In this Issue
From the Directors | Events | Stories | Partner Spotlight | News & Updates
From the Directors
Greetings! We are taking a break from a busy fieldwork season to update you on what has also been a very busy spring and summer for the MSP LTER.
In May, we submitted our Renewal proposal to our primary funder, the National Science Foundation (NSF). We took that time to reflect on the last five years of research outcomes and discuss new paths of inquiry for urban ecological science in the Twin Cities Metro Area. Our focus on renewal meant that we could not hold our typical Summer Symposium for research partners and colleagues. Instead, our research team leads recorded ten-minute Overview Talks with their annual updates from the past year, as well as plans for future work.
As part of looking ahead, we are excited to announce plans for the new Center for Urban Ecosystems at the University of Minnesota. The center will house much of our MSP LTER research and enable us to grow our capacity for community collaboration, broaden our research scope, and attract new funding opportunities. We look forward to formally launching the Center later this year.
Summer has proven to be as busy as the spring. In addition to their typical fieldwork, Co-Director Emilie Snell-Rood and her lab have been tabling at numerous community events, talking about urban pollinators and contaminants with Twin Cities residents. You can see a list of these and other events on our website so you can join them with your questions.
If it’s too hot to talk about our research outdoors, there are ways to both escape the heat and engage with the MSP LTER this summer. Solution Studio, the Bell Museum’s annual summer makerspace, partnered with MSP LTER researchers for the fourth consecutive year to create interactive exhibits that invite museum visitors to step into the role of urban ecologists. In this issue, Information Manager Mary Marek-Spartz uses her “Data Stream” feature to provide insights into how MSP LTER research informs the makerspace activities. You can visit Solution Studio now through August 30 at the Bell Museum.
One of the researchers featured in this year’s Solution Studio is also an author highlighted in this issue of City Buzz—PhD candidate Katie Polik. In her piece, Katie dives into her research assessing the causes and potential solutions to water clarity issues in lakes across the Twin Cities Metro Area. Katie is joined by research scientist and fellow Surface Waters Research Team member, Becky Forgrave, who continues the issue’s water theme. Becky uses her article to discuss a collaborative project between the MSP LTER, University of Minnesota Water Resources Center, and University of St. Thomas that uses chatbots to gauge residents’ perceptions of Metro Area lakes and compares those results to other, quantitative water quality measurements.
Freshwater ecosystems play a central role in this issue’s “Partner Spotlight,” as well. Our new Community-Engaged Research Coordinator, Jessie Merriam, joined local artist Kim Boustead for a conversation on their experiences with the MSP LTER as artists-in-residence from 2023 to 2025, including a discussion of their 2025 Ramble on Salt that they planned with the Surface Waters Team. We hope you take time to reflect as they did on the importance of the mindful, reciprocal co-production of knowledge and the indelible connection between art, ecology, and community.
Until next time, we hope you are staying cool and connected out there!
- Sarah Hobbie, Co-Director & Lead Principal Investigator, and Emilie Snell-Rood, Co-Director
Featured Events
Bell Museum Solution Studio | Now through August 30
The Bell Museum's summer makerspace is back this year, featuring activities and challenges inspired by the work of MSP LTER researchers. In Solution Studio, you can follow your curiosity and let your creativity loose. Awaken your inner scientist by playing the Plant Game, plotting pollinators on a Metro Area map, building a pond sampling tool, and more!
Visit the exhibit now through August 30.
The Urban Ecosystem: Music Inspired by the Nature of Cities | October 8 and 11
Join us at the Bell Museum on October 8 at 6pm or October 11 at 4:30pm for a unique concert experience that blends the worlds of music, nature, art, and research! Begin the evening with conversations and hands-on activities with MSP LTER researchers. Then hear the new composition The Urban Ecosystem: Music Inspired by the Nature of Cities—a collaboration between Seattle-based composer Jessi Harvey, the Twin City’s own 10th Wave Chamber Music Collective, and the MSP LTER. Through live music and accompanying visuals, explore how plants, animals, and humans interact with each other in the lakes, forests, and grasslands that make up our local, urban ecosystem.
Information for Concert Performances
- October 8 Event Page | Doors open at 6pm, concert starts at 7pm
- October 11 Event Page | Doors open at 4:30pm, concert starts at 5:30pm
- Get Tickets
The Data Stream & Other Featured Stories
The Data Stream: Plotting Pollinators at the Bell Museum
By Mary Marek-Spartz, MSP LTER Information Manager and GIS Analyst
The "Plot A Pollinator" activity at the Bell Museum's 2026 Solution Studio makerspace introduces kids to GIS using real bumble bee distribution data. Designed for lower elementary students, the activity teaches foundational map-reading skills like reading coordinate planes, legends, and heat maps, while sneaking in more complex geospatial concepts like hexagonal tiling and map distortion. It's a hands-on entry point into spatial thinking, built around a question every good scientist asks: what patterns can we find in the world around us?
Seeking Clarity on Lake Restoration
By Katie Polik, PhD Candidate in the University of Minnesota Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior, and the MSP LTER Surface Waters Team
What does it take to bring a lake back from toxic algal blooms? MSP LTER PhD candidate Katie Polik breaks down the legacy phosphorus problem facing Twin Cities lakes, and dives into the research-backed treatments helping reverse it—from alum treatments to carp removal.
What Do We See When We Look at a Lake? Understanding Visitor Perceptions of Lake Water Quality
By Becky Forgrave, Research Scientist at the University of Minnesota Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior, and the MSP LTER Surface Waters Team
Do lake visitors' perceptions of water quality match what the data actually shows? A multi-year study across Twin Cities lakes uses on-site chatbot surveys to find out, comparing what people perceive to other, quantitative water quality measurements. Learn about the study's initial findings and future plans in this piece by Becky Forgrave, a research scientist working on the project.
Partner Spotlight
Partner Spotlight: Conversational Reflections on Rambles and Art-Science Engagements
A conversation with former MSP LTER artists-in-residence Jessie Merriam, now the MSP LTER Community-Engaged Research Coordinator, and Kimberly Boustead, local artist in the Twin Cities
The MSP LTER's Community Engagement Assessment team studies how inclusive research shapes both scientists and the communities where they do their work. From 2023 to 2025, artists-in-residence Kim Boustead and Jessie Merriam helped bring that work to life, fostering reciprocal relationships between researchers and the Twin Cities community through art and facilitated conversations. In this interview, Kim and Jessie reflect on their work with the MSP LTER over the past two years, the pitfalls and triumphs of community-engaged research, and look to what’s ahead.
News & Updates
2026 Research Overview Talks
Learn what our researchers have been up to over the past year by viewing the 2026 Overview Talk videos from our research teams! These were recorded via Zoom to keep partners and other colleagues informed of recent activities, initial project results, and plans for future work. If you have any issues accessing these, please email Meredith at [email protected].
Meet Jessie Merriam, Our New Community-Engaged Research Coordinator
This past spring, former MSP LTER artist-in-residence, Jessie Merriam, joined the MSP LTER as its Community-Engaged Research Coordinator! The role will help MSP LTER researchers build deeper, more reciprocal partnerships with the communities where they work. Connect with Jessie by email at [email protected] and read her recent blog post about vision for the position.
2026 LTER Site Exchanges
The MSP LTER is playing an active role in the 2026 LTER Site Exchanges, both hosting visiting scholars and sending its own researchers to other sites. MSP LTER PhD student Cameron Clay will travel to Puerto Rico's Luquillo (LUG) LTER to learn how to use specialized equipment that tracks plant roots underground. Meanwhile, Brittany Washington, a PhD student from Baltimore Ecosystem Study, will visit the Twin Cities to compare how researchers study groundwater in two very different environments. And Dr. Nicholas Medina from the Morton Arboretum will work with MSP LTER researchers here to collect soil samples for genetic analysis, helping to identify the microorganisms living in urban forest soils.
New Publications & Products
Over the past year, our site has published new articles and reports, and archived new datasets. These products encompass research on topics such as nature-based solutions in urban environments, implications for managing urban trees in the context of stormwater regulation, treatment strategies to improve nutrient pollution in Twin Cities lakes, and more. You can find the library of our published written publications and our datasets on our website. While all published datasets are publicly available, some publications are behind a paywall for several months before becoming available to all. If you have trouble accessing a product, email Meredith Keller at [email protected].
Some Notable Achievements Among Our Researchers, Spring-Summer 2026
- Governance Team Co-Lead Kristen Nelson retired from her position as a Professor in the University of Minnesota Department of Forest Resources, where she served for over 25 years. Congratulations, Kristen!
- The Bell Museum honored two MSP LTER students with its annual Graduate Awards and Fellowships: PhD Student Leta Landucci received the Natural History Award and PhD student Simone Maddox received a Natural History Fellowship.
- MSP LTER Affiliate Researchers Alicia Coleman and Nfamara Dampha were honored with 2026 CFANS Borealis Awards, Coleman with the Exemplary Faculty Award and Dampha with the Community Builder Award.
- Mae Davenport (Community Engagement Assessment Team Co-Lead) released the guidebook ANISHINAABE MANOOMIN GENAWENIMAAJIG (Those Who Watch Over the Wild Rice): A Guidebook for Healing Relationships with Manoomin, the culmination of a multi-year Tribal-University collaborative project that brought together knowledge holders to explore and educate others on healing relationships with Manoomin.
MSP LTER Research & Researchers in the News, Spring-Summer 2026
- Last spring, the University of Minnesota published a feature story about the MSP LTER site and the benefits of the urban ecological research it provides.
- WCCO News interviewed Bonnie Keeler and other Surface Waters Team researchers about our chatbot project that surveys lake visitors across the Twin Cities to understand how they perceive water quality in real time.
- Co-Director Emilie Snell-Rood authored a piece for Northern Gardener magazine that teaches readers how to look for certain butterfly behaviors in their own gardens.
- The University of Minnesota sat down with Gretchen Hansen from the Surface Waters Team to discuss her research on protecting coldwater fish habitat in the face of stressors like invasive species, climate change, and heavy metal pollution.
- The Urban Contaminants Team's research on the risks of roadside microplastic pollution was highlighted in an article from the University of Minnesota Center for Transportation Studies.
- Sierra Magazine covered the Adaptive Silviculture for Climate Change (ASCC) Network earlier this year, as did the University of Minnesota, both spotlighting this central focus of the MSP LTER Urban Forests Team. ASCC researchers also published a paper discussing the history of the program and how it can be used as a model for forest management across ecosystems in a time of climate change.
- CBS News covered research by Rebecca Walker (Nature & Wealth Team), Lea Pollack (Urban Contaminants Team), and others that examine how crowd-control agents may be affecting soil and plants in local urban gardens.
- PhD Student Leta Landucci’s City Buzz article using biochar for weed suppression and contaminant mitigation was featured in a December 2025 issue of District 10 Como Community Council's weekly newsletter.
- Late last year, an article covered the 15-year history of MSP LTER's REU partner The Sustainable Land and Water Resources Research Experience for Undergraduates (SLAWR REU), a research program that weaves together Indigenous and Western knowledge to advance scientific understanding and support management decisions made by tribal governments.
About Us
The Minneapolis-St. Paul Metropolitan Area (MSP) Long-Term Ecological Research Program (LTER) brings together over 100 researchers, students, artists, and community organizers from the University of Minnesota, University of St. Thomas, USDA Forest Service, and other local to national institutions to study how urban stressors affect the ecological structure and functioning of urban nature, including pollinators, urban forests, urban watersheds, and lakes and streams. Guided by the practice of community-engaged research, the MSP LTER partners with dozens of community and agency/government partners throughout the Twin Cities Metro Area to conduct its work.
Who: 100+ researchers, educators, artists, and community organizers from the University of Minnesota, University of St. Thomas, USDA Forest Service, and other local institutions.
What: Long-term research on ecological relationships between humans and nature in cities.
How: A six-year, $7.1 million, renewable grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to establish a new site as part of the US LTER Network. The grant began in March 2021 and primarily supports postdocs, students, and staff in research, education, and engagement efforts.
Where: Seven-County Twin Cities Metropolitan Area in the State of Minnesota, or Mni Sota Makoce in Dakota. What we now call the Twin Cities Metropolitan Area are the traditional, historical, and contemporary lands of the Dakota People.
To learn more, visit our website at mspurbanlter.umn.edu, or contact Sarah Hobbie (Lead PI & Co-Director) at [email protected], Emilie Snell-Rood (Co-Director) at [email protected], or Meredith Keller (Program Manager) at [email protected].