Washoe pine is only found in a few sections in the North Western corner of Nevada and part of the Warner Mountain Range. Many of the populations of the pine contain only a few individuals and in the Surprise Resource Area, are often found in association with aspen, snowberry, chokecherry, gooseberry, and wax current. Also in these areas is Wyoming big sagebrush, bitterbrush, and pose. We have populations of this species in at least two sites of the Hays Mountain Range and several along the southern stretch of the Warner Mountains.

Alejandro, Garth (Range Technician), and I went to a population of pine that is located near Bally Mountain and overlooks Mosquito Lake. Many of the pine trees were in wet areas and contained rock outcrops. We were unsure as to when the pine cones would be ready and how many pine trees were actually in this population so we set off to survey the area for pine trees and to collect seed from the mature plants for future use. Our hope is to at some point be able to plant Washoe Pine in more areas along the Hay’s Range.

Getting to the pine tree involved hiking through several aspen groves along the rock ledge until we found our first pine tree which was over fifty feet tall. We collected seeds from this tree and then continued farther along the ridge following several aspen groves. Within these aspens, we found more mature trees and many baby trees sheltered within these canopies.

The Washoe Pine with Mosquito Lake in the background.

With two boxes full of pine cones we decided that we would need to return at a later date to collect more seeds as we started a seed bank for our region. On our way out we decided to have lunch at an overlook that looked back at our pine collection area as well as the valley below. While having lunch we realized that we were sitting above a mother bobcat with her two kittens that were playing on the rocks. Below them and moving across the valley was a herd of antelope. It was a great day on the Great Basin.

The Collection Area

Most people are curious (and a bit confused) when I tell them that I’m a seed collection intern, so I thought I’d explain it in this blog post. I work for the Mid-Atlantic Regional Seed Bank (MARSB), a regional partner of the national Seeds of Success program. Seed banks are controlled environments in which seed can remain dormant and viable for long periods of time. Seed banking helps ensure the long-term survival and genetic diversity of stored species. MARSB is a mid-term storage seed bank in which seeds can remain dormant and viable for several years. In long-term seed banks, like the well-guarded seed bank in Fort Collins, Colorado, seeds can remain viable for decades.

As MARSB interns, my field partner, Emily, and I spend much of our time collecting seed for Seeds of Success East’s coastal restoration efforts. We have a list of twenty foundation species that grow in coastal areas that were harmed by Hurricane Sandy. These species are used in immediate restoration projects and/or stored for future restoration projects, which is especially important as climate change is increasing the frequency and severity of storm events. We spend a lot of time collecting species that grow in salt marshes, beaches/sand dunes, coastal freshwater wetlands, and coastal forests. Here are a few of the foundation species we’ve collected so far:

Hudsonia tomentosa (woolly beach heather) is a short, shrubby plant found on back dunes in the rock rose family (Cistaceae). Hudsonia’s spreading growth habit and widespread roots help prevent dune erosion. We collect Hudsonia by massaging seed off of the stems into a cloth bag or by scooping up fallen seed from the sand. Hudsonia was the first species I collected seed from during our training trip in June, and I got a bit overzealous with my scooping method – I wound up collecting more sand than seed. However, by my second and third Hudsonia collection I had perfected my scooping method and Emily and I made some great Hudsonia collections.

Dunes carpeted with Hudsonia tomentosa (woolly beach heather)

Teucrium canadense (Canada germander) is a cute little forb in the mint family (Lamiaceae) that’s found on the edges of salt marshes. It was easy for Emily and I to find populations of Teucrium once our mentor Clara taught us that it’s often associated with Phragmites australis, a common and highly invasive reed that also grows along salt marsh edges. Despite sometimes having to bush-whack through Phragmites, Emily and I loved collecting Teucrium because each plant has a ton of seed and it was easy (and satisfying) to strip handfulls of seed heads from each plant.

Teucrium canadense in seed (Canada germander)

Teucrium canadense (Canada germander) in bloom – image via Minnesota wildflowers

Hibiscus moscheutos (crimsoneyed rose mallow) is a salt marsh plant with big, beautiful flowers in the mallow family (Malvaceae). We only had one collection site for Hibiscus, but it had thousands of plants – it was really beautiful when they were all in bloom. Like Teucrium, Hibiscus has many seeds per flower head, so it was easy to collect. However, once we got the Hibiscus back to the seed lab, we had to treat it with anti-pest strips because we wound up collecting all the little bugs that live in the seed heads – the prettiest plants sometimes hide the creepiest critters.

Hibiscus moscheutos (crimsoneyed rose mallow)

Hibiscus moscheutos (crimsoneyed rose mallow) flower close up – because one picture is not enough. Sorry it doesn’t have a crimson eye!

Panicum virgatum (switchgrass) is a tall, common grass (Poaceae) found in open fields, forest path edges, salt marsh edges, and on sand dunes. It’s fun and easy to collect because you can strip handfuls of seed from every plant, and by the end of our six collections, I had some pretty tough finger callouses (and a few cuts). It’s a great restoration plant because of its heartiness and ability to grow in multiple environments.

Handfull of Panicum virgatum (switchgrass) seed

Cakile edentula (American searocket) is a small, fleshy plant in the mustard family (Brassicaceae). Like Hudsonia, it has a deep root system and is a good dune stabilizer. When Cakile’s seeds are ripe the whole plant dries up and rolls around in the wind dispersing its seed, like a tumble weed. This dispersal method led to a long collection day, because the population just kept going along the beach!

Partially dried up Cakile edentula (American searocket)

Cakile edentula (American searocket) is a lot prettier before its leaves fall off and it dries up. Image via California florae.

Until next time,

-Laura

Things have slowed down a decent amount in the last month. With colder weather creeping in and office work taking over, time blurs together, yet to my amazement we are now near the end of October. Time in the office has been spent mostly mapping fencing across our field office, primarily for grazing allotments monitored from this year. Some of the allotments done this year will be part of a broader range-land health report on a watershed scale. And in order to accurately state the extent of the report we need to know the real size of the allotments based off of where the fences actually lie. While mapping fencing may not sound thrilling, there is something calming and rewarding about finding those many lines that cross the landscape.

Atop Mosier Gulch trail, looking ahead to the Bighorn Mountains. A great day for some mountain biking.

But mapping fencing is not the only thing to be done. Weeding of course is still on the to do list. The same weeding found on the vegetation plots mentioned last blog. Yet incredibly the end of that is on the horizon! Only 5 out of the 24 plots remain. We have also recently opened the door to range-land improvements. These improvements include fences, wells, spring developments, reservoirs, roads, etc. that are located on BLM land. These need to be located through mapping or in the field, they ideally need to be regularly inspected, they need to contain a physical file, and also need to be included in an online database. Since so many factors involve each improvement there is of course work to be done resolving discrepancies and conducting inspections in the field.

Beyond the excitement of work has been the last of the warmer activities in the mountains. One weekend I had the chance to meet up with the many Lander, WY interns for a trip in the Western Bighorn Mountains. To my luck I received a call about the trip minutes before heading out on a backpacking trip of my own. I met up with them at the trailhead later on in the day and we had set up camp not far from West Tensleep Lake. This had been the first night I’ve ever slept atop a tarp with nothing overhead. And what a night it was to do so. That night we had dew collect upon everything exposed, and the temperature had dropped below freezing.

Waking up to a frost covered sleeping bag was certainly a first for me, although miraculously it was a toasty night in the bag. After a hearty breakfast we ventured off to the next location down-trail. At Helen Lake we set up the next camp and I had time to do some fly fishing for the day. It was a beautiful day and I even got to nap in in the hammock after fishing. Beyond the nice weather hid looming overnight storms. And to my shock (which shouldn’t have been unexpected in early October) was some late night and early morning snow. Frost on the sleeping the first night, and a snowy tent the second. Both firsts for me. But even though it was as cold as it looks, the valley was gorgeous with all the snow.

Lake Helen up West Tensleep Trail

A gorgeous view just waiting to be snowed on

First time waking up to a snowy campsite!

After all the fun of camping in a large group, the next weekend I planned to continue the initial backpacking trip I had sought after. The destination was the Firehole Lakes up near Bighorn Peak on the Eastern side of the mountains. This 5-6 mile hike including an off trail section crossing boulder fields. Finding a site to camp up near the bottoms of the high peaks is difficult due to the rockiness of the Bighorns. But after finding an adequate sight I had noticed the plethora of moose activity in the area. Stripped bark, chomped young trees, and no shortage of moose poo. All this activity led to the unsurprising, yet still unnerving calls of an animal near the tent before bed. While exciting to hear the moose nearby, I was also reconsidering placing my tent on this moose’s favorite tree chomping spot. But nevertheless the moose had moved on and/or found a resting spot for the night, and wasn’t heard again.

After a night of waking up nearly every hour (the wind was obscene that night) I was awoken to an absolutely incredible sunrise. I may have missed the reddest moments of the sunrise but I got quite the show when I walked down to the lake. This trip also initially had the goal of catching some of the larger fish found in these lakes. But with no luck the day before or the morning after, I eventually started working my way out, only to finally catch a small fish in a tiny stream a mile back.

A stream on the way out of the Firehole Lakes. And of course the only place where I catch a fish that weekend.

The last month has primarily been spent in the near and dear Buffalo area, but it’s hard to complain with the Bighorns just minutes away. With the cold weather setting in I’ll hopefully take advantage of the nicer days left before the near sedentary life sets in. Til next time!

Nick Melone

Buffalo, WY

5 months in the desert, I can’t believe it’s almost over and that I’m writing my last blog post. I have just a few days left and then I pack all my things into my car along with my two cats and head back across California to the North Coast, about 860 miles away. It’s a bit scary too because I have not yet found a job and am currently planning on living off my savings from this internship. More than that though, I feel a great sadness, that I’m about to leave all this behind. It’s been 5 months and I am now familiar with the land, the plants, I know my way around, I know the people, the politics and feel very vested in this project. I defiantly plan on keeping in touch with my mentor and with the field office here to see how everyone is and how the project goes.

I am currently helping to edit a document that summarizes our summers worth of vegetation monitoring out at Dos Palmas. Other current projects include conducting ACEC (Area of Critical Environmental Concern) monitoring. We just went to the desert Lily Preserve last week and did an evaluation of the land. It looked really good out there. I have also wrapped up the seasons SOS work, sending in our last collection, wrapping up and sending in the vouchers we collected, and packing things away with good notes for next years intern.

The dried remains of a Bird cadge evening primrose (Oenothera deltoides) at the Desert Lily Preserve. Sorry Krissa, this was literally the only Onagraceae I found all summer.

I hope to get a field job this coming spring somewhere in the Pacific North West region, though at the same time one thing I have learned with this internship is that I am more of a long term person and as such would like a permanent position some place. Leaving and saying good bye is difficult, and when you have become attached to the land it’s even harder.

Out hiking desert canyons, washes and tributaries. Armed with loppers, hand saws, and herbicides, in search of invasive Salt Cedar to eradicate.

This is only the first chapter of my post college life. I am beyond excited to see where I go from here, weather that is back to school for a higher degree, to work who knows where, or what, I just know it will be fantastic. One thing this internship has really showed me is that I love working, and there are really honestly and truly jobs out there that will hire me where I can make a difference and contribute to something that I believe benefits everyone.

I learned so many things this summer, including how to use a plant press to make herbarium vouchers!!!

Making a pressing of Eriogonum inflatum for an SOS collection at Big Morongo Canyon Preserve

A long time ago my grandma asked me if I had all the money in the world what would I do? I said (thinking of the central valley of California and extending up all the way into the mountains eastward) that I would like to own thousands of acres and restore the land with native plant and animal species, including reintroducing mega fauna. Possibly build a large stone wall around the huge strip of land and reintroduce fire to the landscape in regular and healthy intervals. She said I was crazy and that was just a dream, maybe so, but now that I’m here and working at the BLM I feel like I have actually found that dream. There are thousands of acres of wild lands, millions in fact. I get to work and help restore them, protect them, and maintain them. I get to work on native seed collections for future restoration efforts and scientific research. I feel that I am living my dream actualized (and this is only my first job out of college!!!!!). I would love some day to become a a full time and permanent BLM employee.

Gathering seeds of Anemopsis californica that we patiently waited for and watched all summer long. (I can’t believe this is actually my job!!!!)

Anemopsis californica. My last SOS seed collection.

Thank you Chicago Botanic Garden.
You have done more for me than you could ever know.

Crystal S. Neuenschwander
CLM Intern, BLM, Palm Springs, Ca

My introduction to Wyoming as a CLM intern was marred by an unfortunate incident. The person who was to be my partner abandoned their position on the eve of our first day, leaving me to handle all SOS-related activities in our field office this summer. It was the last thing that I had expected upon my arrival in the little town of Rawlins. We had a big job ahead of us, and the CLM program at this particular field office was crafted for two people. With one, the amount of work allocated to our office would be unmanageable. My mentors and I had two options: cut way down on my workload and not meet the original seed collection quota, or try to make ends meet while CLM worked to hire a late-season replacement.

We chose the latter. I commenced researching the flora of southern Wyoming and my duties as a SOS intern. I gained a feel for the plant community and began work on scouting possible collection sites and gathering voucher specimens from each population. It was a large amount of work that depended on several factors: the existence of suitable populations of our target species in the field office, correct identification of those target species, accurate estimations of population size and seed yield, the site’s relative safety from stochastic factors, etc. If any of these factors went belly-up, I would need to begin the whole process over again. I decided that the only thing to do would be to dive in headfirst with both sleeves rolled up, and make the best of whatever happened.

I quickly found that I had a lot to learn about both BLM work and Wyoming itself. The high desert is a harsh landscape full of hazards that this Tennessee native had never encountered: prairie rattlers, ferocious winds, and a dryness that seems to suck the life out of you. One must be tough and self-sufficient to survive this landscape. Over time, I found that many Wyomingite life skills are skills that are integral to working in the conservation field. Probably the most important of these is field navigation. I had some superficial experience with reading maps in school as part of a cartography class, but for most of my life, Google Maps and plain ol’ familiarity told me how to get to wherever I went. Once in Wyoming, I was faced with a novel landscape, most of which was without cell phone service. To find my field sites, I had to resort to the old-fashioned methods of paper and intuition. There were more than a few wrong turns before I really got the hang of it!

Going hand-in-hand with field navigation was learning to operate 4WD vehicles. “Lucky”, our trusty Chevy Silverado, did not always have the easiest time with us interns behind the wheel. But after a week of being made to drive on steep, rocky, guardrail-less canyon roads (never has Driver’s Ed been more terrifying, emotional, and effective), I felt completely at home behind Lucky’s steering wheel. Trucks such as these are used extensively in federal agencies and other outdoor jobs, so I’m very glad to have this experience now!

The most enjoyable new field skill by far was learning the flora of the Intermountain West. As a botanist in training, it is always a pleasure to apply my skills to another region. I was fortunate enough to have a mentor with a botany background; with his guidance and some research time in the field and the office herbarium, I was able to get a handle on the plant communities in a relatively short amount of time. One of my best memories of the summer was of my first day in the field with him. Second week of work: going out with Frank for some hands-on botanical education. It was the last week of May, when most desert wildflowers are at peak bloom. We drove up through the Cherry Creek valley in the Ferris Mountains, stopping at every new plant we came upon. After copious notes and exploration, we drove down into a small canyon filled with limber pine, currants, blazing stars, and wild greens. I was amazed at the diversity of this austere landscape.

My drive to learn these new skills and the prospect of tackling our collection project alone greatly fostered my independence, a character trait that’s always been crucial to eaking out a living in the West. My mentors were there to help me with anything I asked, but over time I began to manage our project myself. I decided our weekly schedule according to the phenology of our target species, gave reports at project meetings and on conference calls, and handled the data management aspect of our project.

My mentor’s guidance, weeks of preparation, and a lot of new knowledge from the CBG workshop made me feel equipped and determined to tackle our collection task on my own by the time the seeds had begun to cure. Fortunately, the arrival of a replacement intern spared me from doing that (It turns out that collecting seeds can take a long time!). Nevertheless, I feel that my solo work during my first month and a half in Rawlins left me feeling much more confident in my own abilities than I was when I first arrived. This experience allowed me to guide my new partner through our busiest month (July) and wrap up our project in a timely manner.

I’ll admit, when I first accepted this internship, I really didn’t understand the magnitude of what I would be doing. The importance and scope of the SOS program didn’t become clear to me until I attended the workshop in Chicago. The JMP Symposium especially hit home the dire need for a national native seed program. I understood the importance of restoration research, but had no idea of how much networking and coordination is needed to make native plant restoration a reality. I also didn’t realize the precarious state of plant conservation and botanical training in the U.S.; learning that my desired profession is itself on the brink of extinction shook me to my core, and made me feel more committed than ever to advocating for plant conservation measures. Plants are the literal ambassadors between Earth’s main energy source and the inhabitants of this planet; their communities cannot continue to be sidelined in the way that they are now.
I don’t know exactly where I’ll end up next year, or even next month, but one thing is for sure: I am a much more equipped conservation worker than I was this spring. If the West has taught me anything, it is that with enough knowledge and persistence, the battle can be won.

I had always figured the desert was going to be a hot place.  That’s just part of the whole “Desert” deal…You get sand, cacti, and heat.  I knew that going into this job.  However, knowing and experiencing are two totally different things.  It’s similar to jumping into a mountain lake. You KNOW it’s going to be freezing, you’re geared up for it and mentally prepared, but once your feet hit the water everything changes.  You gasp for breath and can’t think coherently, even though you KNEW it was going to be freezing.  That being said, it was obviously hot, very hot in the Arizona summer.  The saving grace was that most of our work was in water and early in the morning so usually the heat was not a huge issue while working, even though I’m not sure “breathable waders” manufacturers know the correct definition of the word “breathable”.

Besides a few days here and there where we did work in the middle of the day, we were able to beat the heat on the job, although I wouldn’t recommend spending a lot of time on blacktop.  Sidenote: I’m still not sure how all the high-schoolers handled football practice during July and August but that’s neither here nor there.  A week or two ago I was absolutely shocked when I went outside one morning to get something from my truck and legitimately shivered.  My brain had no idea what to make of that, but there was definitely an internal celebration because autumn had finally gotten to Southeastern Arizona.  Growing up in Texas (where it’s also absurdly hot), fall was always my favorite season because it meant that you could be outside running around doing whatever, without suffering from heat stroke.  I realized not much has changed since childhood, because I immediately perked up the first time I had to put a jacket on. (They also evidently don’t believe in Daylight Savings Time in Arizona, so come November it’ll mean more time working in the cool temperatures!).  A few weeks have passed since then, and we’re still in that awkward phase where you have to wear a jacket in the morning, then start overheating when the sun gets up, and then take it off but its perfect weather in my book.

The coming of Fall also means that we did our bi-annual monitoring of Aravaipa Creek.  If you are unfamiliar with Aravaipa, I would recommend looking it up.  It’s an absolutely stunning place, and considered the crown jewel of Southeastern Arizona and also of our field office (Edward Abbey even called it home for a while as a Ranger).  A good portion of the creek falls within BLM wilderness, along with The Nature Conservancy property, as well as a few private inholdings scattered in.  We teamed up with a group of students from the University of Arizona to monitor nine different sites along the creek for fish demographics.  Aravaipa Creek houses two species of endangered fish (Loach minnow, and Spike Dace) and this monitoring has taken place twice a year since 1963 to assess different statistics about how they are doing.  It was a wonderful experience because A. I got to work in a beautiful and almost unknown area of the country, B. I got to interact with a lot of like-minded people in my age range (You’ll never believe it, but there aren’t a lot of young conservationists in a ranching/mining town of 10,000 people) and C. It’s an extremely fulfilling feeling knowing that you are doing your part as a cog in the machine of something much larger than yourself.

That last sentence I think sums up the number one thing I have gotten from this job.  I wrote on a previous blog post that our main project is removing invasive fish species from a creek within a national conservation area.  When I first started, if I was in a bad mood or a sleep-deprived/lack of caffeine state of mind it was easy to think of negative thoughts like “Well, how big of a difference can one person make?… It’s just one creek, even if we remove all the invasive species, it’s just one creek. How big of a difference will that even make in the broad spectrum of the world”.  After reading blog posts on here for a while though, an epiphany hit me like a ton of bricks, and it has made all the difference both in this job and my outlook in the future of nature.  Ya, I’m just one dude slowly but surely repairing and ecosystem.  Just by myself, I’m making just a mere blip on the radar in conservation.  BUT, I’ve read about people doing the same thing in Alaska, In California, In New Mexico, Wyoming, Utah, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, the Eastern U.S and probably others I’m forgetting.  My point being is that to save the world, it takes a village.  One person has nowhere near the amount of man power to do everything that needs to be done to conserve the natural world, but if a large group of people that truly believes that they are making a difference in their neck of the woods do their part, then we all act as spokes and keep this wheel moving.  Hopefully the students we worked with this past weekend enjoyed the work enough to enter this line of work and add to the number of people working toward a common cause.  Hopefully someone somewhere has seen what you are doing and understands how important it is and has been inspired to do the same.  Hopefully you can see a goal involved in what you are doing, because it gives you a perceptible meter of how your project is going and something to strive for.  And finally, hopefully everyone reading this has had a least one “Ah-Ha” moment where you have seen success in your project and felt that extremely rewarding feeling inside of you where you look across the landscape and honestly tell yourself that you HAVE made a difference.

Anyways, I’m going to hop off the soap-box for now, best of luck to those finishing up their time with the CLM program, and good luck to those continuing.  As Fall continues and dips into Winter I’ll write again.  In the meantime keep trekkin’ along, saving the world.

Theres somethin’ about those Saguaros…

Taylor.

(Veggietales, anyone?)

It is definitely Fall here in New England, and each day is getting more and more beautiful with the changing foliage. The seeds are changing as well – we have entered into a season of finally being able to collect from the Asteraceae family – Goldenrods (Solidago spp.), Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca), and soon the pretty flowers of the Asters will also be dispersing their fluffy seeds to the wind.

Scarborough Marsh in Maine a few weeks ago, sporting some beautiful Fall colors.

New York Aster (Symphiotrichum nova-belgii) in a salt marsh in Southern MA.

Last Friday, we went on an adventure to collect seeds on one of the Boston Harbor Islands, Thompson Island. The Island runs STEM education programs for children and has camp programs as well. Just a twenty minute ferry ride out of a port in South Boston and we arrived. We met with someone from the National Parks Service who showed us around the island. They are working on restoration projects around the island, and will be using plants from our seed collections to replace invasive plants with native ones.

Approaching Thompson Island! A very windy morning, but sitting on the top deck was so worth it for the view.

We began our day in one of the salt marshes, and migrated throughout some smaller microhabitats throughout the island. We found a small patch of Canada goldenrod (Solidago canadensis) on the side of a hill, some blue vervain (Verbena hastata) and grass-leaved goldenrod (Euthamia graminifolia) sprinkled throughout a small meadow, and collected seed clusters from the staghorn sumac (Rhus hirta) along the paths (the trees we could reach anyway…). We also stopped to eat lunch on the beach facing Boston, and had a full view of the skyline.

There is something very serene about watching a bustling city from the shores of a quiet beach with your fellow hippies…

We then proceeded across the entire 170-acre island, looking for seeds along the way. Just as we were thinking we might have scoured the whole island, we decided to walk along the beach on the side facing the open ocean. Lo and behold, we found dozens of salt-marsh patches along the shore, filled with sea lavender (Limonium carolinianum), and finally in seed! We had been checking on this plant in so many of our sites, so it was very exciting to finally find somewhere it had ripe seed. This was our eighth collection for the day, almost breaking our nine-collection-in-a-day record. We had so many seeds that we had to put them all in a full-size trash bag to carry around the island. Quite a successful and beautiful day!

What the sea lavender looks like before it’s in seed – such a beautiful little plant! (Photo from gobotany.newenglandwild.org)

Cape Cod National Sea Shore a few weeks ago. Slightly unrelated, but the scenery was too dramatic not to post.

Krista Heilmann

Seeds of Success East

New England Wild Flower Society

Framingham, MA

Not your typical range improvement project: A bathtub with a view.

Got to love small town Idaho traffic jams

And of course your friendly neighborhood CBG interns ft. the AIM crew

Places you must go in Pinedale:

1). The PAC (Pinedale Aquatic Center). This place is huge, with brand new equipment, pools and courts. I loved working out here and wish I had purchased a membership sooner.

2). Pinedale Community Food Basket. From clothes and shoes to kitchenware and appliances, this is a thrift store that a seasonal worker like yourself will learn to love and appreciate.

3). The Great Outdoor Shop. Need I say more?

4). The Wind River Brewery. Excellent food; a little on the pricey side compared to your Applebees or T.G.I Fridays, but it is well worth it.

4). Boondocks Pizza.

Nearby trailheads you should research/visit/hike out of: Big Sandy, Boulder, New Fork Lakes, Green River Lakes, Elkhart Park.

These are the BLM modular homes offered to seasonal workers. Next door is the BLM ware-yard, where supplies such as trucks, snowmobiles, UTVs and miscellaneous gear are stored. Your trash is also just inside the gates of the ware-yard — the disposal service is included in your rental fee.

This park is practically in your back yard.

You will not see a lot of raccoons, but mule deer and moose that have become very accustomed to humans will appear outside your house every once in a while, and roam through the parks often.

Inside of the housing unit:

all utilities and WiFi included in the rental fee

There are some real classic movies on VHS. The house does not have a VHS player. though. It may be worth to buy one from a thrift store to enjoy these fantastic films.

Located just off of Pine St (the main road), you will be walking distance from just about anything and everything that downtown Pinedale has to offer, including the BLM office.

Ridley’s Family Market. This is the only “superstore” in Pinedale. It is, therefore, very likely that you will buy the majority of your groceries and other household items here.

The Wind River Brewery has the best burgers and sweet potato fries in town — I recommend this restaurant to anyone who comes into Pinedale. This gem is just two blocks from the BLM housing unit.

Inside the BLM office:

It’s dark and cold and never sees the sunlight. It’s where they store the interns.