The Kaspari Lab

Category: Doing Science


Introducing “Ecology Stories”

Wisdom begins with the proper naming of things. In this episode of Ecology Stories—written as a resource for science classes—@damotmot and I present an illustrated intro to taxonomy.

Read More

The Ten Principles of Ecology

I have been teaching a course called “Principles of Ecology” at OU since 1996. It was a traditional two one-hour lecture, one three-hour lab for most of those years. In 2013, I decided to flip the course, converting the lectures…

Read More

A short essay on Koechner’s Criterion and its relationship to success in Grad School

Where I coin Koechner’s Criterion and run with it

Read More

What journal gets the first peek at your manuscript? Results from a year of ruminating.

The manuscript’s done. Now what?

Read More

How to schedule a committee meeting

How to get your committee in one room, and in a reasonably good mood.In short, be early; be concise; be considerate; be professional. Bonus: you will earn the reputation for being just that.

Read More

On the salutary effect of the Kudos Email

If you like someone’s work, don’t just cite them, write them!

Read More

On writing a strong NSF pre-proposal

Its been 4 years since NSF DEB began to require pre-proposals. What makes a strong one?

Read More

Lightning strikes 14 times at a conference session: exploring multi-element limitation at the Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation meetings.

Reported by Mike Kaspari, Kyle Harms, and Jennifer Powers Meetings are a vital part of the process of science. We meet with colleagues old and new, exchange ideas, schmooze, and testify. At the same time, these conferences are expensive in…

Read More

Canopy and understory microclimates – how are the ants handling them?

The author, Jelena Bujan, in the canopy of Pseudobombax septenatum, a deciduous tree with smooth green bark. Jelena is completing her third field season on Barro Colorado Island, in Panama.  In tropical forests, is frequently assumed that canopies are “deserts”…

Read More

Politics 101 for Academics

Politics is the art of the possible. Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made. I’ve known both quotes for a while, but as I just now looked them up, I discovered they have the…

Read More