Elsa Godtfredsen
Research Interests
I study how climate change is reshaping the reproductive landscape for subalpine plants. Specifically, I am interested in how changes in snowmelt timing and summer precipitation can alter plant pollinator interactions and plant reproductive success.
I conduct my field work to explore these questions at Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory (RMBL) in Gothic, Colorado.
You can read about some of my current projects and findings here.
Past Research Experiences
At Colorado College, I conducted an undergraduate thesis analyzing how floral color can indicate higher UV resistance in a montane herb Ipomopsis aggregata.
At the Department of Agriculture I worked on improving the effectiveness of the Conservation Reserve Program, which creates restored farmlands with pollinator-attractive plant species.
At the Mountain Area Land Trust I contributed to a 70-year monitoring project that has been tracking the phenology of alpine plant species and the visitation of bumble bees as climate change continues to become more severe.