Professional profile
I am a Professor of Biology and Environmental Science. I joined the faculty in 1970. During my tenure at St. Norbert College I have been awarded the Leonard Ledvina Award for Excellence in Teaching, the Donald B. King Distinguished Scholar Award and the Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland Community Service Award.

My main mission as a professor at St. Norbert College is to excite my students about their discipline. I believe it is very important that they understand the intellectual content of their discipline and the process by which this knowledge develops.

Promoting and sustaining creative ideas and inquiry in the cooperative pursuit of learning through an active faculty/students collaborative research is central to my mission as a professor. To provide my students with real research experiences is to instill in them abilities to formulate and test hypotheses. Research opportunities that excite them about their discipline are paramount to their transition from incipient to ardent scientists.

Specifically, I am an ecosystems ecologist that works on trophic cascades in lakes. I specialize on the predator-prey interactions of largemouth bass and their prey. Since 1980, I have received 24 grants from the National Science Foundation totaling nearly 1.4 million dollars in support of my research and teaching. With these grants, I have been able to support undergraduate research assistants each year since 1980. Currently, I am working on carbon sources to lakes measuring the importance of terrestrial organic carbon to aquatic food webs. The most recent grant (2008-2010) will support research examining regime shifts in lakes that result from food web manipulations.

Location: John Minahan Science Hall
Room: 305
Phone: (920) 403-3186
Fax: (920) 403-4033

Mailing address:
St. Norbert College
100 Grant Street
John Minahan Science Hall, 305
De Pere, WI 54115-2099

jim.hodgson@snc.edu

Academic credentials:
B.S., University of Wisconsin-Platteville
M.A., Western Michigan University
Ph.D., Montana State University

Courses taught:
BIOL 228 Ecology
BIOL 310 Tropical Biology
BIOL 338 Limnology
BIOL 389 Mammalogy
BIOL 428 Advanced Ecology
ENVS 300 Environmental Science

>> download Dr. Hodgson's résumé (PDF)

Recent Publications: (*indicates a student author)

Weidel, B.C, S.R. Carpenter, J.J. Cole, J.R. Hodgson, J.F. Kitchell, M.L. Pace and J.T. Solomon. 2008. Carbon sources supporting fish growth in a north temperate lake. Aquatic Sciences 70: 347-260.

Hodgson, J.R., C. J. Hodgson and J.Y.S. Hodgson*. 2008. Water mites in the diet of largemouth bass. Journal of Freshwater Ecology 23: 327-331.

Pace, M.L., S.R. Carpenter, J.J. Cole, J.J. Colloso, J.F. Kitchell, J.R. Hodgson, M.J Middelburg, N.D. Preston, J.T. Solomon, B.C. Weidel. 2007. Does terrestrial organic carbon subsidize the planktonic food web in a clear-water lake? Limnol. Ocean. 52: 2177-2189.

Hodgson, J.Y.S.*, J.R. Hodgson, G. Bunker and J. Miller. 2006. Predictive relationships between canopy overstory and the herbaceous understory in a northeastern Wisconsin forest. The Michigan Botanist. 44: 139-148.

Cole, J.J., S.R. Carpenter, M.L. Pace, J.F. Kitchell, J.R. Hodgson and M. Van de Bogert. 2006. Differential support of lake food webs by three types of terrestrial organic carbon. Ecology Letters. 9: 558-569.

Choudhury, A., E. M. Charipar*, P. Nelson, J.R. Hodgson, S. Bonar and R.A. Cole. 2006. Update on the distribution of the invasive Asian fish tapeworm, Bothriocephalus acheilognathi, in the U.S. and Canada. Comparative Parasitology. 73: 269-273.

Hodgson, J.R., J.Y.S. Hodgson* and E.M. Charipar.* 2006. Niche dynamics of largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides) in a north temperate lake. Mitt. Internat. Verein. Limnol. 29: 1635-1638.

Hodgson, J.R. and E. Hansen.* 2005. Terrestrial vertebrate prey in the diet of largemouth bass, Micropterus salmoides in a small north temperate lake. J. Freshwater Ecol. 20: 793-794.

Carpenter, S.R., J.J. Cole, M.L. Pace, M. Van de Bogert, D.L. Bade, D. Bastviken, C. Gille, J.R. Hodgson, J.F. Kitchell, and E.S. Kritzberg. 2005. Ecosystem subsidies: Terrestrial support of aquatic food webs from 13C addition to contrasting lakes. Ecology. 86: 2737-2750.

Pace, M.L., J.J. Cole, S.R. Carpenter, J.F. Kitchell, J.R. Hodgson, M. Van de Bogert, D.L. Bade, E.S. Kritzberg and D. Bastviken. 2004. Whole lake carbon-13 additions reveal terrestrial support of aquatic food web. Nature. 427: 240-243.