Dr. Russell P. Balda

Dr. Balda is a broadly trained ornithologist and behavioral ecologist.  He developed a lifelong interest in animal behavior and ecology while an undergraduate student at the University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh, where he studied with the late Dr. Jacob Shapiro.  He received his undergraduate degree in Secondary Education to teach history and biology.  he received his Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy Degrees from the University of Illinois under the late Dr. S. Charles Kendeigh.  His doctoral dissertation dealt with the breeding birds of the Chiricahua Mountains in southeastern Arizona.  During this study he developed a deep appreciation for the diversity of birdlife in southwest, where he has made his home ever since.

Much of his initial research at Northern Arizona University focused on describing the physical and social ecology of the pinyon jay (Gymnorhinus cyanocephalus).  This research, which lasted from the early 1970s to the mid-1980s, yielded 10 papers on the life history of pinyon jays and greatly contributed to science’s understanding of the species. 

In the mid-1980s, Dr. Balda saw the potential in the fact that seed-caching birds, including pinyon jays, Clark’s nutcrackers, Mexican jays, and western scrub-jays, are self-motivated to return to inconspicuous points in the landscape to retrieve hidden food.  Balda, with collaborator Dr. Alan Kamil, began to employ the cache-recovery paradigm as a model system for studying learning, memory, and "spatial information processing". Balda and Kamil’s research led to enormous advances in the understanding of spatial learning in birds and the publication of approximately 50 scientific papers.

Graduate Students
Curriculum Vitae
Bibliography (PDF)

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