Marilyn Knight

Marilyn works for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in the Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program in the Virginia Field Office in Gloucester, VA. The Partners Program is a voluntary program that provides free technical and financial assistance to landowners, managers, tribes, corporations, schools, and nonprofit organizations interested in improving wildlife habitat on their land. 

Since 1987, the national program has helped more than 60,000 landowners restore more than 7 million acres of forest, prairie, wetland, and stream habitat for wildlife. Marilyn focuses on habitat restoration and enhancement projects to help recover Virginia’s federally threatened, endangered, and at-risk species, many of which are aquatic, through stream restoration, bank stabilization, riparian buffers, and aquatic connectivity. She also assists with prescribed burns in longleaf pine habitat for the benefit of red-cockaded woodpeckers and offers ongoing GIS support to her office, as well.

Prior to coming to the Virginia office, Marilyn was an endangered species biologist in the South Florida Ecological Services Office for 14 years, where she worked on the recovery of eastern indigo snakes, sand skinks, and Florida bonneted bats, among other species. She also worked for the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission with the small game, waterfowl, and game land management programs and interned on the Red Wolf Recovery Project prior to coming on board with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

A native of North Carolina, Marilyn received a B.S. Degree in Biology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a M.S. Degree in Biology with an emphasis on Wildlife Biology from Murray State University in Kentucky. Her graduate school research focused on mammalian prey consumption by reintroduced red wolves in eastern North Carolina.