The Sperry Lab

I joined the Sperry-Degregorio lab in spring 2017 and my research interests broadly including herpetology, ecology, spatial/movement ecology, and conservation biology. More specifically, I am studying a population of spotted turtles isolated in a highly urbanized landscape in northern Virginia. I’m interested in understanding the status and distribution of spotted turtles on the Fort Belvoir army installation and surrounding properties, and how turtles move and utilize fragmented landscapes. I’ll also be using genetic sampling to determine diversity and population structure and connectivity. Spotted turtles are suffering from range-wide population declines, and were petitioned for federal listing in 2015. This study will help provide conservation and management recommendations to support healthy metapopulations of spotted turtles across a human-use landscape.

Publications:

Ruther, E.V. and Akre, T.S.B. (In Prep) The Use of Spatially Explicit Capture-Recapture Models to Re-Evaluate a 25-Year Wood Turtle (Glyptemys insculpta) Dataset. Ecological Applications.

Akre, T.S.B. and Ruther, E.V. (In Prep) Wood Turtle (Glyptemys insculpta) Nest Site Selection and Survival in an Unusual Landscape. BioOne.

Akre, T.S.B., Ruther, E.V., and Lemmon, L (In Prep) Utility and Best Practices on the Use of Environmental DNA on a Cryptic, Aquatic Reptile Species, the Wood Turtle (Glyptemys insculpta). Chelonian Conservation and Biology.

Lassiter, E.T., Akre, T.S.B., Ruther, E.V, Dragon, J., Fink, M., Krichbaum, S., Morse, B., Rutherford, E. (In Review) New County Records and Additional Records for Amphibians and Reptiles in Virginia, USA. Herpetological Review.