans has have in in this how do you how do you educate the public over what do you want to see change order what impact do you have humans have a lot of impact on wildlife there’s a lot of things we can do I think most importantly because for us as a when I left college is we work with local communities leaving at the doorstep of the protected areas where large carnivores leave and we try to educate them there’s a lot of conflict in some of those areas because the large predators may occasionally take take our livestock so I think going in working with those large come out with these local communities and showed him how to keep the livestock safe on a daily basis really helps to mitigate the issues I think working with local communities is really important recently we also started a project in New York City or the project has been going on for the many years already but I joined him the Gulf in communities CD of New York City research project where we their difficulties in New York and a lot of people don’t know it so we also do a lot of Aldridge with the public and we just tell them don’t be afraid of coyotes they’re not going to come and get you and I think that really helps too

so it’s I think it’s a it’s a lot about educating people and then people will leave close to these predators at the same time I think also training the next generation of scientists who will go out and do more work a lot of work needs to be done and it’s probably not going to be it’s not going to get better and it’s not going to get easier with all the challenges we are facing right now I’m talking about climate change and forest disappearing at an alarming rate so yes I would say that’s probably the email the biggest impact we we have is to work with people who live close to these predators but also to train the next generation of scientists

having said that your what would you say to the audience the the people in the other is the the the kids in the audience that want to listen or even parents that have kids like myself what would you say or device which give them the one versus the colonel like what you’re doing I think Tom I’ve I probably recommend kids to get involved in local research projects try to get there’s organizations maybe in your local towns there may be a museum there lot of opportunities all do you just need to go and look universities sometimes have also outreach events so I think just get involved with these things and go out into it and I think you’ll just kept captivated by age is always I remember my high school students the old a grew up in New York City many of them haven’t been outside in from the forest a lot so yeah they get captivated just by listening to the stories I tell them and I and I think the more you do the more you’ll get exposed it helps you to to find out what you wanted to but then also hopefully you’ll get involved in this kind of work and quit and decide to continue being a scientist

who are even work with Fred and why life which is a lot of lots of things thanks again pardon so yeah with you then you know what I’m hearing you say is that go try things and see what your heart tells yes because back to your experience it was that one year when you were twenty four when your life changed because you were inspired to do sometimes and ever since then you can give you that reason to go get up every morning to do something find that calls yet and so for kids and and and the parents are listening to this well and you know that one have an impact is expose them to museums eat that’s interesting because in my limited knowledge of the museum’s I think is a place you go to him and see things that happened the past I don’t think about the the this is also soon reading of actively do something now other than maybe donate some money or not but you’re saying actually see what programs that offer and be involved there so that’s yes there’s a lot of their lot of opportunities and

I think it’s not only museums also auto organizations I think it’s all about going out and see what’s there and then it’s also I think again I come back social media were offering it’s about trying to find out what’s all down maybe we all need to do a better job just reaching out more to the public so it’s even more well known that they’re all these resources and kids can go and do and and I think that’s basically that’s always I tell my students school in two and try and go and go into things

because even when your biology students and undergraduate student you still don’t know what you wanted to also tell them go into internships and help with with working different research groups and then I think it will help you to decide what to do because you really don’t know you’re young and yes it’s all about getting exposed and going to fill such a beautiful mess is because I think amphibians speaking from the heart here because I’ve got a fifteen year old seven go through these things and seeing her struggles in trying to figure things out on the pressure that she’s thinking about on the enemy’s one week she was the one thing next which was another and quite frankly socially that’s out there culture does a really great thing with gray of exposing yes all the things it’s home fatter and keeps the attention of teenagers and I think there should be a lot more of what you said I’m glad that social media has been is it being helpful in raising awareness but we need to do a better job of that so the kids can start having planted that seed of maybe I want to do this and and had a way with the next step is the things that was the next step question mark that kids have and so I I I find this very very fascinating thank you so much for being with us I really have enjoyed this so and learns so so much who will follow you on social media and keep spreading the word thanks for having me was really great experience what an inspiring fascinating conversation Holly is doing such interesting work and if you like to follow her along her research you can find on Twitter we will put a link in the sentence thank you again Claudia and best of luck on all your the real lab podcast team includes me damn Dillard producer Mariah gossip in audio engineer Jake walls special thanks to our friend rob Antoun Weiss and the amazing team at the research and innovation network Austria if you liked this episode make sure you leave us a review on I tunes so other science research and innovation fans can find thank you for