John Trott, my 7th grade teacher, introduced me to birding. Roxie Laybourne at the Smithsonian inspired me to become an ornithologist. I married Erika Jansic in 1971. We earned B.A.s in Biology from Antioch College. We recieved M.S. and Ph.D.s in Vertebrate Zoology from Louisiana State University. My dissertation explored habitat partitioning by antbirds in Ecuador. Erika studied the effects of intercontinental migration on the parasites of two sandpiper species. We also studied antbird trematodes. In Peru, Erika and I discovered a new bird species. We named "Nephelornis oneilli” for John P. O’Neill. A bird is also named after us, "Pipreola reifferi tallmanorum." We spent our professional lives teaching biology at Northern State University in South Dakota. I coauthored “Birds of South Dakota.” We retired to Olympia, Washington (by way of Northfield, Minnesota). Now we band and photograph birds and chase dragonflies.