After an intensive week of training at the Chicago Botanic Garden, Jeanne and I returned to yet more training at the Las Cruces NM BLM office.  This included safety, UTV, diversity, NEPA, CPR, and various other trainings associated with  various other acronyms.  Additionally, we have gone out on a few range assessment excursions to scout for collection sites and to assist in plant ID for presence and absence  of plant species.   

We’re used to praying for rain in Southern New Mexico, and even though it’s been a sporadically wet spring, the summer is hot and dry no matter how you cut it, and the plants are usually accordingly sad and crispy this time of year.  As a result, our seed collecting activities have been limited to scouting populations using forensic botany. 

We have found excellent candidate populations of Bouteloua gracilis, Ipomopsis longiflora, Bouteloua curtipendula, Thymaphylla acerosa, Sporobolus airoides, Muhlenbergia arenacea (Sand Muhly), M. porteri (Bush Muhly),  and Sporobolus flexuosus.  Much to my surprise, we have also found a big, happy candidate population of Pleuraphis jamesii (James’ Gallleta grass).  I had been unaware that it occurred this far south, (usually what we find around here is the rather closely related Pleuraphis mutica “Tobosa grass”).  I had my doubts about finding adequate populations of Setaria leucopila because, although fairly common, I have never seen it in any great density.   Sure enough, though, we found a population that shall do nicely for an SOS collection.  Oh me of little faith….

 We have found a lovely population of Ipomopsis longiflora, but I’m afraid there will be some strategizing necessary since our reconnaissance indicates that the fruit capsules explosively dehisce almost immediately upon maturation.  Jeanne, my co-intern, called up a contact that she’d worked with on a restoration project involving a super rare species of Ipomopsis endemic to New Mexico (I. espiritus-sanctus, “Holy Ghost Ipomopsis) to get some information on how to collect seeds.  His suggestion was to bag the plant and catch the seeds that way.  I am hoping we don’t have to go this route for seed collection, but time will tell.

We have had luck finding Aristida purpurea (purple threeawn) from geographic regions not yet collected, but my mentor is after specific varieties (var. perplexa and var. longiseta).  However, thus far we have not found populations of either variety in sufficient quantity for collection.  But we have found good populations for Aristida pansa which may make for a viable substitution.

Anyway, we’ve seen a lot of beautiful but stark New Mexico landscapes.  I do love working in these open lands where there may be no signs of humanity for miles and miles, except for maybe the infamous spaceport in the northern part of the county. 

Overall, I have been impressed by the diversity of backgrounds and viewpoints in the Las Cruces field office.  And yet, there definitely seems to be a positive and generally fun work environment here.  I hope next time I update y’all, there will be a lot more  ‘nitty gritty’ plant collections to report on (may the skies open up on us with delicious rain…).  In the meantime, please enjoy some random photos of our adventures and some cool plants we’ve found along the way! 

David Morin

Las Cruces Field Office, Bureau of Land Management

Coryphantha longispina.  A poor photo of a cute cactus.

Helenium microcephalum

I keyed this critter to H. microcephalum, an unusual DYC found in a dry stock tank.

Creosote (Larrea tridentata) anyone?  We’ve got it; seemingly as far as the eye can see.  This is hotter than it looks.  Trust me.

Rangeland assessment team hard at work.  The Rio Grande valley is in the distance…

Ipomopsis longiflora with mesquite and Broom Snakeweed.

We shall be collecting from this site, provided A) we get rain and B) we can find a reasonable way to harvest the seeds.

Oryx scat.  I did see some oryx, but was too slow with the camera.  Hence, I’ll leave you with a photo of the next best thing.

My advisor, P. J. Alexander overlooking tank training grounds at the McGregor allotment.  The military gets to do training on this allotment for some reason. This is as good a photo as I’ll ever get of Patrick.  He’s odd about getting his picture taken.  I did, however, get his blessing to share this photo….

Mostly crispy Sporobolus airoides.  When the rains come, this will be a target collection site.

Penstemon ambiguus.  A very cool, shrubbish, and unusually low dwelling Penstemon in NM.  There are two like that that I know of, of about 70 plus Penstemon species in the state.

Houstonia rubra

A cool rubiacid from the coffee family!  And one that I’ve rarely seen in flower.  Rubiaceae is a huge tropical family, but with few taxa in the deserts of the southwestern US.  Also, a bit of Physaria fendleri, a hip yellow flowered mustard.

Over the past few months I’ve spent a minimum of 23 full days counting individual plants, and their flowers or flowering stems. That equates to 184 hours on hands and knees picking through scratchy weedy grasses, blackberry canes and poison oak to find various rare plants. Most recently my co-worker Christine and I just finished doing a complete census of a listed species of daisy called Erigeron decumbens on each of our many wetland prairie sites.

Doing this much intensive and detail-oriented monitoring has been a challenge. The thoughts that go through my head during particularly long stretches of flower-counting most resemble my experience of jogging. At first, I convince myself that it will fly by… but not too long after I find myself calculating progress versus length of road ahead or transects left to count and finally digress into an internal battle to keep moving forward. There is usually a fleeting moment when I question a few life choices and fantasize about a desk job, or even my past as a bartender / waitress. I bribe myself with sips of coffee and the occasional stretch in an effort to ignore sore knees and the sharp florets poking through my socks and into my ankle bones. I agonize over my ability to detect each tiny plant and constantly push myself to look closer. My muscles strain and my mind wanders… only 30 more to go…

About this time I have passed the half way point. My movements become more efficient and calculated and I find relative peace knowing that the hardest part is over. My mind loosens it’s fixation on the end and allows me to push through. In the final stretches, I bask in the glow of hard-earned accomplishment. Once I take my last step / stoop to count the last plant I feel as though I could keep going and going, my mind fully surrendered to the task just completed.

I’ve never meditated much but I imagine that the struggle to quiet one’s mind is similar to that of careful monotonous counting. In the end, my work equates to a few rows and columns of data; a collection of numbers to better know the trajectory of these rare species. As we walk to the car I notice my internal dialog with each step…1,2,3,4… I’m caught in a loop of numbers and when I close my eyes I can see those delicate leaves, the bashful flowering stem, and a particular shade of green that separates one plant from another in my mind’s eye.

Erigeron decumbens

Training, scoping, collecting, oh my!

June was a busy month for the interns at the North Carolina Botanical Garden. After a week of SOS East Training here in Chapel Hill, N.C., we dove into research. With our heads buried in herbarium specimens and Delmarva Peninsula maps, we prepared for our first trip to the coast.

We traveled through North Carolina up to Virginia and Maryland. During our time, we saw some beautiful coastal plain habitats…

But when we returned, we had work to do: seeds to clean and more permits to acquire.

Until next time!

Background-
Impression Sunrise:

Impression Sunrise (Impression, Soleil Levant), created by Claude Monet in 1874, is one of the most important works in the impressionist movement. The contrast of the diminutive, dark colored fishing boats against the dominant, red-orange hued sunrise conveys peace and tranquility. In the background, the soft gray silhouettes of factory smoke stacks, construction machines, and large ships are almost comforting. In the midst of all the boom of construction in France following the Franco-Prussian war (1870-1871), this busy port of Le Havre may have symbolized the renewed power of France to Monet. But there is more than one way to view to heavy industrialization, and neither is generally that great for the fishermen.

And now-
Impression Sagebrush:

Traveling out here, I drove cross country with my mom all the way from Saint Louis, Missouri to the tiny town of Burns, Oregon. It was the longest road trip I’ve ever been on. What struck me the most was how much of this country is miles upon miles of highway connecting little towns to little towns, the green grasslands blending into dark mountains blending into red rocks blending into gray-green sagebrush. It occurred to me on that trip that this is the stuff America is made of.

Compared with my Massachusetts hometown of Lexington and my erstwhile home of St. Louis, the scenery around Burns is incredible. Here in Harney County, one might crest a hill only to be confronted with a towering butte, or a range of snow crested peaks. It seems that every tiny dirt road has a view of expansive gray-green slopes, or the shimmering tan flat of desert. You might say it’s majestic.

The people of Burns are endlessly friendly and helpful to us newcomer interns. Several have invited the four of us into their homes, a couple have introduced us to other young people in the area, and some have invited us to fish and shoot with them. Many people have recommended their favorite activities to us. One night at a fiddle music festival, we were even given waltzing lessons, and another time we were welcomed with rocky mountain oysters at a cattle branding. Yes, many people have different world views from us city folk, but that has never dampened their honesty and hospitality.

One of the first things that surprised me about the BLM came up in my first conversation with my mentor, Caryn. During the interview process, she told me that the BLM was hoping that the sage grouse would not be federally listed as a threatened species. At first I was shocked, since I had expected that people would want to protect a species whose population has seen such a precipitous decline in the recent past. On second thought, this position makes sense since it would be difficult to coordinate protection of the sage grouse according to the endangered species act with the many ranchers who use BLM land.

When I arrived in Burns and started work however, it seemed not only that the BLM did not want the sage grouse to be federally listed, but many individuals actually saw the potential listing of the sage grouse as a threat to the ranching lifestyle that dominates the county. They believe that sage grouse are in decline for three main reasons: 1) fire due to drought, 2) invasive annuals such as cheat grass, and 3) encroachment into sagebrush by western juniper trees (Juniperus occidentalis). All three of these things also pose challenges to their ability to raise cattle.

Later, when I was hiking in the Steens Mountains with friends, we happened to meet a man who had helped write the petition to federally list the sage grouse. He was upset when we informed him that the BLM was still seeding burned areas with crested wheat-grass (Agropyron cristatum), a non-native grass that provides good forage for cattle. In his view, the cattle ranching industry was the one threatening the sage grouse in three main ways: 1) overgrazing grass so that it provides no cover, 2) allowing raven populations to overwinter on dead cows causing an increase in ravens which then prey on sage grouse, and 3) degrading water sources by trampling.

Clearly there are at least two sides to the sage grouse issue, and they seem to come to a head over the issue of ranching and cows. Cows are highly valued and represent a way of life in Harney County. In fact, even though many cows stand in the road, anyone who hits a cow with a car must pay for it. Ranchers and those who work closely with them at the BLM see the importance of ranching in the community. These people live lives that seem to come out of an old western, complete with brandings, rodeos, cowboys, and roundups. Other people see cattle ranching as an ongoing problem that is only getting worse as the high population of cattle (over 100,000 in the county compared to about 7,000 people) degrades the land over time. Some people even argue that with their use of government land and government subsidies, ranchers are all essentially “living on welfare”.

Beyond the seemingly timeless beauty of Harney County’s rich culture set against its stunning landscape, there lies a conflict between cows and birds, or maybe just between two groups of people. Hopefully, the large amount of funding currently going towards sage grouse research can find why the sage grouse is really declining and how the decline can be stopped while cooperating with ranchers, because the sage grouse is being considered for federal protection over the next few years. The clock is ticking.

This was a very eventful month. Outside of the spectacular workshop in Chicago, my team and I have been monitoring a fledgling golden eagle and a few fledgling prairie falcons. On one of our visits we were actually lucky enough to witness all four fledgling prairie falcons make their first observed flight. Later that week we met with another office here in Utah and worked with fellow CBG employees to find and collect native seeds for the Seeds of Success program.

Also, we’ve completed our work in Hamlin Valley. This week we’ll be focusing on completing our reports and assessing how we can optimize sage grouse habitat while maintaining areas important other wildlife. This is particularly relevant for raptors, since they exploit Pinyon-Juniper for nesting, but also pose the largest threats to Sage Grouse.

Finally, we were invited to train with the Cedar City Department of Natural Resources (DNR) on proper capture and release of the threatened utah prairie dog. Their work centers primarily on extracting prairie dogs from properties where they pose as a nuisance or hazard, and releasing them at sites where they can prosper. So far this internship has been exposed me to a plethora of useful field experience, and I’m excited to how the coming months will unfold.

This is Amelia (as in Earhart)

Introducing the Brady Bunch

Might be more than a month ago, our motley crew mistakenly maneuvered into much muck. We managed to master the mire with much more matter and mustered moxie. Marinated in mud and muck, magnificently messy, but made merry by make-shift mastery, we maintained our march.

Silver shadows sent us shivering. The sunlight shriveled silently and swiftly. Storms snuck south, suddenly sullying our satisfied spirits. Still, us seven shouldn’t stop, said someone with stout-hearted sense. So, six settled somewhat skeptically.

Soon we saw a shimmering suspension of snow specks at summit. The sky suggested we’d see no sunset nor stars, and some suspected sleepy shivers. Seems we soon might not set sight on seed supply sites or small shrubs. Shouldn’t such slight snow soften by sunrise? Supposedly.

We woke warm and not wet with wild water; this weather had worked well for wanted winks. When watching the wondrous whiteness, we wandered while waiting. Work wavered as weeds withdrew in whirls of white. The white-wash world made our worthy work worthless! Wow Weather, why wouldn’t you wait?! This Wednesday, Weather won.

-O

Carson City BLM

Now over two months into my internship, I have gained more experience in water quality monitoring as well as begun training on riparian surveys. We have covered much of our resource area in the past month from the sub-alpine forests near the Wallowa Mountains to the lower elevation canyons along the Grande Ronde and Snake River.  We had to camp out for a few sites along the Grande Ronde and awoke to a chorus of coyotes and the brilliant night sky. One of our sites, Joseph Creek, winds through a stark basalt canyon in contrast to its lush banks of alders, blackberries, and many species of wildflowers. Joseph Creek is one of our long term monitoring sites, where the BLM uses these long term trends to adjust management of the surrounding area, be it grazing intensity or off road vehicle usage. Some of these sites are also Section 7 ESA streams, meaning they are habitat for state and federal listed fish species such as the Chinook salmon and the Steelhead trout. At these sites along with the usual water quality protocol, we also deploy temperature loggers for the season to measure the daily maximum and minimum so we can have a thermal regime for each stream.

Recently we had another intern, Zoe, start with us from the local watershed council and she is a wonderful addition to the team. She is new to ecology and natural resources studies for the most part, so my mentor and I are teaching her the ways of fieldwork and the science behind our projects. Zoe is from the area and has already been informing me of more places to explore!

Speaking of exploring, I’ve had a few more adventures in and around the gorgeous local mountains.  I had the fortunate chance of seeing a Great Grey owl hunting in a private ecological reserve in the foothills of the Wallowas! I also went hiking in both the Elkhorns and Wallowa mountains and am eager to go back to both, which contain many miles of backcountry trails.

Also a couple weeks ago, I attended the CLM Workshop at the Chicago Botanic Garden, which was an inspiring experience. I got a chance to learn more about plant taxonomy and how important a role it plays in restoration projects. For someone new to the plant world, the information was a bit overwhelming, but it gave me a glimpse of what distinguishing characteristics are used to key out a species and how seeds are collected and raised for establishing or maintaining a species.The symposium that brought speakers from various backgrounds was most relevant to my interest as they discussed restoration at the large scale, including wetlands as well as entire watersheds. It was a real privilege to hear Professor Joy Zedler, a prominent leader in watershed restoration, speak on the potential framework for future studies, through looking back on her own projects. I left the conference feeling a better sense of purpose in my own work with the BLM, understanding monitoring’s importance in recognizing shifts in ecosystems and through successful collaboration with stakeholders management plans can mitigate loss of species as well as ecosystem function.  In conclusion, I have to say the conference was also  a great opportunity to explore Chicago, as well as meet the fabulous set of individuals that are my fellow CBG-ers.

Alternative Training: Boot Camp for Grasses!

Since I have already attended the CBG training two years ago, I was fortunate enough to go on an alternative training opportunity in the city of Seattle. The opportunity involved an intense three day course on grass identification. We were given a plethora of grasses to observe and identify throughout the three day period. The first day involved a few lectures on grass identification and the importance of grasses. We were given over fifty samples of grasses to look at. Glumes, awns, ligules, paleas, anthers, culms, and every part relating to grasses was observed! By the end of the day, I was exhausted due to the shear amount of key features per grass I identified. This session really helped me out! In the past, all my botany classes concentrated on forb, shrub, and tree identification and always skipped over grasses.

Grass identification is serious business!…Also, when identifying grasses, sun block is essential.

Everyone’s favorite brome, cheatgrass!!! Kidding! 😉

The second day brought us out in the field to Discovery Park! We identified all the invasive and native grasses in the area. There were many interesting grasses that even grew in Illinois (where I am from) that grew in the fields here! Some of the grasses that stood out were ripgut (Bromus diandrus), quackgrass (Elytrigia repens)…..the genus has changed considerably, and American dune grass (Leymus mollis). Ripgut was a brome species and basically looks like a cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum) on steroids. Thank goodness I don’t see this in the field at work! Quackgrass was a particularly nasty invasive I have always encountered. If you grab the tip of the grass and pull the culm in the opposite direction, you could make all the seed heads move in a quacking fashion like a duck! ^_^ American dune grass was a massive grass found along the shorelines of the Sound and was planted to control the erosion of beaches. Overall, the day required a lot of walking and identification, but I loved it!!

The groundskeeper was curious on why so many people were on their knees picking grass…

The third day began with lectures and a chance to look at the herbarium they had at Washington State University. I had the privilege to look at many herbarium grasses that were collected along the Northwest corridor. Some of the collections were over 100 years old!! We met an artist that was working on the new taxonomic key for the Hitchcock guide book. There were other people that were working on the herbarium website. I use the Hitchcock guide book and the website all the time for plant identification and now I got to meet the people who actually worked on it all! I was so happy!! At the end of the class, I learned over 80 genera of grasses. The huge amount of species I have learned would help me in the future when I begin plant monitoring soon. Hopefully, I will see more grasses beyond the Stipa, Elymus, Leymus, Bromus, and Festuca species.

Looking at some herbarium specimens.

Eaglet Names!!

The eaglets have hatched and were very active in their nests recently. Some have started to explore the perimeters of their nest and beyond! O_O Recently, Jenny and I have been doing revisits and have observed many of the eaglets in action. I gave them names that suited them. I am sure you recognize Boo from my previous blog! Most of the active nests were up north towards the Canadian border. The central and southern nests did have some success as well!! Here are the names for the eaglets.

Site Name                       Eaglet

Bridgeport Bar East:        Bosmin

Douglas Creek:               Roseluck

Enloe Dam:                    Wyatt

Francis Canyon:             Eclipse

Grimes Lake:                 Boo

Hull Mt:                         Moonshine

Ice Caves:                     Dipper

Palisades North:            Lily

Pomona:                      Goldie

Saddle Mts:                 Star Buck

Sheep Creek:               Mable

Sinlahekin Loomis:       Fig Newton

Siwash Creek:             Truffle Shuffle

This is Truffle Shuffle doing his thing. It is really hard to take pictures of the eaglets. Haha!

Rock and Mineral Adventures

I have been busy on the rock hounding front around Wentachee, Washington. From petrified wood to opal to geode nodules, Washington state has it all! My favorite rock hounding spots were the Saddle Mountains, Douglas Creek, Red Top Mountain, and Crystal Mountain!

The Saddle Mountains were known for their petrified wood. Limbcasts and large logs of petrified wood were littering the ground on top of the mountains. This area had so much petrified wood, it was incredible. There were calcite and silica deposits as well near the petrified wood, so you could collect neat specimens!

Petrified wood and limb casts from the Saddle Mountains!! \(O_O\)

Douglas Creek has a lot of silica/ opal deposits at the top of the hills. The colors of the rocks vary from red, orange, pink, green, and white. The opal rocks look constantly wet and with cleaning they turned out to be top quality stones!

(/O_O)/ Douglas Creek silica rock and opal!

Red Top Mountain has Ellensburg Blue Agate. Those rocks could be easily dug up from the ground from the breccia deposits. The nodules and agates have a vivid blue color that could be used for jewelry. I went after a thunderstorm in search of the nodules. People left piles of dirt next to the holes and left everything. When I came after the storm, the nodules were exposed and washed by the rain. I could easily find the nodules in the piles. I spent a few hours early in the morning collecting samples.

Ellensburg Blue Agate and Nodules.

Crystal Mountain was an amazing place to search for blue nodules, agates, and other various large crystals. I hiked in and slid down the talus slopes to the geode piles. The talus slopes I was sliding on had many agates and blue striped nodules, so I quickly grabbed as much as possible while sliding down. At the bottom of the talus slopes, you could find huge geodes and nodules weighing 10 to 15 pounds! Geodes literally covered the ground in a few areas. Thanks to a fire in the previous year and the sheep eating grass in the area, everything was exposed! I hiked out of the area with 40 pounds of rocks! ^_^; The hardest part was carrying everything up the talus slopes. Haha!!

Blue nodule!!

The Bounty of Crystal Mountain!!!

The Great Transition: NISIMS

We were finishing up in Sulfur Canyon on NISIMS reports. Jenny and I have been going into the depths of Sulfur Canyon and recording wildlife observations, anthills, various bird species, and invasive plants. Cheatgrass, tall tumble mustard (Sisymbrium altissimum), Dalmatian toadflax (Linaria dalmatica), whitetop (Lepidium draba), Russian knapweed (Acroptilon repens), diffuse knapweed (Centaurea diffusa), and common woolly mullein (Verbascum thapsus) were the most prevalent weeds that were growing in the area. We hiked up various hillsides and narrow ravines to get to some of the most isolated sections of the allotment. By the end of each day, my shoes and pants would be covered with needle and thread (Hesperostipa comata) and cheat grass seeds. The area in my  shoes and pants that were exposed were pierced by seed, which was pretty painful, but I survived. <_<

Doing NISIMS data collection!!

In the future, we will be transitioning to many sites that had a fire within the last three to five years. These ESR sites would have basic transects that would help identify the plant population and the amount of invasive plants in that allotment. We will be traveling all over the state, including the other resource area to monitor the sites. In Burns, OR or Buffalo, WY, some of the sites would be two to three hours away. In Washington, some of the sites would be a lot further, because the Spokane District of BLM is basically the entire state. After the July 4^th weekend, we will be starting with Watermelon Hills to do NISIMS and to monitor a rare SIlene species!!

Moment of Zen

A “bumbled” bee collecting pollen.

Bonus Sheep Herd:

Sheep herd relaxing.

Moving to New York City from Bloomington, Indiana has been full of challenges. After 15 hours of driving and exiting the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, I was immediately rear ended, though this is New York and this doesn’t qualify as an actual accident. Learning. I had a day to settle in before I had to go to the internship training in Chapel Hill, NC. The training itself went fine, the North Carolina Botanic Garden staff were fantastic hosts. We made a couple collections and ate quite well the entire time we were there. Unfortunately, the week came to an end and we had to return to NYC.

Upon arriving at the airport in Chapel Hill, I received a text from my roommate letting me know my whip had been towed. Great. I had left my car with my new roommates to move my car due to the twice a week street cleaning. They moved my car, though I found out it was to a no standing zone. So after a couple hours dealing with the Brooklyn Navy Yard tow people (they had no record of my vehicle), I finally got my car out, but not before $400 in fees and an additional $230 in tickets were paid. Learning.

The internship has otherwise gone okay. I don’t know my species as well as I would like, though that is fixable. I’ve learned that tents don’t actually keep you dry and when it rains (frequently), sleep is hard to come by. I’ve been to Long Island, New Jersey, and Delaware so far, all new places. I’ve explored unfamiliar habitats and been exposed to plants previously not encountered in my home oak-hickory forests. I get to hike most days and spend plenty of days on the beach. As a group, we’ve made a handful of collections. I believe the count is currently five, so only 295 more to go for the season. It’s a seemingly daunting number at this point, though I’m sure easily obtainable as the season progresses.

While this month has been one of my most trying, full of financial despair and exhaustion, I have to imagine it should get better. Things can’t go wrong all the time, right?

Alvord Desert, Steens in the Backgorund

It’s been about 5 weeks ish since I’ve moved from my home in Baltimore, Maryland to a small rural town in Burns, Oregon. The act of moving to Burns was hard at first since I basically packed my bags the night of graduation and flew here immediately, meaning I missed a lot of grad parties and celebrations with friends. However, I wouldn’t really have it any other way. I can honestly say I really adore life here in my double wide trailer and with my 3 other CLM intern roommates. I open my front door in the morning to donkeys Duncan and Fiona, and horses Chester and…. I forget the other one’s name. At night I have 2 pretty kitties that love to cuddle and be pet. I miss rain though.  It’s very hot and dry here, and now that its hitting over 100 during the day, there is no relief. In a way Burns is its own cultural immersion experience. Cowboy life is real here, the big brimmed hats, cowboy boots, rodeos and bull riders, and high-waisted wrangler jeans are legit and not just for fashion. I’ve seen cow brandings and got a taste of Rocky Mountain oysters. All that “organic”, “grass fed” beef you like so much? It’s bred out here on the range in this way that’s not necessarily meant to be environmentally friendly, but is more or less anyway. The cows frolic all day on the range. Be wary though, because if you hit one, you pay out $5,000 to the farmer.  Being a black girl moving from a city to  a small conservative town, I was not sure exactly what to expect in coming to Burns.  But let me tell you, everyone in this town is super friendly.  I have literally not met one mean boned person here. Also I learned the BLM doesn’t slaughter/cull horses, which is nice to know because that was my only impression of the organization before coming here.

Wild Horse Lake on the Steens

By the end of my time here I shall be a botany goddess (at least when it come to identifying grasses of Oregon). So far my work has mainly been emergency stabilization and rehabilitation monitoring. In other words, I visit areas that have burned in the last few years and determine which plants (mostly perennials) have reestablished themselves. Sites vary from a decent mix of sagebrush and other natives to mostly invasive cheat grass. Sagebrush and high desert county are very different from the deciduous forests I grew up in, but I fancy the vastness of the range. I work 4/10s so 4 10hour work days a week.  This schedule is necessary, as it takes almost 2 hours to commute to any one field site. Actually, a 2 hour commute is generally a rule of thumb to get anywhere out side of Burns, thereby a 4/10s schedule is awesome because it also gives us 3 day weekends, which we have used to adventure to the steens, the city of Bend, and nearby lakes.

Well, I hope you enjoyed this snapchat of a CLMer’s life!

-Jessica Macer

Burns BLM