Lars Rudstam
Director, Cornell Biological Field Station and Professor, Natural Resources and the Environment

Lars Rudstam is a professor in fisheries and aquatic sciences in the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment, Cornell University and the director of the Cornell Biological Field Station. He is an immigrant from Sweden with a background in engineering, zoology, limnology and marine biology and work with scientist across the globe on various issues in aquatic ecology and fisheries. Current larger projects are in the Laurentian Great Lakes working with lower trophic level dynamics, and Oneida Lake with fisheries and ecosystem effects of invasive species.
Education
- University of Wisconsin-Madison, Zoology, B.Sc., 1978
- University of Wisconsin-Madison, Limnology, M. Sc., 1983
- University of Stockholm, Sweden, Marine Biology, Ph.D., 1988
- University of Wisconsin-Madison, Limnology, Postdoc, 1989-1992
Recent Research
Rudstam’s research is at the interface between basic and applied science with special interest in food web dynamics and the interactions between fisheries management and ecosystem processes. He is also interested in spatial and temporal patterns of animal distributions and what causes those patterns, partly because heterogeneity in the different organisms’ response to space and time affect food webs and ecosystem dynamics. Currently, he works with lower trophic levels and fisheries across the Great Lakes, from Lake Superior to Lake Ontario, with long term analysis of ecosystem processes in Oneida Lake, and with comparative analyses of aquatic ecosystems across the globe. He teaches fish ecology and work with managers, mostly in New York and Canada, as part of technical committees.
Selected Publications
- Bunnell, DB, SA Ludsin, RL Knight, LG Rudstam, CE Williamson, TO Höök, PD Collingsworth, BM Lesht, RP Barbiero, AE Scofield, ES Rutherford, L Gaynor, HA Vanderploeg, MA Koops. 2021. Consequences of changing water clarity on the fish and fisheries of the Laurentian Great Lakes. . Can J. Fish. Aquat. Sci. In press
- Scofield, AE, JM Watkins, E Osantowski. LG Rudstam, 2020. Deep chlorophyll maxima across a productivity gradient: A case study in the Laurentian Great Lakes. Limnol. Oceanogr. 64:2460-2484
- Stockwell, JD., BP O'Malley, S Hansson, RJ Chapina, LG Rudstam, BC Weidel. 2020. Benthic habitat is an integral part of Mysis ecology. Freshw. Biol. 65:1997–2009.
- Scofield, AE, JM Watkins, LG Rudstam. 2020. Heterogeneity in zooplankton distributions and diel vertical migrations: Application of a laser optical plankton counter in offshore Lake Michigan. J. Great Lakes Res. 46:780-797
- Rudstam, LG, CJ Gandino. 2020. Zebra or quagga mussel dominance depends on trade-offs between growth and defense-Field support from Onondaga Lake, NY. PLoS One 15:e0235387
- Schaffner, LL, Govaert, L De Meester, SP Ellner, E Fairchild, BE Miner, LG Rudstam, P Spaak, NG Hairston Jr. 2019. Consumer-resource dynamics is an eco-evolutionary process in a natural plankton community. Nature Ecology & Evolution 3:1251-1258
- Barbiero, R P, L G Rudstam, J M Watkins, and B Lesht. 2019. A cross-lake comparison of crustacean zooplankton communities in the Great Lakes 1997-2016. J. Great Lakes Res. 45:672-690
- Hetherington, AL, LG Rudstam, RL Schneider, KT Holeck, CW Hotaling, JE Cooper, and JR Jackson. 2019. Invader invaded: population dynamics of zebra mussels (Dreissena polymorpha) and quagga mussels (Dreissena rostriformis bugensis) in polymictic Oneida Lake, NY, USA (1992-2013). Biological Invasions 21:1529-1544
- Macura, B, P Byström, L Airoldi, B K Eriksson, L Rudstam, and J Støttrup. 2019. Impact of structural habitat modifications in coastal temperate systems on fish recruitment: a systematic review. Environmental Evidence 8:14
Courses Taught
- NTRES 3110 (Lec) and 3111 (Lab): Fish Ecology, Conservation and Management
Contact Information
Cornell Biological Field Station, Bridgeport, NY 13030
211 Fernow Hall
Ithaca, NY 14853
lgr1 [at] cornell.edu
Lars in the news

News
Lars Rudstam and Taylor Brown recently participated in the 2023 Great Lakes Cisco and Lake Whitefish Early Life History Workshop, jointly organized by the U.S. Geological Survey and the Great Lakes Fishery Commission . The workshop was held from...
- Biological Field Station
- Natural Resources
- Fish

News
Acoustic surveys are a critical tool for studying fish populations and can provide fisheries-independent data on spatially extensive fish populations. However, prior work has identified fish avoidance of survey ships, presumably in response to...
- Biological Field Station
- Natural Resources and the Environment
- Natural Resources