{"id":138809,"date":"2021-07-09T13:32:00","date_gmt":"2021-07-09T19:32:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/?p=138809"},"modified":"2022-09-20T14:55:32","modified_gmt":"2022-09-20T20:55:32","slug":"wildlife-biological-technician-uses-degree-to-save-animals-collin-hildreth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/?p=138809","title":{"rendered":"Wildlife Biological Technician uses degree to save animals | Collin Hildreth \u201919"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Collin Hildreth has used his UCCS Biology degree to help animals survive as a Wildlife Biological Technician.<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

When Collin Hildreth ’19 was just seven years old, he saw Steve Irwin \u201cThe Crocodile Hunter\u201d on TV and was immediately inspired to work with animals. Now, at 23, Hildreth is using his Bachelor of Science in Biology to work alongside animals every day as a Wildlife Biological Technician.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Every day, he works to maintain the precious ecosystems surrounding military training grounds within unincorporated El Paso County.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAnimals have always been a very big passion of mine,\u201d Hildreth explains. \u201cI always knew I wanted to get a degree that would let me work with animals.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hildreth came to UCCS from his hometown of Gilford, New Hampshire when the great outdoors of Colorado Springs, and his own sense of independence, started calling to him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It helped too that Hildreth had family in the area, including an aunt who worked in the UCCS recruitment department and told him about competitively-priced tuition rates for out-of-state students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt that point, I got even more invested in UCCS and finally made the decision to come out here,\u201d Hildreth says. “It was one of the best I\u2019ve ever made.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Right from the start, Hildreth\u2019s General Biology Degree and classes like Conservation Biology and Methods in Evolutionary Genetics taught him essential skills that applied directly to his current Wildlife Biological Technician role.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn my job, having a wide knowledge base is very advantageous,\u201d Hildreth explains. \u201cAnd that\u2019s something that I\u2019ve always aspired to have \u2014 to know as much as I can about wildlife and wildlife-related fields.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To supplement his expansive learning, Hildreth\u2019s professors, including Jeremy Bono of the UCCS Biology Department, guided him toward pursuing internships to get crucial hands-on experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the summers between his freshman and sophomore years, Hildreth returned home to Gilford to work at the Squam Lakes Natural Science Center, where he led trail tours, handled live animals, and even hosted presentations about various creatures for appreciative audiences, just like his childhood idol.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn my head, it broke down to: How can I be Steve Irwin?,\u201d Hildreth recalls. \u201cHow can I get people as excited about this animal as I am? Just seeing people\u2019s faces light up that was an awesome feeling, for sure.\u201d  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was out of this extra experience that Hildreth was able to reinforce his education while setting his sights on becoming a zookeeper or host at a nature centure, like Squam Lakes. But by the end his senior year, Hildreth wasn\u2019t sure if he\u2019d ever find a job doing what he loved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWith the field I wanted to go into there\u2019s limited job availability to begin with and [it\u2019s] also very competitive,\u201d Hildreth notes. \u201cOnce people get their jobs, they rarely leave them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After applying to countless positions with no response, Hildreth was approached by Bono with an opportunity to become a Wildlife Biology Technician through Sole Solutions, a wildlife conservation contractor for government agencies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this role, Hildreth and his small team of fellow contract-based technicians coordinate with government employees to ensure that habitats located on military training grounds go undisturbed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Day to day, they build nesting boxes that induce mating among local birds, refill artificial water sources used by animals in the area, and collect endless data that is used to inform future conservation policies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These efforts are all part of an ongoing collaboration between the U.S. Department of Defense and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to make sure animals survive despite human activity, especially endangered species. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSome species that are on our watchlist are Burrowing Owls, Golden Eagles and Black Hill Prairie Dogs,\u201d Hildreth says. \u201cWe have surveys catered to each of those species to make sure that training isn\u2019t impacting their populations.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

To Hildreth, his degree prepared him well for all the field-based research the job requires. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWith our data, a lot of it involves direct observation,\u201d Hildreth says. \u201cComing into this job, I already had experience in a lot of my classes using observation skills and gathering data through my labs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hildreth also got invaluable observational experience through the UCCS Nature & Hiking Club, which he helped start just before his senior year with a few fellow wildlife lovers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUCCS provides a really good framework for starting clubs,\u201d Hildreth says. \u201cSo we provided a community for people to get together, explore new areas, and learn cool facts from each other for whatever we discovered.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the end of his time in the club, Hildreth was helping lead a handful of students on fun and informative hikes, spreading important knowledge about the natural world.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat club was a huge benefit,\u201d Hildreth says. \u201cJust learning new things from other people that I had never come across or thought about.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Likewise, Hildreth credits UCCS for opening his mind and eventually the door to a career path he wouldn\u2019t have ever considered \u2014 one that helps keep our natural world in balance, one that Steve Irwin would be proud of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTo me, it\u2019s making sure that animals are allowed to coexist with humans,\u201d Hildreth concludes. \u201cThe opportunity that UCCS gave me, getting a lot of experience in many different areas, really helped me prepare for that.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Collin Hildreth was just seven years old, he saw Steve Irwin \u201cThe Crocodile Hunter\u201d on TV and was immediately inspired to work with animals.\u00a0 (More)<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":138811,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1,427],"tags":[370,369,106],"class_list":["post-138809","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all","category-alumni-stories","tag-alumni","tag-alumni-success","tag-department-of-biology"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Collin-Hildreth-Featured.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1mBpJ-A6R","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138809","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=138809"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138809\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":142763,"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138809\/revisions\/142763"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/138811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=138809"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=138809"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communique.uccs.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=138809"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}