Davis leaving council

John Davis is stepping down as conservation director of the Adirondack Council to work for the Wildlands Network, a nonprofit organization working to preserve natural corridors for wildlife migration.

“It has been a great five years working on conservation strategies inside the Park,” Davis said in a news release today.  “Now, I get to think about how the Adirondacks can remain connected, or reconnect, to other major conservation areas on the East Coast.”

Besides working for the council for the past five years, Davis has been a proponent of the Split Rock Wildway, a wildlife corridor that would connect the Champlain Valley with the High Peaks region. The Explorer published a story on this initiative in our January/February 2006 issue.

Davis lives in a small cabin in Westport and commutes to the council’s office in Elizabethtown by bicycle or skis. He has logged some twenty-five thousand miles going to and from work. He should be plenty fit for his Wildlands Network assignment: hiking, paddling, cycling, and skiing through the East’s largest wildlands and waterways and studying the biological connections between them.

On his treks, Davis will be accompanied by naturalists, biologists, and others. He will write about his journeys and the efforts to preserve wildlife habitat.

“It saddens us to say goodbye to John Davis,” said Adirondack Council Executive Director Brian Houseal, who hired Davis in 2005.  “He is a highly valued member of our staff, a well-respected conservationist and national leader in the area of wildlife habitat connectivity.  More than that, he has become part of our family here at the council and we will miss his companionship and his sense of humor.  We wish him the greatest success in his future endeavors.”

Davis will leave his post at the end of the year.