Eugene "Geno" Wallace Schupp

Eugene “Geno” Wallace Schupp, 74, of Logan, Utah, passed away the morning of June 1, 2026, in the Emergency Department of Logan Regional Hospital, after a valiant battle with esophageal cancer.

Geno was born, as his mom liked to say, “almost a fool” on April 2, 1952, at Patrick Airforce Base near Cocoa, Florida, to Donald Lawrence Schupp, Sr., and Mary Rebecca Fleming. “Gene,” as he was then known, followed 3.5 years after brother Donald (Don) L. Schupp, Jr. Geno and Don played – and fought – lots when they were children. Don likes to tell the story of when he and Geno made spears together. When Don wanted to stop playing, Geno threw a spear that stuck in Don’s leg, getting Geno in trouble. As the child of a career army dad, Geno lived in Japan; Ft. Bliss near El Paso, Texas; Austin, Texas; and Lawton, Oklahoma – all before completing the fourth grade. Dad retired from the military and moved the family to his hometown of Bartow, Florida, named after the first Confederate General to be killed in combat in the American Civil War (aka the War of Northern Aggression). In Bartow, Geno completed elementary school, junior high, and graduated in 1970 from Summerlin Institute (high school).

Along the way, Geno enjoyed hunting and fishing in the then-wildlands of Florida. Geno attended freshman year at the University of South Florida (USF) in Tampa but dropped out before, as he said, they could fail him out. Geno worked in construction for 3 years before buying a sailboat with friends and sailing down the west coast of Florida. The ultimate destination was the Caribbean Sea, but they decided that a sounder plan was to stop the journey at Key West. Geno returned to USF to pursue a B.A. in Biology, working his way through college in a pizzeria where it did not take long for “Gene” to become “Geno.”

After completing his B.A. in 1977, Geno pursued an M.A. in Zoology at USF (1981), studying ant-plant interactions on Cecropia in Ecuador. This is when Mom took out the life insurance policy on Geno, sure that she would need the money to ship his body home. Not knowing the language, Geno read the first few chapters of “Spanish Made Simple” on the plane to Ecuador. This started a half-century of speaking Spanish with a huge vocabulary and little need for proper verb conjugation – “If bad Spanish bothers them, they can correct you.”

Geno moved to Iowa City, Iowa, in 1980 to pursue a Ph.D. in Biology at the University of Iowa. There he met Donald (Don) H. Feener, a post-doc in an adjacent ecology lab, who quickly became his very best friend, and post-doc Edward (Ted) W. Evans. A decade or so later all three of them were ecology faculty at universities in Utah! Geno lived in Panama on and off for 6 years studying seed predation on the small tree Faramea occidentalis at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) on Barro Colorado Island (BCI), the most-studied tropical forest in the world. Geno and Don (aka “Feener” to Geno) joined many world-class tropical ecologists (aka “tropical derelicts”) on BCI, instituting many traditions including the annual BCI Derby Day party to celebrate the running of the Kentucky Derby. In 1987, Geno and Don Feener along with Beth Braker were co-coordinators of the Organization for Tropical Studies field course, “Tropical biology: an ecological approach,” in Costa Rica. Geno completed his Ph.D. in 1987 and was a post-doctoral research associate at the University of Iowa until 1988.

Geno was the first NSF-NATO Postdoctoral Fellow to Spain (1988-89) at the Estación Biológica de Doñana, Seville, Spain. It was in the Sierra de Cazorla of southern Spain, researching seed dispersal of the tree Prunus mahaleb, where Geno began a 38-year friendship and scientific collaboration with Dr. Pedro Jordano. This post-doc experience instilled in Geno an intense interest in the ecology of dryland ecosystems -- and a passion for the food, drink, culture, and lifestyle of Andalucia, southern Spain.

Geno was the Department of Energy Alexander Hollaender Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellow at the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory 1989-1992. After applying for seemingly hundreds of faculty positions, he read a job posting that he thought was written for him: Assistant Professor of Plant Population Ecology in the Department of Range Science in the College of Natural Resources at Utah State University. He applied for the position, landed an interview, was offered and accepted what became the best job on the planet. Geno was appointed Assistant Professor in 1992, promoted to Associate Professor in 1998 and Professor in 2011, and retired in 2025 from his final academic home in the Department of Wildland Resources in the S.J. and Jessie E. Quinney College of Natural Resources, Utah State University.

At Utah State University (USU), Geno was a rigorous yet compassionate teacher and mentor of many students. Every year he taught the general education undergraduate course, “Ecology of Our Changing World,” with the mantra, “The only thing constant is change.” Every other year he taught the graduate course, “Plant Population Ecology.” Geno developed the B.S. degree program in Conservation and Restoration Ecology (CREc), and every year taught the upper division majors’ course of the same name. As a graduate mentor, Geno was major professor for 4 Ph.D. students and about 20 master’s students, and a graduate supervisory committee member for many others. Geno served USU in many roles, including College of Natural Resources (CNR) representative to the Honors Faculty Advisory Board (many years); CNR Assistant Dean for Research & Graduate Education (2012-2013); CNR representative to the Fulbright Faculty Advisory Committee (2017-2025), and Associate Director of the Ecology Center (2024-2025). He received several CNR awards, including Faculty University Service Award (2014), Undergraduate Research Mentor of the Year (2009), and Undergraduate Advisor of the Year (2006).

As a researcher, Geno inspired and collaborated with many colleagues from around the world. A major theme throughout Geno’s research on seed dispersal in tropical and temperate plants is that healthy ecosystems depend on the complex web of mutualisms between trees and the animals that disperse and eat the seeds. He is perhaps best known for his scientific papers on seed-seedling conflicts (check out his publications and citations in Google Scholar). Geno was a principal investigator of the more than 20-year-long Sage-STEP experiment with sites across the Great Basin, investigating restoration of highly threatened sagebrush biome. He was also a founding member of the science committee for the Canyonlands Research Center, which is a collaboration among academics, land managers, and The Nature Conservancy to improve land management and facilitate climate adaptation in southern Utah’s iconic public lands.

Geno’s research connections helped him recruit international post-docs and graduate students to Utah State University. This included Spanish post-doc Dr. Jóse María (“Rocka”) Gómez in 1994, beginning a 32-year-long friendship and scientific collaboration. Geno took sabbatical leaves to Spain in 1999-2000 and 2007-2008 and was appointed a visiting researcher in the Integrative Ecology Group at the Estación Biológica de Doñana, in Sevilla, Spain. Through 2024, Geno made an annual pilgrimage to southern Spain, where he was warmly welcomed by Rocka and Adela in Granada, Pedro and Myriam in Sevilla, and many other wonderful colleagues and friends. Geno always arranged his travel to arrive in Spain in time for lunch, typically at one of his favorite tapas bars in Sevilla, or at a restaurant in the mountains near Granada.

In 1993, a USU student asked her soils professor, Janis Boettinger, if she knew Gene Schupp in the Range Science Department. “No? I think you’d really like him.” Despite having several mutual friends and that mutual student, Geno and Janis did not meet until early 1994 at Jenny Norton and George Wotton’s house. They said to each other nearly simultaneously, “Oh, so you’re Geno/Janis – I’ve heard a lot about you!” Janis invited Geno on a first date – camping and hiking in the San Rafael Swell over spring break. The rest is history. Geno and Janis built a delightfully rich and full life together. They had a house with a greenhouse and solar panels, a yard with many native and drought-tolerant plants, a big veggie garden, and many potted flowers outside. They loved wine and traveled to California every year to taste and buy wine, cultivating wonderful friendships along the way. Friends and family visited them at home in Utah and in Spain when they were on sabbatical. They traveled widely and internationally – often leveraging attendance at a scientific conference with additional time exploring local culture, food, and drink. They were part of a fun, generous, and caring community of friends in Cache Valley, Utah, and were an institution in the philanthropic community. They attended events, hosted Spanish tapas and wine tastings and saffron dinners annually, and delivered appetizers during the pandemic to raise funds to support local non-profit organizations. They not only generously supported these organizations directly but used food and drink to successfully lure new donors into the fold. For many years Geno was the master of ceremonies and auctioneer at Planned Parenthood’s annual Chocolate Festival.

Geno and Janis did not have kids, but Geno had a special bond with his niece Julie from the first moment he held her as a baby. “Uncle Geno” loved watching Julie grow up, ride horses, have 22 international exchange sisters hosted by brother Don and sister-in-law Susan, live in the United Arab Emirates, marry Moh (three weddings in three countries!), and become the amazing mother to Maryam, Layla, and Adam. Unable to travel in May 2026, Geno proudly watched the live stream of the hooding ceremony where Julie received her Ph.D. from Virginia Tech University – and became the second Dr. Schupp in the family!

Geno is survived by his sweetie and life partner of 32 years, Dr. Janis L. Boettinger; brother, Donald L. Schupp, Jr.; sister-in-law, Susan; niece, Dr. Julie R. Schupp, Ph.D.; nephew-in-law Mohammad Alhalabi; grandnieces, Maryam and Layla; grandnephew, Adam; Janis’s sister, Lea J. Garrard; and best feline buddy, Cappy Boots.

To quote a line from a friend’s email in response to learning about Geno’s passing, “…think of… Geno when (you) cook, garden, travel, protect, and stand for what is good and right.” If you agree, feel free to donate to an environmental, artistic, educational, and/or social justice non-profit organization in Geno’s memory. A few of Geno’s favorites included Stokes Nature Center, Valley Dance Ensemble, USU’s Caine School of the Arts, student scholarships at USU, CAPSA, and Planned Parenthood.

Janis cherishes the many friends and colleagues who reached out to share memories and offer support. She is grateful for the compassionate medical staff who cared for Geno at the various Intermountain Health facilities in Logan, Ogden, and Murray. Janis sends special love and appreciation to Jenny and George for supporting her on June 1 and to Don and Julie (and Adam) for traveling from Virginia so quickly to help. There will be a celebration of Geno’s extraordinary life – with lots of food and drink and, hopefully, smiles and laughter – to be scheduled soon.