I am a Professor of Wildlife Science at the University of Washington. My graduate (Northern Arizona University) and initial post-doctoral (University of Vermont) research focused on the social behavior and ecology of jays and ravens. I was especially interested in communication, social organization, and foraging behavior. My current research brings this behavioral approach to pressing conservation issues including conservation of endangered species, urban ecology, and the varied connections between crows and people. I enjoy blending biology, conservation, and anthropology to suggest that human and crow cultures have co-evolved. My most recent work applies a neurobiological perspective to understand the amazing feats of corvids (crows, ravens, jays and their kin).

Chris is a graphic designer and artist with a 25 year background in pen and ink drawing, oil painting, photography and screen printing. In the 1990s he embraced the computer revolution and developed a way to merge painting and photography in the digital medium. In the tradition of Alfred Stieglitz's "Photo-Secessionist" movement, photographic images are transformed by digital dark room techniques and intense painterly manipulation to create textures and effects that attempt to bridge the unique properties of photography and painting, a process he has dubbed the "painted photo montage". Using these techniques, he created the multi-bird habitat vistas in the celebrated book "The Field Guide to Bird Conservation" published by the American Bird Conservancy.