I retired as Forest Botanist for the Shasta-Trinity National Forest after thirty years, from 1989-2019, conducting rare plant surveys and managing the botany program for this 2.2 million acre federal property.

Before that, I served as the first Curator for The Berry Botanic Garden Seed Bank for Rare and Endangered Plants of the Pacific Northwest, in Portland, Oregon.

I have an old B.S. in Botany from Oregon State University and an M.S. in biology from Northern Arizona University,

The bulk of my observations and photos are in Calflora and Calphotos. I hop over to iNat to see what people are reporting from my neighborhood, to help with IDs as best I can, and to learn from others' experience. My voucher specimens are at UC/JEPS, CAS, DAV, Chico, and Humboldt.

My focus is on the Klamath Range flora of NW California, where I have collaborated on publishing new taxa and biogeographical/floristic info; older papers are under the name Julie Kierstead Nelson.
I recently coauthored the book, Wildflowers of California’s Klamath Mountains and contributed to the Plant Communities chapter of The Klamath Mountains, A Natural History; both published by Backcountry Press.

I'm a California certified consulting botanist (#0005) , and currently serve on the Calflora board of directors, as well as the CNPS rare plant program advisory committee.

I teach field workshops in NW California for the Jepson Herbarium workshop series, with co-teacher Heath Bartosh and others.

My interests are in floristics of the Klamath Ranges and to a lesser extent, the southern Cascades. Genera I know something about include Sedum, Adiantum, Neviusia, Silene, Vaccinium, Allium, Phacelia, Erythronium, Asarum.