SWCA Holds Permit for Gartersnake Activities in Arizona and New Mexico

Eleanor Gladding is a senior biologist and project manager in SWCA’s Tucson office. As a herpetologist and ecologist, her areas of expertise include endangered species habitat studies, revegetation planning, species-specific surveys, noxious weed issues, and wildlife-habitat relationships. She is adept at identifying plants and animals, their habitat, and signs of presence. She is also skilled at writing technical and non-technical reports and conducting the extensive literature research that accompanies writing at the professional level. Her duties as a biologist include study design, field studies and special-status species surveys, and report writing and editing.

Matt McMillan is the Natural Resources Director in SWCA’s Austin office. A biologist and herpetologist with 23 years of experience in natural resource studies throughout the southwest United States, providing technical expertise on threatened and endangered species as well as surveys and habitat assessments, aquatic resource surveys, delineations, and Clean Water Act permitting, vegetation sampling, habitat restoration, and ecological monitoring. He also has conducted wetland delineations, wetland qualitative assessments, ordinary high water mark delineations, and vegetation sampling throughout New Mexico as well as in Oklahoma and Texas. Mr. McMillan works with clients to identify, develop, and monitor ecological parameters and provide environmental compliance surveys prior to, during, and post-construction of project development. He has written BAs, BEs, wetland delineations, and other resource reports for private, federal, state, and local clients in support of consultations with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, U.S. Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Forest Service, Reclamation, and state and local agencies. He has worked on threatened and endangered species matters in riparian systems on the Rio Grande, Canadian, and Gila Rivers in New Mexico and Pecos River in New Mexico and Texas for a variety of clients including the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission, New Mexico Department of Transportation, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. Mr. McMillan has worked in the Chihuahuan, Sonoran, and Mojave Deserts on the systematics, biogeography, and conservation biology of reptiles and specifically population monitoring of rattlesnakes and desert tortoises. Mr. McMillan has worked under USFWS 10(a)1(A) permits to handle, bleed, and rehydrate tortoises in Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah. He is currently permitted to handle federal and state threatened and endangered amphibians and reptiles including the Chiricahua leopard frog, Jemez Mountains salamander, dunes sagebrush lizard, narrow-headed gartersnake, and Mexican gartersnake. He is also permitted to handle federal and state threatened and endangered fishes including the Rio Grande silvery minnow, loach minnow, and spikedace.