Oct 2-4, 2023
Los Altos High School
Bill Leikam
President & Co-founder
Urban Wildlife Research Project
A journey into the lives of the gray fox (Urocyon cinereoargenteus townsendi)
Science
Beginning with a global view of these foxes you will then be introduced to a pair of foxes who pair up and have pups. This begins a monogamous relationship that takes us through the lives of their pups through the year until they disperse to go find their own mate and their own territory.
Meet the Speaker:
Bill says, “Science has been an important thread throughout my life.” Among other endeavors, and based on his research into the nature of consciousness, he was selected as a member of a US Delegation to the Peoples Republic of China in 1981. In 2017 he was asked to contribute to the field guide Canids of the World: Wolves, Wild Dogs, Foxes, Jackals, Coyotes, and Their Relatives, published by the Princeton University Press.
In 2020 Dr. Katharina Weikl from the University of Zurich, Switzerland, asked Bill to join an international wildlife project of 15 nations globally titled “Triggered by Motion”. Next year he will probably be traveling to the International Conference Biotoopia in Viinistu Estonia to present his work and his thoughts on these unique foxes. He is an Associate Director for the Guadalupe-Coyote Resource Conservation District. In that role, he is working on a project to translocate Tule Elk into the Santa Cruz Mountain range.
Bill conducts unprecedented research on the behavior of the gray fox. Twelve years ago, Bill began documenting, photographing and studying the behavior of the gray fox. This study resulted in the development of the Urban Wildlife Research Project. His pioneering work has attracted a great deal of attention by the press and there have been three documentaries filmed about he and his work with the gray foxes.