Yolo Basin Foundation
Graduate Student Fellowship

To recognize the Yolo Basin Foundation’s 25th anniversary in 2015 and to honor its founder Robin Kulakow, the Kulakow-Julian Family established the “Yolo Basin Foundation Graduate Student Fellowship Fund.” The gift provided support for selected graduate students who are working in the areas of environmental education, public use, environmental sciences, or environmental/conservation policy related to the 16,800-acre Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area or the 60,000-acre Yolo Bypass. The Fellowship included an annual stipend, as well as mentoring, for the student’s research.

Fellowship Program

The 2022-2023 awards are the final year of the fellowship. Yolo Basin Foundation thanks the fellowship students for contributing important research. These graduates will go on to contribute greatly to the scientific knowledge and management of wetlands and wildlife throughout their careers.

The following list details the study topics that were funded by the Yolo Basin Foundation Graduate Student Fellowship beginning in 2016 and continuing through 2023.

• Effects of wildfire-derived contaminants on behavior and development of the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area mosquito Culex tarsalis
• Evaluation of Yolo Basin Foundation Discover the Flyway school program.
• Quantifying foraging behavior and ecosystem service provision of bats in California agriculture
• Population Distribution and Habitat Assessment for the State and Federally Threatened Giant Garter Snake (Thamnophis gigas) and the State Species of Conservation Concern Western Pond Turtle (Actinemys marmorata) within the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area.
• Is reestablishment possible? Chinook Salmon Reconciliation Ecology in Putah Creek and the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area
• The geography of Putah Creek: Modeling riparian dynamics and restoration outcomes on a regulated river
• What Supports Aquatic Food Webs in the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area: Autotrophic Production or Terrestrial Detritus.
• Using microbiomes to explore benefits of floodplain habitat for salmon on health.
• Does “wilding” juvenile Chinook Salmon on agricultural floodplains boost survivorship in California’s Central Valley?
• Bats in the Basin: Tracking bat ecology in time and space. Phase II in assessing population, health and ecosystem services of the Yolo Basin bats.
• Establishing a long-term, citizen-science population monitoring program for the Yolo Causeway Bats: Phase I in evaluating the pest-control services of the largest colony of Mexican free-tailed bats (Tadarida brasiliensis) in Central California.
• Non-invasive analysis of bat diets in the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area using DNA.
• Evaluation of environmental health through quantification of cyanotoxins and toxic cyanobacteria in the YBWA.
• Linking riverine exports from Yolo Bypass inundations to the Delta food web.
• Isotope tools to track floodplain rearing of native fishes.
• Illuminating estrogenic effects in fish: Determining seasonal estrogenicity and water quality in the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area.
• Determining Chinook salmon passage at Lisbon Weir: a paired camera approach
• Genetic techniques enhance biodiversity monitoring in the Yolo Bypass.
• Morphological and behavior differences among Daphnia from vernal and permanent ponds in relation to UVB exposure.
• Analysis of plant community heterogeneity and its effect on aquatic invertebrates in vernal pools.