Aoife Galvin

About Aoife Galvin

Aoife Galvin is a detail-oriented Technical Writer and Wildlife Biologist with a strong foundation in ecology and a focus on clear, high-quality environmental documentation. She specializes in writing biological assessments and monitoring reports, translating complex scientific data into concise, actionable content for clients and agencies. Her background combines advanced writing expertise with hands-on field experience, including species surveys, construction compliance monitoring, and data collection using ArcGIS and Survey123. Aoife has led field teams in challenging environments and brings academic research experience in avian disease ecology and parasitology, with published peer-reviewed work and extensive fieldwork ranging from California to the Galápagos.

Experience

1. Wildlife Biologist

   Aspen Environmental Group

   May 2026 — Present · Agoura Hills, CA

2. Wildlife Biologist and Technical Writer

   Mountainview Biological Consulting, LLC

   Nov 2023 — May 2026 · southern California

   • Conducted biological surveys and compliance monitoring for projects across Southern California, focusing on nesting birds and special-status species. • Prepared comprehensive reports including pre-construction reports, daily, weekly, yearly, and final monitoring reports, and biological constraints analyses for various clients. • Utilized ArcGIS Online, CNDDB, NWI, NHD, Soil Web and for habitat assessments, ensuring accurate analysis of project areas and compliance with regulations.

3. Wildlife Biologist

   Harmsworth Associates

   Nov 2023 — Dec 2025 · Orange County, CA

   • Conducted comprehensive surveys and habitat assessments for nesting birds, rare plants, and various wildlife species, including BUOW and western pond turtles. • Conducted sound monitoring for nesting LBVI. • Assisted with habitat restoration projects, including measuring annual growth rates at restoration sites • Trapped cowbirds, crawfish, clawed frogs, and bullfrogs in preserves.

4. Field Crew Lead

   PG Environmental

   Jul 2023 — Sep 2023 · Salt Lake City Metropolitan Area

   Led a field crew of 3 collecting plant and soil data for BLM AIM in remote parts of Utah. Planned and organized field work trips, which consisted of week long camping trips involving remote, backcountry driving and hiking off-trail to plots carrying all equipment in harsh weather conditions. Data collection included plant species richness and abundance, LPI, vegetation height, canopy gap, soil color, soil texture,soil stability, and general soil horizon characteristics.

5. Field Technician

   PG Environmental

   Apr 2023 — Jul 2023 · Salt Lake City, UT

   Part of a crew of 3 conducting data collection for the Bureau of Land Management’s AIM project in desert and sagebrush steppe areas of Utah. Field work consisted of week long camping trips, off road driving on poorly maintained roads, and hiking up to 6 miles a day over rough terrain carrying a 40 point backpack in weather ranging from intense heat to thunderstorms. Data collection involved setting up transects, LPI, plant vegetation height, canopy gap, plant identification, digging a 70 cm soil pit, identifying and classifying all horizons and their characteristics, and analyzing soil stability. In office work involved ecological site verification and matching field data to mapped soil regions.

6. PHD Student

   University of Utah

   Jan 2022 — May 2022 · Galápagos, Ecuador

   In a team of 2, developed and conducted a field season mapping Galapagos mockingbird and Darwin finch nests and collecting their parasites on Santa Cruz Island, Galapagos Islands. Daily field work involved cutting paths through rough terrain with a machete, searching for nests, observing bird behavior, checking nest progress, collecting nests once chicks fledged, and dissecting nests to collect an invasive nest parasite (Philornis downsi). Side projects involved color banding mockingbirds and observing mockingbird preening behavior. Other work included planning of trip, organization of export permits etc., and communication with Ecuadorian authorities in Spanish to export parasite samples.

7. PHD Student

   University of Utah

   Aug 2021 — Feb 2023 · Salt Lake City, UT

   Developed and designed a proposed thesis project on the adaptive significance of preening behavior in birds. Involved an extensive literature review and subsequent proposal on the topic. Preliminary research included observing the behavior of captive pigeons through scan sampling, developing methods of inducing preening behavior, and care of over 60 captive pigeons in animal care facilities. Passed doctoral qualifying exam on this proposal in January 2023.

8. Graduate Teaching Assistant

   University of Utah

   Aug 2021 — Dec 2022 · Salt Lake City, UT

   Assisted as a TA for an upper division parasitology laboratory class. Assisted in lab set up, grading, and helped develop lab activities.

9. Master Thesis Student

   San Francisco State University

   Aug 2019 — Aug 2021 · San Francisco Bay Area

   Masters of Ecology, Evolution, and Conservation Biology Student with thesis on the disease ecology of hummingbirds. Thesis work included catching and collecting blood and feather samples from hummingbirds throughout CA and extracting DNA from samples and running qPCR assays to identify presence of viruses and pathogens.

10. Graduate Teaching Assistant

    San Francisco State University

    Aug 2019 — Jun 2021 · San Francisco Bay Area

    Taught several courses to SFSU undergraduates, including an introductory biology lab, and upper division ecology classes. Helped adapt courses to online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic.

11. Lab Manager

    Wayne Lab at the Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

    Jan 2019 — Aug 2019 · UCLA

    Provided assistance in a variety of ways to make sure the lab ran smoothly. Included ordering supplies for the whole lab, keeping track of the lab's budget and various grants, making reagents and beads for the lab, keeping the lab space and freezers clean and organized and all equipment running, shipping samples out, organizing weekly lab meetings and presentations, training new lab members, assisting with any lab work that needed to be completed, and also in charge of all safety matters for the lab, including handling safety inspections and safety training of lab members.

12. Student Researcher

    Buth Lab in the Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

    Sep 2018 — Dec 2018 · UCLA

    Dissected a dozen Partially Armored Threespine Stickleback fish and identified all parasites in/on the specimens in an effort to examine if parasitism could be a factor for the decline of the closely related Unarmored Threespine Stickleback, which is highly endangered and hard to study due to permitting issues.

13. Student Research Assistant

    Pinter-Wollman Lab at the Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

    Aug 2018 — Dec 2018 · UCLA

    Collected data for a behavioral study on communication systems in ant colonies. Involved reviewing prerecorded videos of experimentally starved ant colonies and recording interactions of forages with other colony members on the computer program AnTracks.

14. Student Research Assistant

    Yeh Lab in the Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

    Feb 2018 — Jun 2018 · UCLA

    Assisted with behavioral observations on a population of Dark-eyed Juncos on UCLA's campus. Included tracking mating pairs of birds, recording the start of nesting behavior, finding nests, and banding adult and hatchling DEJU.

15. Student Researcher

    Wayne Lab in the Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

    Dec 2017 — Dec 2018 · UCLA

    Extracted eDNA from soil samples, prepared samples to be sequenced by creating metabarcoding libraries, and analyzed sequencing results. All samples were collected from areas in California with the overarching goal of characterizing the biodiversity of California in a noninvasive manner under the University of California Conservation Genomics Consortium's CALeDNA program.

Education

• University of California, Los Angeles

  Bachelor of Science - BS · Ecology, Behavior, and Evolution

  2015 — 2019

• University of Utah

  Doctor of Philosophy - PhD · Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

  2021 — 2023

• San Francisco State University

  Master's degree · Ecology, Evolution, and Conservation Biology

  2019 — 2021

Skills

• Nest searching
• Laboratory Skills
• Exam design
• Team Leadership
• Animal Husbandry
• Agarose Gel Electrophoresis
• Lesson Planning
• Feather collection
• Spanish
• Survey123
• Hall feeder trap
• Presentation
• Team Motivation
• Literature Reviews
• Scientific poster
• Microscope
• Inreach
• Bird Banding
• Presentation Skills
• Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR)
• Genomics
• Grading
• ArcGIS Products
• Animal Behavior
• Soil Classification
• University Teaching
• Plant Identification
• Experimental Design
• Research
• Parasitology
• Field maps
• Avian blood collection
• Animal Handling
• Team Spirit
• qRT-PCR
• Soil Science
• Scientific Papers
• DNA Extraction
• Bird Watching