***Registration info below***
Please
join us on June 5 - 9, 2023 in Rohnert Park (Sonoma County), CA for the 68th
Western International Forest Disease Work Conference (WIFDWC)
! The
following email includes previously shared information in addition to the newly
updated registration website and highlighted reminders about deadlines (the
first deadline is April 6th for the hotel)! As always, you can also visit
www.wifdwc.org
for more information.
Registration
Register
online by April 17th
at:
https://www.tickettailor.com/events/westerninternationalforestdiseaseworkconferencewifdwc
$325 regular registration*
$125 student registration*
$125 retiree registration*
$40 guest on field trip (transportation and food on Wednesday)
Note:
Registration will be open until May 15th, but
will
include a late fee of $75 after April 17th.
*
Includes Wednesday’s field trip (transportation and food). As per usual, this
does not include Monday’s optional field trip, committee meeting breakfasts or
lunches, dinners on your own, or the banquet meal. These additional costs will
be charged when registering.
Location
Sonoma
County encompasses both sea (the wet coastal strip) and sun (the drier, hotter,
higher Mayacamas Mountains). The county features a wide variety of vegetation
types, from coastal pines, redwoods, and Douglas-fir-tanoak forests to the oak
woodlands and grasslands of the interior–and of course this entails a
corresponding array of both native and non-native forest pathogens, including Phytophthora ramorum
(cause of sudden oak death) , P. cinnamomi
, Fusarium circinatum
(the
cause of pine pitch canker), Viscum album
(European mistletoe), and
many, many more.
Lodging & Conference Location (same venue!)
DoubleTree
by Hilton Sonoma
1
Doubletree, Rohnert Park, CA 94928
(707)
584-5466
**Reserve your rooms before
April 6th
and ask for the ‘WIFDWC hotel block’ to get the Federal
Government Rate ($157/night) **
Travel Options
Airports
serving Sonoma County include the following:
- San Francisco
International Airport (SFO), 62 miles south of the conference location,
hosts all major American and many international airlines.
- Oakland
International Airport (OAK),
is also 62 miles south of the conference
location–just on the other side of the bay.
- The Charles M.
Schulz Sonoma County Airport (STS) is located 14 miles north of the
conference location.
- The San Francisco
Airport Express offers shuttles from the conference location to each of
the above airports–every hour for SFO and STS, every two hours for OAK.
Find the schedule here.
- For those that
wish to rent a car, ride-share from the airport can be coordinated using
the form provided when you register.
- Other potential
airports that could be convenient for arriving visitors include the San
Jose Mineta
International Airport (SJC), 93
miles south, and the Sacramento International Airport (SMF), 96 miles to
the east.
Additionally,
public train transportation serves the San Francisco area through Bay Area
Rapid Transit (
BART
) and the North Bay via
Sonoma-Marin
Area Rail Transit
. The SMART Train station is located at 900 Enterprise Drive in
Rohnert Park, 2.2 miles away from the Doubletree conference location. Other
public transportation options in Rohnert Park (bus service) are presented
by
Sonoma
County Transit
.
USFS Registration Specifics
- WIFDWC is listed
on the annual Conference Plan.
- USFS employees
should express interest in attending to Supervisors and ROs.
- Sarah Navarro ( sarah.navarro@usda.gov
)
has collected USFS employee information for the Attendance Cost
Spreadsheet; if your role has changed from attendee to presenter
please go into the Box File and change your role.
Agenda (still evolving)
- Monday, June 5:
Afternoon pre-meeting hike/field trip, registration, and welcome social.
- Tuesday, June 6:
Registration, graduate student Flash-n-Dash, three panels, two committee
meetings, and an evening poster session / ice cream social / silent
auction.
- Wednesday, June 7:
All-day field trip, one committee meeting, and an evening banquet with the
Outstanding Achievement Award and presentations from previous recipients.
- Thursday, June 8:
Three committees, three panels, and special paper sessions.
- Friday, June 9:
One committee, one panel, business meeting, and adjourn by 11:30 am.
Papers (contributed and special)
- Note : “
Contributed papers
” are those panel
organizers invite speakers to present. “ Special papers
” are those
given by people requesting a non-panel time slot.
- Please contact
Brennan Ferguson ( brennan.ferguson@usda.gov
) if you
would like to present a special paper
on a forest pathology subject
matter. Send a title and brief description of your proposed paper by March 24th
.
- If more requests
are received than we have time for, we will review the date of receipt and
titles, in order to
select papers for
presentation. Authors will be notified before closing of early
registration.
- As an alternative,
remember that brief presentations (as arranged with the committee chair)
may be given during committee meetings.
Posters
- You are invited to
submit a title and a brief description for the poster session. Posters may
address any forest pathology-related topic.
- Email abstracts to
Patrick Bennett ( patrick.bennett@usda.gov
) by Friday May 5th
to reserve a space for
your poster.
Graduate Student Introductions (“Flash-n-Dash”)
- All graduate
student attendees are asked to give a brief introduction (five minutes) of
you and your research program.
- Students should
contact Brad Lalande
( bradley.lalande@usda.gov
)
by May 5th
with
their name, university, and project title.
- Graduate students
are also encouraged to present more details on their work in either the
poster session (see below) or as a paper (see above).
Committee Meetings
The
following committees are scheduled to meet. Please contact the moderator by May 5 th
if
you wish to have time on the
agenda for a short presentation.
Silent Auction
The
WIFDWC silent auction raises $1,000+ per year to support student travel. Betsy
Goodrich (
anne.goodrich@usda.gov
) will be helping organize
the auction. Start thinking about what you can donate and bring to the meeting
for the auction. Ideas include:
handmade items, books,
rare journal articles, photos, jewelry, tree and fungi swag, or WIFDWC swag
from years past!
Outstanding Achievement Award
- Congratulations to
Ned Klopfenstein (2020), Phil Cannon (2020), and Greg Filip (2019) for
their recent Outstanding Achievement Awards!
- Nominations for
the 2023 WIFDWC Outstanding Achievement Award are now open and will remain
open until March 24th
.
See the Call for Nominations webpage
for
details.
- Questions should
be directed to Jane Stewart ( jane.stewart@colostate.edu
).
Student Travel Awards
- Travel awards are
available for qualified graduate students to subsidize travel-related
expenses. Interested graduate students should visit the ‘Graduate Student
Travel Award’ web page at www.wifdwc.org
for more information
and the application form.
- The application
deadline is March 24th
.
- All graduate
students that receive this award are expected to participate in the
Graduate Student Introduction (Flash-n-Dash) and are also encouraged to
present an oral or poster presentation.
- Questions should
be directed to Betsy Goodrich ( anne.goodrich@usda.gov
).
Pre-meeting Field Trip
(Monday afternoon)
- Arriving over the
weekend or Monday morning? Join us for a hike (forest pathogens noted as
encountered) on Monday from 1 pm to 5 pm (exact times may change).
- Details on
location, conditions (difficulty), and length will be forthcoming.
- There is no
registration fee, so:
- Participants will need to bring their own food and
water.
- Carpooling from the DoubleTree will be required.
- If interested,
please contact Chris Lee ( christopher.lee@fire.ca.gov
).
Field Trip (Wednesday)
- Join us on
Wednesday from 9 am to 5 pm for a field tour focusing on forest pathology
issues at a handful of local state parks.
- Topics of interest
will include:
Phytophthora ramorum
, P. cinnamomi
,
Mediterranean oak borer, Viscum
album
, pitch canker, Armillaria
spp., Phaeolus
schweinitzii
, Onnia
spp., a variety of stem decay fungi, and other native pests.
- Transportation and
lunch for this field trip is included in your registration costs.
- Transportation
will be via coach, not school buses, and bathroom stops are planned!
WIFDWC Planning Committee Contacts
- Chairperson, Jane
Stewart ( jane.stewart@colostate.edu
,
970-491-8770)
- Program Chair,
Brennan Ferguson ( brennan.ferguson@usda.gov
,
509-885-6163)
- Treasurer, Holly
Kearns ( holly.kearns@usda.gov
,
503-668-1475)
- Secretary, Rachel
Brooks ( rachel.brooks@dnr.wa.gov
,
360-522-2030)
- Local
Arrangements: Chris Lee ( christopher.lee@fire.ca.gov
,
916-203-0856) & Tom Smith ( tom.smith@fire.ca.gov
, 916-599-6882)