Dr. Catherine Badgley’s path to ecology and evolutionary biology has never followed a straight line, and that is precisely what makes her work so rich. A paleontologist, biogeographer, conservation thinker, teacher, farmer, and advocate for transforming the global food system, Dr. Badgley has built a career around one central question: what supports biodiversity, and how can we protect it?

Her fascination with the natural world began early, growing up along Colorado’s Front Range. She loved the Rocky Mountain landscape, but even as a child, she sensed that something was missing. Predator-control programs, expanding ranches, and growing towns had altered the ecosystems around her. By about age 10, she says, she was already aware of what we now call the biodiversity crisis. That awareness became a lifelong commitment: to learn not only how to protect biodiversity, but also “what supports biodiversity.”

In college, Dr. Badgley found her way into science through geology. Her introductory biology course focused almost entirely below the organism level (physiology, biochemistry, molecular biology), while geology took her outdoors within the first month. “If I’m going to be studying something for four years, that’s the way I want to go,” she remembers. She majored in geology while continuing to take biology courses, including ecology. Later, she earned a master’s degree in wildlife ecology, bringing her closer to conservation, and then pursued a Ph.D. in Biology through an opportunity to join a new fossil-collecting expedition in Pakistan.

That expedition became the foundation for decades of research on the Siwalik fossil record, a remarkable sequence documenting ancient ecosystems and mammal evolution in South Asia. Dr. Badgley began as a novice graduate student and, over time, became one of the project's leaders. It is a trajectory she often shares with students: “You may feel that you’re just at the beginning now, but you are going to become a leader over your career. Be prepared to step forward when you have those opportunities.”

Today, Dr. Badgley’s scientific interests span the fossil record and the modern world. She studies mammalian biogeography, asking why some places support high species richness while others do not, and she often works closely with geologists to understand the landscapes that support high and low levels of biodiversity. At the same time, her conservation concerns have increasingly led her toward another arena: food systems.

For Dr. Badgley, the link is direct. Modern agriculture is the major driver of biodiversity loss worldwide. In Michigan, she sees a microcosm of a global pattern: diverse small farms growing food for people, alongside large-scale monocultures producing crops largely for livestock feed or biofuel. With SEAS colleague Ivette Perfecto, she developed and taught a course on food systems that brought students to farms and farm-related organizations across the region. Those field trips highlighted alternative models of agriculture rooted in diversity, local knowledge, and ecological care.

Dr. Badgley also lives these questions daily on her 110-acre farm in western Washtenaw County. The land has been farmed organically for more than two decades and is protected by a conservation easement. About 65% is natural habitat, with additional areas for pasture, farmland, gardens, a greenhouse, an orchard, beehives, and livestock. There, she and her farm manager grow much of their own food, using compost, manure, crop rotation, and a wide diversity of crops, including heirloom varieties developed by Indigenous peoples of North America. One section of the garden is devoted to the “Three Sisters”: corn, beans, and squash grown together, following an agricultural tradition developed in Mexico thousands of years ago.

Living on the farm has reshaped how Dr. Badgley teaches. It has taught her the labor and skill required to grow food and deepened her appreciation for farmers. It has also reinforced a core principle: coexistence with native biodiversity. When foxes kill chickens, hawks take pigeons, or deer browse the garden, the response is not eradication. “They were here before we were,” she says. Instead, the farm experiments with better fencing, guardian strategies, and ways of living alongside wildlife. “We are deliberately learning how to live with predators rather than, for example, poison them, or shoot them, or trap them,” she explains.

Dr. Badgley’s work also embraces the intersection of science, art, and public communication. She participated in the Bearded Lady Project: Changing the Face of Women in Science, a portrait, book, and film project addressing gender bias in paleontology. Her recent book on the Siwalik fossil record included commissioned paleoart. One illustration even became a custom jigsaw puzzle! Next, she plans to write a book for general audiences titled Lessons from Deep Time, based on a first-year seminar she teaches in the Residential College.

Looking ahead, Dr. Badgley believes EEB’s work will become more urgent as the biodiversity crisis deepens. The challenge, she says, is not only to keep doing excellent research, but to speak beyond academia: to students, neighbors, readers, farmers, and anyone willing to listen. “We need to get the word out,” she says, about biodiversity, food, deep time, and the futures still possible.

Watch Dr. Badgley's TEDx talk here. 

Learn more about the Bearded Lady Project here.