The 51st annual Southern Forest Insect Work Conference will be 4-7 August
2008 in Chattanooga, Tennessee USA.  Although we soon will be updating the
SFIWC website (http://sfiwc.org) with this year's registration form, I
encourage you to make your hotel reservation as soon as possible.  We have
a large block of rooms set aside for the group until 20 July 2008, so make
your reservations before this date.  Don't miss out on the special pricing!

Here are the details:

Date: 4-7 August 2008
Place: Chattanooga Marriott at the Convention Center, 2 Carter Plaza,
Chattanooga, Tennessee USA
Toll-free phone reservation: 800-841-1674.  Ask for the "Southern Forest
Insect Work Conference" group rate.
Online reservation: http://www.marriott.com/chadt.  Enter the meeting dates
and use the group code, SFISFIA.
Parking is available for meeting participants at a discounted rate of $6.00
USD per day (self park).
Visit http://www.marriott.com/chadt for hotel information.

Room rates are $85.00 USD per night plus tax.

Remember, this low rate is valid only until 20 July 2008.  Make your
reservation right away.


And an update on the 2008 SFIWC Program from Chris Asaro (Program
Chairman):

We still have a few vacancies for concurrent sessions.  As of now we have
six session topics (bark beetle control, southern pine beetle, hemlock
woolly adelgid, prescribed fire, systemic insecticides, and possibly gypsy
moth), which are just enough to have 2 concurrent sessions per each of 3
time slots.  A number of folks at last years meeting indicated a desire to
see 3 concurrent sessions per timeslot, so I strongly encourage you to
submit more ideas and volunteer to moderate a session.

As for the graduate student session, we currently have five speakers and
would like to at least double that number.  Graduate students or
professors, please help us fill up this session by contacting Gina Davis (
gina21 at vt.edu) or Kelly Felderhoff (klfelder at ncsu.edu) and providing them
with names, affiliations, and presentation titles as soon as possible.

Finally, there have been no title submissions to date for the poster
session.  Once again, please help us put this program together by sending
poster titles, names, and affiliations to Carla Dilling (cdillin1 at utk.edu)
as soon as possible.

With your help, we aim to have a complete program for this years meeting by
early June.  Thank you.


William P. Shepherd, SFIWC Secretary-Treasurer
USDA Forest Service SRS
2500 Shreveport Highway
Pineville, LA  71360  USA

Voice: 318-473-7256
FAX: 318-473-7222
E-mail: williamshepherd at fs.fed.us
SFIWC website: http://sfiwc.org