Our Panelists
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Taha Ebrahimi
Author & Illustrator of the Regional Bestseller, Street Trees of Seattle: An Illustrated Walking Guide
Taha is the author and illustrator of Street Trees of Seattle: An Illustrated Walking Guide (Sasquatch Books, 2024). She serves as a member of the council for Historic Seattle as well as the board for the Cal Anderson Park Alliance. She has been named by The Stranger as "Seattle's Coolest Street Tree Expert."
Her writing has appeared in Creative Nonfiction, Crosscut, The Seattle Times, and numerous anthologies. She is also the recipient of awards from the Pacific Northwest Writers’ Association, the Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation, and the Thomas J. Watson Foundation.
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Josh Morris
Urban Conservation Manager at Birds Connect Seattle
Additionally, Josh is Seattle’s Urban Forestry Commission's NGO Representative and has been involved in urban forest policy development and activism in Seattle for many years.
Josh is delighted to be part of the Birds Connect Seattle community, where he coordinates Seattle’s Urban Bird Treaty City Coalition. His professional background is varied. He’s been a project scientist, a high-school chemistry teacher, a legal assistant, and, for one curious month, a chocolate vendor on Monterey’s Cannery Row. He holds a master’s degree in International Environmental Policy and is a certified naturalist.
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Kersti Muul
Urban Conservation Specialist, Wildlife Field Biologist, & Artist
Executive Director - Salish Wildlife Watch
Kersti is a wildlife biologist and urban conservation specialist, wildlife first-responder, science educator, artist, photographer, and frequent contributor to local and national media. She concentrates on the intersectionality of wildlife and urban spaces, particularly the human-induced impacts on remaining natural spaces and the structural and political challenges that arise for both people and remaining biodiversity.
Kersti participates in collaborative and independent research projects on how adverse climate events, urban heat islands, tree-canopy loss, entanglement, disease, and urban development impact avian species. She is a former Consulting Utility Specialist and Arborist and continues her involvement in urban arboriculture. She empowers and educates the community through independent outreach and monitoring using her evocative photography; leading community science projects for local non-profits; and running six advocacy listservs, including the Salish Wildlife Watch, land-based, ethical wildlife, and whale alerts.
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Jack DeLap
Panel Moderator
Dr. Jack DeLap is a professor, ecologist, and fine artist deeply committed to education, research, and the nexus of art and science to amplify our understanding of humans and the natural world.
A member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and American Ornithologists Society, he has co-authored journal articles on a range of topics, including urban ecology, wildlife biology, animal behavior, impacts of human recreation in wildlands, and landscape conservation under Global Climate Change.
A member of the Guild of Natural Science Illustrators, DeLap creates original images for professional journals and books, most recently contributing works to Yellowstone Birds: Diversity & Abundance in the World’s First National Park (2023, Princeton University Press); additional illustrations appear in Whooping Cranes: Biology and Conservation (2019, Academic Press), The Mezcal Rush: Explorations in Agave Country (2017, Counterpoint Press), and Welcome to Subirdia: Sharing Our Neighborhoods with Wrens, Robins, Woodpeckers and Other Wildlife (2014, Yale University Press).
He earned his PhD in Environmental & Forest Sciences from the University of Washington, MSc in Wildlife Biology from Colorado State University, and BA in Fine Art + History from Pitzer College.