Tom Gardner

Hi, I'm Tom Gardner of Lincoln.

I graduated from UNL in 1989 with a degree in wildlife management. Although I was raised in Lincoln, my family always had a love of nature and wildlife.

A non-traditional student, I first studied agronomy at UNL and spent two years as a Peace Corps volunteer, working in agricultural extension in Guatemala because I had a lot of experience with crops. I didn’t grow up on a farm, but my father was a corn geneticist.

The main thing that they wanted me to accomplish was a land-use survey for land management analysis. During my stay in Guatemala, I saw that the rain forest was disappearing rapidly and learned how important it is to manage and preserve our natural resources. When I returned to UNL, I was older than the traditional student and had life experiences that affected my course of study.

After getting my degree, I went to work for the UNL food science department in the food processing center, where I worked for nine years. I also was in the retail end of the food industry, working for Hinky Dinky and its successor, Sunmart.

What I learned at UNL has been most beneficial in my volunteer activities. I haven’t had a career in natural resources, but I’ve worked with a number of groups and causes where my educational background has helped. My education has always enriched my life.

I’m involved in the Tern and Plover Conservation Partnership and Bluebirds Across Nebraska, trying to develop and preserve bird habitat in the state. Most of the tern and plover habitat is along the Platte and Missouri rivers, where sand and gravel mining, farming and flow regime changes have eroded traditional habitat. Bluebirds have lost many of their natural roosting places, in abandoned woodpecker holes and dead trees on the margins of wooded areas, so we put out houses to keep the population strong, monitor their progress and keep sparrows away.

A lot of my UNL education still comes into play, such as finding the right spots to locate the birdhouses. We’re also doing work on what birdhouse design is most attractive to the bird. We’ll put up the houses in pairs, and barn swallows will frequently take up residence in the other house.

I think my education at UNL was outstanding. I took advantage of the Cedar Point Biological Station by taking a number of courses our there during the summer and living out there. I always believed that learning in the field was the best possible way to really get a grasp of a given discipline. Studying under the outstanding people that they have, both in the biological sciences department and in natural resources, I encountered a lot of wisdom.