Clara Hoffman

Home Range Program Coordinator

Twisp, WA

August 28, 2024

Clara Hoffman showed up to our camp wearing a pair of chic clogs and double-knee jeans. A member of the Westie class of 2018, Clara now lives in the Methow Valley working as the Project Coordinator for Home Range Wildlife Research.

During the winter she spends most of her week on snowmobiles categorizing lynx habitat, setting and monitoring traps. During the summer months, she spearheads Home Range’s efforts to improve human-Black Bear relationships in the valley through education and community outreach regarding conflict mitigation strategies. An aspect of her lynx work that I found especially compelling was her investigation into how climate change impacts predator-prey dynamics as low snowpack seasons negate the lynx’s evolutionary advantage on snow.

Clara hails from Vermont and was raised in a culture of farming and animal husbandry; though these are not her vocation, she shared that these passions are still close to her heart. She lives in a yurt on a small farm in Winthrop that has “the best carrots I have ever had”. This year, she grew her rows on the property, heirloom tomatoes (which didn’t do so well), green beans, and one singular melon!

by Irving Baldwin