Searching Among the Mountains

UNE Researchers are Investigating a State-threatened Animal

by Curry Stover

A UNE faculty and an Animal Behavior student, in partnership with the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, search for a state-threatened animal.

The rugged beauty of Northern New England is surprising to some, but undeniable to those who immerse themselves in spaces that refuse to conform to anything or anyone. 

The sunrise over the Bigelow Preserve mountains

Maya Galpern (Animal Behavior and Marine Biology, ’25) didn’t expect to be thrust into the harsh northern landscape when she arrived at UNE, but after securing a spot on a research project run by Zach Olson, Ph.D., associate professor of animal behavior, Galpern was ready to take everything she learned in the classroom out into the Maine wilderness.

Olson aims to identify the elusive northern bog lemming, a small burrowing rodent that has been listed as state-threatened since 1986. At dawn, they drive north to the Bigelow Preserve in Stratton, Maine, don waders, and trudge into a bog where the sun beats down and bugs bite. Olson and Galpern spend hours bent at the hip, searching for animal excrement invisible to the untrained eye.

The view of sugarloaf mountian across a lake
Maya Gilpren surveying the bog for the northern bog lemming

“Maya’s doing a great job — it’s hard work,” said Olson, who has been searching for the rodent since he first arrived in Maine in 2012. Traditional wildlife tracking methods have been unsuccessful in finding this creature, so Olson and Galpern are using newer methods of determining where the northern bog lemming resides. “We’re out there trying to work with an animal that we rarely detect and never see.”

It’s not glamorous. Some days, they go hours without finding a single sample. At the end of the day, they pack up and head straight to the lab for DNA extraction.

Maya Gilpren jotting down notes in a bog in northern Maine
The early morning landscape of the Bigelow Preserve and the mountians in the distance
The view of sugarloaf mountian from infront of a lake with vegitation infront of the view
In the bog, Zach Olson places a sample into a test tube that Maya Gilpren holds.
Maya Gilpren holding a sample file and backpack in the Bigelow Preserve

While the northern bog lemming may not have major economic or ecological value, its presence highlights the importance of biodiversity, Olson said. “And that’s enough for us to continue the search for the northern bog lemming.” 

“I didn’t expect to enjoy research so much,” Galpern said. “One day, we’ll know more about where the northern bog lemming lives, and that’s really cool to me.”

Learn More About the Search for the Northern Bog Lemmings

 

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