Dana Karelus
Dana Karelus is the State Mammal Specialist for Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. In this role, she coordinates research, conservation, and management for the nongame mammals in Texas.
She completed her Ph.D. at the University of Florida. Her dissertation was on Florida black bear space use, movement patterns, and habitat selection in an area that had been recently recolonized by bears. Following that, she worked as a post doctoral researcher at Borderlands Research Institute in Alpine, Texas where she focused on mountain lion and kit fox research and aided with research on a variety of other mammals in the region. Then lastly before starting her job with TPWD, she worked as a research scientist for Texas A&M Natural Resources Institute in College Station, TX and performed monitoring on Department of Defense lands for species of greatest conservation need and threatened and endangered species, including prairie dogs, burrowing owls, and other birds.