Any questions about the meeting should be directed to Darren Miller.

• Registration includes: dinner on Feb. 23; breakfast and lunch on Feb. 24; Welcoming Social.
• Registration fee is $35 for students and $50 for others.
• Deadline for registration by mail is February 3, 2012.
• Late registration fees (after February 3) are $60 for students and $85 for others.

To register:

• Mail registration form and fee to Ray Iglay, ATTN: SBDN Registration, P.O. Box 2288, Mississippi State, MS 39762.
• Submit fees as a check or money order made out to SBDN or pay online.
• When paying online,e-mail registration information to riglay@cfr.msstate.edu

• Feb. 23 (1:00 - 5:00 pm) - SBDN Annual Meeting
• Feb. 23 (6:30 pm - ?) - Welcoming Social
• Feb. 24 (8:00 am - 5:30 pm) - Mammal Colloquium
• Feb. 25 (7:30 am - 1:00 pm) - Field Trip (lunch provided)

Times are tentative and subject to change

Field Trip to Noxubee National Wildlife Refuge - Saturday, 25 February 2012

A short drive to Noxubee NWR will allow participants to tour mature, bottomland hardwood forests and discuss results of previous roost-related research with Rafinesque's big-eared bats and southeastern myotis on the Refuge. Timber management and biodiversity goals within this system will also be discussed. Participants will have a box lunch at the end of the tour and return to Lake Tiak O'Khata by 1:00 pm.

Participation in this field trip requires early registration and a small fee of $15.

• All activities will be held at the Lake Tiak-O'Khata Resort, 213 Smyth Lake Road, Louisville, MS 39339. The conference center is situated in a rural environment with a large lake on site.
• Discounted conference room rate is $68.00 (single or double). Book your room between now and 10 February 2012 by calling 1-888-845-6151 and requesting the room block for SBDN.
• Discounted Conference sleeping room rate expires February 10, 2012. Be sure and book your room prior to that date to receive the special conference rate.
• Lake Tiak-O'Khata has a full service kitchen. Three meals are provided with registration (see registration form for details). Restaurants are also located in nearby Louisville, MS and also in Starkville, MS (33 miles away) and Philadelphia, MS (26 miles away). There is also a casino (Golden Moon) in Philadelphia, MS.
• Parking is free.

The closest airports are Meridian, MS (regional airport; 64 miles), Columbus, MS (regional airport 69 miles), and Jackson, MS (International Airport; 96 miles).

Map and driving directions.

Three student awards are presented following the Mammal Colloquium.  Two awards are sponsored by SBDN (SBDN Best Student Oral Presentation on Bats and Best Overall Poster Award) and one award is sponsored by the Colloquium (Best Student Oral Presentation). To be eligible, indicate student status when you submit the abstract.

• With this announcement we are making a call for presentations for the 22nd Mammal Colloquium, Friday, February 24th.
• Poster and oral presentations should focus on mammals and mammalian ecology (Note: The Colloquium is NOT a bat only meeting; non-bat presentations are strongly encouraged).
• A total of 15 minutes will be allotted for oral presentations, including time for answering questions (12 minute presentation, 3 minutes for questions).
• Submit abstracts electronically in Microsoft Word format to: Alison McCartney at alison_mccartney@blm.gov.
• Abstracts will be accepted until 31 January 2012.
• Early submission of presentations via email is strongly encouraged and will be accepted until 5:00 pm on 31 January, 2012.
• Indicate whether you will make an oral or poster presentation and please underline the name of the presenter in the abstract.
• Please, indicate if you intend to make an an Oral Presentation or Poster Presentation. If the presenter is a student, do you wish to compete for the student awards? (Yes or No).
• All oral presentations must be on Microsoft PowerPoint.
• Presentations must be brought on flash/thumb drive and must be loaded on conference computers by Friday morning.
• Follow the format guidelines and example below when preparing your abstract.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR PREPARATION AND SUBMISSION OF ABSTRACTS

• Abstracts should be less than 300 words and include name, organization, and address of authors, title, study justification, objectives, brief methods, summarized results, and discussion of results.
• Title should be in all capital letters, bold, and centered at the top of the page.
• Include names and current addresses of authors after the title.
• Italicize addresses of authors.
• Underline the name of the presenter.
• Use 12 point Times New Roman font.
• Use 1-inch margins on all sides.
• Left justify authors and text only.

GUIDELINES FOR PREPARATION OF POSTERS

• Should be no larger than 48 x 48 inches.
• Should be readable from a distance of 2 meters.
• Title should be capitalized with lettering at least 2 cm high (e.g. 72 pt).
• Authors and institutional affiliations should be in upper- and lower-case lettering at least 11 mm high (e.g. 42 pt).
• Text lettering should be at least 9 mm high (e.g. 36 pt) with a line thickness of at least 1 mm.
• Text for Literature Cited section can be smaller if space is limited (e.g. down to 20 pt).
• Information should be well organized and concisely presented. Most posters include the following sections: Abstract, Introduction, Materials and Methods, Results and Discussion, Conclusions, Literature Cited.
• Keep written text to a minimum (remember the rule of thumb "less is more"). "Bullets" and short phrases are effective. Use no more than six illustrations (large graphs, flow charts, diagrams, and photographs). Keep captions and legends short and informative.

Meeting content and preliminary agenda - doc. Final agenda will be available in early February after all abstracts have been received and processed.