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Lance Arvidson is a community ecologist and the founder and president of Common Ground Ecology. He has built the company to prioritize the design and implementation of practical conservation and management efforts for native ecosystems and wildlife populations. By focusing on adaptive approaches that meet the needs of private landowners and enhance the capabilities of government agencies, he has helped protect hundreds of thousands of acres of private land across Florida while documenting numerous new imperiled species occurrences, including entire unknown subpopulations, on private lands. He is an FWC Authorized Gopher Tortoise Agent and has certified hundreds of agents while teaching the Gopher Tortoise Authorized Agent training course for over 15 years. He holds a Master of Science degree in Biology from the University of South Florida and a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Kansas.
Lance Arvidson
President
Catie Welch is a senior ecologist specializing in project management and development, ecological surveys, land use assessments, and GIS analysis. Catie grew up in Florida and received a Bachelor’s degree in Biology from Florida Atlantic University and her Master’s degree in Forest Resources with a focus on Wildlife Sciences at the University of Georgia. Her master’s thesis focused on white ibises’ spatial use of urban parks in South Florida and their role in pathogen transmission across the natural-urban land cover gradient. Her post-graduation work involved working alongside the USDA on a study of Newcastle Disease Virus (NDV) across Kenya for three years where she planned, organized, and executed field sampling visits, laboratory and data analysis, and report writing. Most recently, she ran the natural resource management program at the 58,000-acre Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park. This program included imperiled species management, invasive plant species management, and assisting with grant development for the fire management program.
Catie Welch
Director
Fabiola “Fabby” Baeza-Tarin is a conservation ecologist specializing in the acquisition of conservation lands and conservation of rare and imperiled species. Fabby was born and raised in the border town of Ojinaga, Chihuahua, Mexico at her family’s cattle ranch. She received her Bachelor’s degree in Biology and Master’s degree in Range and Wildlife Management from Sul Ross State University in Alpine, Texas. For her master’s thesis, she worked under Borderlands Research Institute to investigate overwinter habitat requirements of two grassland bird specialists that have experienced steep population declines, Baird’s Sparrow and Grasshopper Sparrow on a ranch in Marfa, Texas. Upon graduation, she moved to Florida where she worked as a Research Assistant in the Avian Ecology Program at Archbold Biological Station overseeing a population of the critically endangered Florida Grasshopper Sparrow at the DeLuca Preserve before joining Common Ground Ecology. She now leads conservation projects and remains a passionate advocate for working lands that support wildlife.
Fabby Baeza-Tarin
Director of Avian Ecology
Cara Franceschini is a wildlife biologist specializing in gopher tortoise (Gopherus polyphemus) conservation, relocation, and habitat management. Originally from New Jersey, Cara developed a passion for wildlife and the outdoors at an early age, which led her to pursue a career in conservation. She earned her Bachelor of Science and Master of Science degrees in Fisheries, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology at North Carolina State University. For her master's thesis, she worked with American black bears (Ursus americanus) in Asheville, North Carolina. Her goal was to determine how bear "hibernation" is determined by temperature and precipitation, and to extrapolate the results to predict future climate change impacts on denning chronology. Before joining CGE, Cara served as a Wildlife Assistance Biologist and Gopher Tortoise Resource Biologist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. She gained experience handling human-wildlife interactions and educating the public about Florida's wildlife, and worked closely with private landowners to preserve gopher tortoises and ensure compliance with state regulations at gopher tortoise recipient sites. At CGE, she continues to support the conservation of Florida's imperiled wildlife, focusing primarily on gopher tortoises through science based management, permitting, and professional training.
Cara Franceschini
Senior Ecologist and Gopher Tortoise Lead
Our Team
We work throughout Florida to locate endangered species and their habitats within a vast 65,000 square mile area of diverse land cover. We then collaborate with landowners to conserve and manage their properties in support of these species. We help landowners and government agencies develop and implement ecological management strategies that balance the needs of wildlife and natural landscapes with land use demands. Our approach utilizes practical, science-based tools to survey and manage land, protecting Florida's landscapes, native wildlife, and the communities that rely on these ecosystems.