Dr Ursula Ellenberg

Contact details

Office 310 Castle Street, room 105
Tel +64 3 479 5453
Email ursula.ellenberg@otago.ac.nz

Academic qualifications

• MSc, University of Kiel
• PhD, University of Otago

Research interests

• Conservation Physiology – using physiological tools to understand and predict how organisms respond to environmental stressors to better inform the management of conservation challenges
• Behavioural ecology – asking questions on why and how individual differences affect behaviour (e.g. stress‐coping styles, foraging strategies), and ultimately (life‐time) reproductive success and survival
• Marine ecology and at-sea behaviour of seabirds
• Population ecology and conservation biology of seabirds
• Citizen science

Ursula is an ecologist with a keen interest and broad background in both terrestrial and marine systems. She enjoys employing novel technologies to understand how animals use their environment or respond to stressors to inform anticipatory conservation management decisions. Ursula has more than 20 years of experience in coordinating fieldwork and leading research projects in New Zealand, Australia, Chile, Canada, Germany, the Russian and Norwegian Arctic – and a soft spot for seabirds!

Ursula is a founding member of the Tawaki Trust and together with her partner Thomas Mattern she leads the Tawaki Project, a long-term study of the biology and marine ecology of Fiordland penguins/Tawaki and other crested penguins.

Tawaki Trust

Tawaki Project

Courses

• MARI 112 Marine Biology: The Living Ocean
• MARI 301 Marine Ecology and Ecosystems
• MARI 302 Biology and Behaviour of Marine Vertebrates

Current postgraduate students

• Lauren Tworkowski (La Trobe University, PhD – co-supervisor), “Thermoregulatory capabilities of Little Penguins in relation to human induced changes of their environment”
• Jeffrey Wayne White (University of Miami, PhD co-supervisor), “Foraging ecology and dive physiology of Fiordland penguins/Tawaki (Eudyptes pachyrhynchus) in New Zealand”
• Thor Elley (University of Otago, MSc co-supervisor), “Foraging ecology of yellow-eyed penguins (Megadyptes antipodes) on Rakiura/Stewart Island”
• Blake Hornblow (University of Otago, MSc co-supervisor), “Changing oceanographic conditions and the effect on foraging behaviour of Tawaki/Fiordland penguins (Eudyptes pachyrhynchus)”