April 5, 2011

Botany publication prints two articles by DWU’s Tatina

Dr. Robert Tatina

MITCHELL — Dr. Robert Tatina, professor emeritus at Dakota Wesleyan, has recently seen two works published.

Both articles were published in the October-December 2010 issue of The Michigan Botanist. “Tree Composition and Demography of a Second Growth Hardwood Forest in Verrien County, Michigan,” was researched and published in hopes to help save a forest from logging, Tatina said.

The second article “Noteworthy Collections, Michigan, Aira caryophyllea L.” was written with Anton Reznicek, curator of the herbarium at the University of Michigan, and describes the first reported occurrence in Michigan of a Silver Hair Grass, which Tatina found in the forest discussed in the first paper.

Tatina served as a leading faculty member at DWU from 1975 to 2007. He is currently the editor of the Proceedings of the South Dakota Academy of Science and the author of some 25 notes and articles about prairie ecology, South Dakota flora and science teaching. His current research interests focus on forest plant community structure and composition. A discussion with him was published in the summer 2007 issue of Wesleyan Today, the DWU alumni magazine.