Todd Davis is pictured next to Three Springs Run north of Tipton. A Penn State Altoona professor of environmental studies and English, Davis has published his ninth book of poetry, “Ditch Memory: New and Selected Poems.” Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

TYRONE — Blair County author Todd Davis is having a very good year.

His ninth book of poetry was published earlier this month with much praise and a foreword from the acclaimed author David James Duncan. Another book, an anthology, follows in September and comes as he begins his 21st year as an environmental studies and English professor at Penn State Altoona.

His latest collection of poems is published by Michigan State University Press (200 pages, $27.95 for the paperback) and is entitled “Ditch Memory: New and Selected Poems.” The book features 30 new works and 63 from his previous collections, which Davis likens to a greatest hits compilation. All are set in Rust Belt Appalachia along the Allegheny Front. Davis draws inspiration from area streams and game lands and spotlights the local locale in “For a Stray Dog near the Paper Mill in Tyrone, Pennsylvania,” “Fishing for Large Mouth in a Strip-Mining Reclamation Pond near Lloydsville, Pennsylvania,” and “The Poet Stumbles upon a Buddha in Game Lands 158 above Tipton, Pennsylvania.”

“I want folks to see that poetry is part of our daily lives, representing the different ways we live here in Blair County,” he wrote when reaching out about his book. ​

A grandson of Appalachia farmers, Davis grew up in Elkhart, Indiana, a mile south of the Michigan line. His family had 40 acres in Michigan and Davis also spent time exploring the outdoors at his grandparents’ homes in Kentucky and Virginia. The title, “Ditch Memory” comes from a five-line poem that concludes the section of new works: “I had in mind the wagon road/ that crosses the backfield/where the ivory flowers/ of wild carrot wash/over the banks.”

Davis explains: “I love ditches. I’ve played in ditches since I was a boy. It’s amazing what kind of animal life, flora and fauna you find in a ditch. … I love to take our environmental studies students out along ditch areas.”

He talks of yellow, spotted and orange jewelweed, native plants which are valued for medicinal properties. Orange jewelweed is also known as Touch Me Not and is one of the ways he gets his students excited about nature.

“The way this flower propagates — to spread its seed — is when larger animals, mammals and deer, humans brush against the seed pods, they fall back instantaneously and spring the seed out as much as three to five feet away,” Davis said. “So the students will touch them and once you do it, it becomes addictive.”

His words tumble forth as fast and frothy as the mountain trout stream he enjoys fishing each spring. There’s a gritty honesty and intimacy imbued in Davis’s works as he tackles family dynamics, marital issues, mortality and death.

Davis recalls his father — a veterinarian — reciting poetry as they worked at his animal hospital. An avid reader, Davis said he was “drawn into story from the very beginning based on certain kinds of writers who had a real relationship with the natural world, with the primal world. That’s why I wanted to read and it’s why I wanted to write.”

Teaching students in the environmental studies program at Penn State Altoona has been transformative for his writing as it combines with his love of nature and spreading that appreciation.

In the poetry book’s foreword, fly fisherman and novelist Duncan (“The River Why” and “The Brothers K”) writes:

“Davis’s arrays of unlikely voices are a stupendous feature of his work, a profligate gift to his readers.” Duncan points out Davis has the ability “to leap from point of view to point of view that each tells a story all its own.”

Davis is highly esteemed by his Penn State Altoona colleagues for his passions.

Biology and environmental studies professor Carolyn Mahan said Davis “is committed to his students and to sharing his love for nature with his students — not just talking to them about it, but weather permitting, he teaches them outside in nature.”

His classroom is the Seminar Forest, across Juniata Gap Road, and the Pennsylvania State Game Lands, in the Bellwood and Tipton areas, his home’s literal backyard.

Mahan’s office is across the hall from Davis’ office.

“He works with students and spends time with them. His passion rubs off on them,” Mahan said.

Environmental studies students receive a multi-disciplinary education, taking 70% of coursework in the sciences and the remainder in natural sciences, humanities, and social sciences, according to an online course description. Davis, who earned a doctorate in English from Northern Illinois University, teaches the writing skills necessary to ignite people to action on environmental issues, Mahan said, a “critical role” because effective communication “gets people to care.”

Another colleague Brian Black, a professor of history and environmental studies, echoed Mahan’s praise of Davis’ passion for nature, his students and writing. “I mountain bike with him a lot and every ride is a nature lesson because every time he’s talking about what is all around us. It’s good fun.”

When he came to Penn State Altoona, Davis said he didn’t know much about Pennsylvania woodlands but knew he’d have greater access to public game lands.

“It was more wild and wooded. I had no idea it would be just so awe-inspiring and awesome to me. Since I like writing about humans, too, but am drawn to the other-than-human world, or the greater than human natural world, it was just the perfect place for me to land, both for teaching and for the writing. I feel so lucky.”

Passion for the outdoors, Black said, is one of Davis’ strengths.

“He’s passionate about his students and connecting them to the outdoors and what is wonderful. More than any other faculty, he gets our students to know central Pennsylvania,” Black said. “I call him the genius of this place because he knows the nature of this place more and better than anyone I know.”

He shows students how to be quiet, to observe nature and infuses them with the same awe and reverence he feels and expresses through his poetry.

Davis, who doesn’t own a cellphone, has an ability to encourage students “to think broadly and to step away from their devices and phones and think about the world,” Black said.

“He’s the only person I know who has held up (against a cellphone),” Black said. “He lives simply and tries to keep disturbances from the outside world to a minimum. It’s all about him in the natural world.”

Mahan describes Davis as someone who takes action. As evidence, she recounts how three years ago as they were prepping for the fall semester, Davis shared a new book he would use about southern Appalachia. When Mahan asked why not a book on northern Appalachia, Davis replied it didn’t exist. Mahan said she proposed they do one.

“Todd is a guy of action. He opened his computer and contacted the University of Georgia Press and they were interested.”

A hybrid literary and natural history anthology, “The Literary Guide to Northern Appalachia” publishes in September. The anthology features six experts in flora and fauna who provide descriptions of habitat, range and ecology, original artwork from 11 artists and literary works from 70 poets. It is edited by Todd Davis and his son, Noah Davis, who is also a nationally acclaimed writer and a Bellwood-Antis High School graduate. Mahan served as the natural science editor.

“There’s nothing similar to it around,” Mahan said. “It’s a beautiful book. People who spend time in the woods will appreciate it.”

Todd Davis will be reading some of his poetry along with Penn State Altoona colleague Erin Murphy at 7 p.m. Oct. 29 in the Titelman Study of the Misciagna Performing Arts Center at Penn State Altoona.

The Davis file

Name: Todd Davis

Age: 59

Residence: Tipton

Family: Wife, Shelly; son, Noah, and his wife, Nikea, and son, Nathan

Education: Ph.D. in English, August 1995, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois; M.A. in English, May 1991, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois; B.A., cum laude, in English and Education, December 1987, Grace College, Winona Lake, Indiana.

Employment: Penn State Altoona, professor of English and Environmental Studies, 21 years

Awards and honors: Fred Allen Womack and Frances Sue Zimmerman Womack Book Award, Penn State Altoona, for “Winterkill: Poems”; Kjell Meling Award for Distinction in the Arts and Humanities, Penn State Altoona; Chautauqua Editors Prize for the poem, “The Last Time My Mother Lay Down with My Father;” Distinguished Alumni Award, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Northern Illinois University; Penn State Altoona Outstanding Achievement in Research & Creative Activity Award, and many others.