Dave (he/him) is a conservation ecologist and regenerative farmer. He grew up alongside the headwaters of the Sugar River in Southwest Wisconsin. Within the farmscape of the surrounding hills, he cultivated an identity tied to working lands and nature. Following college at University of Wisconsin - Madison, he began a long affair with the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem where he counted birds, guided students, and studied an endangered high country pine tree (M.S. Montana State University). After graduate school, Dave worked with ranchers and farmers to facilitate nature-based opportunities within their operations as the Director of a large Conservation District. More recently, he returned home to be closer to family and to help catalyze the growing regenerative movement.
Since that return, he has been restoring the family farm (Sugar Valley Farm near Mt. Horeb, WI) to pasture, prairie, and savanna in preparation for grazing livestock and growing fruits and nuts. Dave also serves as the Board Vice President for the Upper Sugar River Watershed Association and is a member of the Farmers for the Upper Sugar River.
When not kicking the dirt, he enjoys time skiing, running, and fishing his natal lands and waters, and traveling to larger, intact wildlands with his partner to help inform the Wild Grid vision.