Trillium sp.

It has been a little over a year now since I started interning in this stunning NW corner of Oregon. On any given day I find myself harvesting native seeds at a BLM seed orchard, attending meetings to coordinate the restoration of a decommissioned dam site, searching mistletoe for butterfly larvae, or adding data to a never-ending pile of spreadsheets. I’ve been fortunate enough to get two extended internships, within 60 miles of each other, which complement each other incredibly well. The first was based out of the BLM’s field office in Salem, and the majority of my work there focused on riparian restoration and native plant materials projects. I traipsed around the Willamette Valley looking for blue elderberry, cascara and nine-bark seeds one day and participated in a design charette for a new recreation day-use facility the next.

Hard at Work: Johnson's Hairstreak Surveys

Now that I’m in the Portland, OR, office, I work with the Forest Service on an interagency team of rare and threatened species specialists. My daily environment still varies wildly, from my lavender-hued cubicle in the heart of downtown Portland to moss-laden conifer forests and wind-whipped coastlines. Some of my favorite projects were surveying for endangered tiger beetles and Johnson’s hairstreak butterflies, the latter of which I got to do with a fellow CLM intern, Camille Duncan.

Over the last few months I have been working with crews to conduct surveys for a rare polypore fungus, Bridgeoporus nobilissimus. These fungi are associated with true firs, which grow at higher altitudes. The fruiting bodies can be quite large (some up to 5 feet across!) but they are often very inconspicuous, hidden under litter and duff at the base of the trees, and don’t seem to fruit very often. This brings up questions as to how rare the species truly is. Could it be that people often overlook it? Or is it much more prevalent in an ecosystem, but not in fruiting form? To tackle these questions, we designed a protocol to set up random sampling plots around known occurrences and take tree core samples of a variable number of true firs within these plots. The core samples are then sent out to a contractor and tested for B. nobilissimus DNA. The results of this will let us know how to survey for the species in the future, and how to manage our forests for it. Hopefully we can also glean more information about the range of this species, and better insight into its life history.

Our final survey of the season is tomorrow, and then I’ll be tying everything up in the next few weeks before I head off on new adventures. I’ll join the chorus and say that this job has been incredibly rewarding and inspiring. Everyone I have worked with has imparted some little note of wisdom or a new perspective, and my field work has reinforced a personal desire to always work with our wild areas and do what I can to protect them. Next step: grad school!

Candace Fallon, Forest Service Regional Office & BLM State Office, Portland, OR

I'm giving a ridiculous thumb up because my heart swells at the sight of deciduous trees.

The Cedar City Field Office handles 2.2 million acres of land.  Although much of that is desert, we have a few areas with real, proper trees — none of this juniper nonsense.  The problem is that these trees are often ailing on account of changes in burn patterns, usually less frequent burns than the region historically saw.  Unsurprisingly, human beings are largely responsible for the changes through fire suppression. You can hardly blame their logic though; fear of being burned to death isn’t entirely unreasonable.

The resulting shifts in vegetation are noticeable, however.  Our stands, groves, and the occasional forest tend to be too dense for their own good and the ground is choked with decades of debris just waiting to burn all too eagerly.  Not only that, but the lack of fire has permitted the spread of the dreaded Juniperus osteosperma into lands where we don’t think it belongs. Our office has a fuels management team which is responsible for try to clear up this whole mess and for which we sometimes survey.

The favored method of control isn’t to go and carefully remove by hand all the downed trees and flammable debris from the ground. Budget and manpower issues aside, no one really wants to do that. Instead the BLM tends to burn things which, to be honest, sounds like way more fun anyway. A controlled burn, unlike a presentation in a 100-level college class, is not something that you can just wing; our office recently executed a burn that had been 10 years in the making.

Up in the mountains where we inventoried sage-grouse breeding habitat, there are a few aspen stands. They’re struggling thanks to over-grazing by cows and wildlife and are being choked by an explosion of juniper. The aspen are growing in the middle of sagebrush which is itself threatened by the same juniper. Our office’s proposed solution is to burn around the groves and clear out the non-aspen by hand within the groves. We hope that the sagebrush will rebound quickly and that exclosures around the aspen should keep the saplings from falling prey to the ravages of elk and cows. The one catch is that we’ve seen plenty of sage-grouse in the aspen and surrounding sage which means that the burn will need to be very carefully controlled and timed to avoid driving off or outright killing them.

Michelle slipped on the loose groundcover while doggedly searching for a raptor nest.

We’ve also been searching for Accipter gentilis, the northern goshawk in areas with struggling ponderosa which could benefit from a proper fire. Raptors are protected under federal law and so we get to make sure that any potential burns don’t interfere with nesting and breeding. When pressed to explain our methodology, I usually resort to Gwen Stefani: we’re wandering around with a boom box looking for ‘holla back girls’. In a show of inter-agency cooperation, the Forest Service has lent us a ‘kek box’ which can blast several different goshawk calls (including their characteristic ‘keks’) that the birds will normally respond to. Our job has been to hike slopes so steep and treacherous that we fear for our extremities — a fellow seasonal broke her ankle trying to fight through unreasonably thick curl-leaf mountain mahogany — while playing back the calls and listening/looking for responses. We’ve only found one pair and they had a seriously ramshackle nest on a tiny scrap of private land which means that burns will likely be approved.

With any luck, we’ll be able to sort some of these problems out. Humans broke the system and now we’re responsible for keeping it running and eventually repairing it. I’m still hopeful.

Nelson Stauffer, BLM Cedar City Field Office, Utah

Rafting the Copper River and keeping an eye out for invasive plants and amazing sights along the way.

For the past 3 months, my CLM internship has placed me in Alaska, specifically Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, our largest national park and a land of superlatives within this gigantic land.  As a member of the Exotic Plants Management Team (EPMT) for Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, it has been my duty, along with the 4 other EPMT workers in the park, to identify, prioritize and weed populations of invasive plants throughout this 13.2 million acre park (about 2.6 million acres per person!).  Luckily, Alaska is somewhat ahead of the invasive species curve, compared to the majority of places in the lower 48, and the immensity of this park lends a few perks to my job.  For example, it is unreasonable to survey large swaths of the park from headquarters on foot, so this summer I have had the opportunity to tag along on a 5 day raft trip, multiple day hiking trips, and multiple flights into the backcountry, all while inventorying for invasive plant species and learning the native plants and animals throughout this park’s many ecosystems.  When we find a population of invasive plants, we use Trimble GPS units to take GPS coordinates, describe the population, and, when manpower allows, weed it.  The most common invasive plants encountered this summer have been oxeye daisy (Leucanthemum vulgare), narrowleaf hawksbeard (Crepis tectorum), white sweetclover (Melilotus alba), lambsquarters (Chenopodium album), foxtail barley (Hordeum jubatum), and the common dandelion (Taraxacum officinale).  Not all of these species are actively weeded by the park’s EMPT program, particularly the common dandelion, but it is still important to monitor all invasive species populations to determine their potential to negatively affect these nearly pristine Alaskan ecosystems.

Inventorying for invasive plants on the Jumbo Mine Trail among the blooming fireweed (Epilobium angustifolium)

The immensity of Wrangell-St. Elias National Park makes it inaccessible to most visitors, and because invasive species usually arrive in new areas with the help of humans, we have focused on inventorying and weeding more highly visited areas, including backcountry destinations, airplane landing strips, campsites, trails into the park, and town centers.  Wrangell-St. Elias National Park differs from many other parks in the US because there are private inholders within the park.  In fact, there’s an entire town located in the center of the park—McCarthy, Alaska—which is where I have been stationed this summer.  Before arriving, I was told that the ‘nearest’ grocery store to McCarthy is a 7-8 hour drive away, comparable to the drive from my home in Ohio to Chicago—and just for some groceries!  The reality has been a bit easier (a general store in town does stock a limited and expensive selection of food), but the people of McCarthy definitely live a different way of life from the majority of Americans.  For the past three and a half months I have lived in McCarthy and traveled around the park, but during the remaining month and a half of my internship, I will be stationed at Copper Center, on the western edge of the park, since McCarthy is shutting down now that tourist season is over.

Porphry mountain in fall, bordering McCarthy

Thus, my internship has challenged me not only in learning the plants, animals and processes of new ecosystems (boreal forest, alpine tundra, glaciers, and temperate rainforest!), hiking for days to inventory invasive species populations, and honing my GPS/GIS and report writing skills, but it has also challenged my way of life.  In McCarthy, many people live out life from a different time: when homes were heated by wood stove, water was hauled from nearby creeks, and people lived off the land.  Cell phones and television hardly exist here, internet is slower than dialup, and mail comes only twice a week.  Yet it has been extremely rewarding to see this way of life, experience some of it, learn about these Alaskan ecosystems, and realize that real wilderness still does exist in this world, an exciting thought for someone who grew up in the Midwest.

Kennecott, an abandoned mining town four miles from McCarthy, overlooking the Root Glacier moraine and bordering mountains

-Joe Donohue, Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, Alaska

One of the best things about having a GIS-based internship is that it’s such a widely used program nowadays that I’ve been at least minimally exposed to what every department does here in the BLM Rock Springs Field Office. Officially I’m here to work on updating and restructuring the GIS database, which I often liken to cleaning out and elderly relative’s attic: there’s tons of stuff, you’re often not quite sure what it is, and you’re constantly uncovering fascinating tidbits of information. There’s no such thing as a “typical” day in this process–the majority of my time is spent asking questions, rearranging and renaming data, hunting down layers from other agencies, and updating, editing, and creating new data where we have gaps. So far I would say the take home message for me has been to always write metadata (records of what information is, who made it, when, how, etc.) for any GIS data I produce in the future. Here’s a great website if you want to know why it’s just about the greatest invention since sliced bread: http://geology.usgs.gov/tools/metadata/tools/doc/faq.html

A few days a week I get to go out into the field to get my hands dirty, literally:

This was on a (very sappy) White Bark Pine (Pinus albicaulis) pine cone collecting trip with Victor Biasotti–a former two-time CLM intern for the Seeds of Success program who’s currently working directly for the BLM.

Using a GPS in the Adobtown Wilderness Study Area on a field trip with the Minerals and Lands Department:

Discovering Wild Blue Rye (Elymus glaucus) on a scouting expedition in the Bridger National Forest:

Unfortunately the seeds weren’t ripe and we got frosted on, but the scenery was spectacular on the 8-mile hike in—we saw two moose, sand hill cranes, Clark’s Nutcrackers, and at 9,200 feet above sea level, breath-taking views, especially at our campsite (below):

This internship has been an amazing experience to date and I look forward to seeing what adventures my last month and a half has in store!

Aiko Weverka, BLM, Rock Springs, WY

Example of a "monocline" at Capitol Reef NP

While I’ve only spent a little over 3 months of my post-graduation life in Utah, I think I can safely say that I’ve seen more of this absolutely stunning state than most native Utahns could lay claim to in their whole lives. From our base of operations near the center of the state in the town of Richfield, my two fellow interns and myself have explored the canyons, mesas, buttes, mountains, meadows, arroyos, pinyon-juniper hillsides, ponderosa and aspen forests, grassland steppes, slickrock desert wildernesses, and all sorts of other swell places that I’m not quite sure how to name. The diversity of landscapes and natural features in Utah is staggering and not at all what I—a mere midwesterner—had expected when I heeded the call of the ever-growing wanderlust in my heart and headed west from Iowa City, Iowa for my position with the BLM in Richfield. Quite the contrary, my limited knowledge of the American Southwest had me worried that I was consigning the next 5 months of my life to be spent in a desolate and lifeless-gray wasteland. Thankfully, nothing could be further from the truth, and I have thoroughly fallen in love with the unique beauty of this land.

Prickly Pear in Flower: Beautiful now, but collecting seeds from the well-protected capsules is a painful experience

As an intern with the BLM, I’ve been working on the Seeds of Success (SOS) program, collecting the seeds of native plants from the Colorado Plateau ecoregion for long-term seed banking (in case of the apocalypse), restoration (plenty of former oil pads need a makeover), and research. While I sometimes feel like a glorified lawnmower as I systematically work my way through a population of natural grasses, cutting seeds off into my collection bag, I recognize the value of the work that I and numerous others are carrying out. Since modern settlers first arrived in the West, bringing such “wildlife” as sheep and cows with them and the multitude of “improvements” that modern life seems to necessitate, this land has been radically altered and the ecology simplified. With the benefit of hindsight, we can now see how many of these changes are detrimental to our future. Restoring native plants to their natural range and banking seeds to preserve genetic diversity is an essential component of successful conservation practices.

Natural Bridge: Found up a tributary of the Colorado River, east of Moab, on one of our plant scouting expeditions

While collecting seeds in some of the most gorgeous vistas I’ve ever seen is pretty neat, it can occasionally get a tad tiresome. Luckily, we’ve had several diversions to keep us entertained and energized. In late July we attended the Botany and Mycology 2009 conference held at Snowbird, Utah. Just east of Salt Lake City in the Wasatch Mountains, Snowbird is one of the premier ski resorts of Utah in the winter, and an alpine wonderland in summer. Lectures, hiking, and of course the free coffee and cookies are a surefire recipe for fun bombs. This past weekend we also had a real stupendous time on the Green River in northeastern Utah for a weed-pulling, threatened-plant-finding, rafting, “BioBlitz” extravaganza. As everyone knows, spending time on or around water is simply too much fun to be work, so when I found out I was getting paid for my recreation, I positively squealed with delight! Well, maybe not quite, but it sure was a rollickin’ good time.

Doing a little Tai Chi on top of Angle's Landing in Zion NP. Good for the heart, good for the soul.

While there’s plenty more to share about my life here in Utah, I think I’ve already communicated the gist of what’s made my internship experience thus far so fantastic. While not every aspect of it has been as rosy as the red rock sandstone I see on a daily basis (see: office politics), I’m still stoked that I chose to come out here. And since I’ll be out here until the beginning of November, I still have plenty of time to see even more great places before I head home. My goal is to get to all 5 national parks in Utah. Having been to Zion, Bryce Canyon and Captiol Reef so far, I only have Arches and Canyonlands left, which should make for some wonderful trips as the weather cools into October.

In parting, I want to leave with some words about the red rock country of eastern Utah that I’ve come to love from a more poetic and authoritative source than myself:

“…it seems to me that the strangeness and wonder of existence are emphasized here, in the desert, by the comparative sparsity of the flora and fauna: life not crowded upon life as in other places but scattered abroad in spareness and simplicity, with a generous gift of space for each herb and bush and tree, each stem of grass, so that the living organism stands out bold and brave and vivid against the lifeless sand and barren rock. The extreme clarity of the desert light is equaled by the extreme individuation of desert life-forms. Love flowers best in openness and freedom.”

– Edward Abbey, Desert Solitaire

Utah Beauty: The Water Pocket Fold of Capitol Reef NP is visible in the background

Alexander Howe, BLM, Richfield, Utah

Clark Mountain - one of my favorite collecting spots

Since June, I have been working for the BLM in Needles, California, in the Mojave Desert. With the government’s recent push for renewable energy development, the Needles Field Office has been busier than it ever has been before. Thousands of acres of public land are beginning to be developed for solar and wind power plants, and the Mojave is an ideal location. My primary task has been to collect seeds from native plants in these areas for future restoration, which has been both rewarding and exhausting. It’s exhilarating to know the seeds I’m collecting will be used to restore and rehabilitate a habitat that will be going through lots of changes in the near future. However, collecting seeds from widely dispersed, very prickly plants in 125 degree heat is about as difficult as you can imagine! The locals like to say Needles is two miles north of Hell…and on hot days, I know exactly what they mean.

Krameria erecta seeds on my glove. They look like medieval maces - they're so prickly you just have to stick your hand in the shrub to collect them!

My other responsibilities include mapping and surveying sand dunes south of Needles for the Mojave fringe-toed lizard, which is currently being reviewed for listing as an endangered species; surveying the lower Colorado River for bats, using mist nets and high frequency recording devices to identify different species calls; hiking miles upon miles hunting down sensitive native plant species to input into the state database, monitoring water sources that are located in wilderness areas for invasive weeds, and learning to identify dozens of new plant and animal species I’ve never seen before.

A pallid bat (Antrozous pallidus) - this little guy was one of 80 individuals we caught in one night

Before accepting this internship, I had never been to the Mojave Desert, and it was someplace I never thought I would go. Moving to the desert from Colorado was a shock to the mind and body, especially since I’d only ever worked in old-growth pine forests in the Rockies. Over the last three months, however, I’ve learned to value and enjoy one of the most desolate, extreme places I’ve ever been. The term wilderness has really taken on a new meaning for me; it would be nearly impossible to survive in the desert even for a few hours without water or shelter. A place that inhospitable and intense deserves respect and reverence, as do all the plants and wildlife that manage to thrive here. The Mojave is an ecologically sensitive, awe-inspiring place that not many people get the opportunity to know or enjoy. I’m incredibly thankful that I’ve gotten a chance to explore an environment I’d never considered before, helping me grow personally and professionally.

Liz Thompson, BLM, Needles, CA

My workplace

For the past three months I have been living and working in Washington State at North Cascades National Park where the mountains are grand and the lakes are cold. I work for the park’s plant ecologist on a variety of long term monitoring projects. This internship has introduced me to Western Washington, from the prairies of San Juan Island, to the old growth and subalpine forests of the North Cascades. My brain has been overflowing with new plant information; common names, scientific names and six letter abbreviations. I moved to Washington from Colorado where I learned the plants and forest patterns of a drier climate. The west side of the North Cascades is wet. The trees are huge and the understory is dense. The ferns and mosses continually remind me of the incredible amount of water that hydrates these forests. Due to the rain shadow effect, the east side of the Cascades is drier and more reminiscent of the Colorado Rockies.

Early in the summer, while we were waiting for the snow to melt in the mountains, we conducted grassland transects at San Juan Island National Historic Park at the American Camp. The prairie that we ran transects across was once forested but more recently served as pasture land. The tract of land is now protected as National Historic Park and is grazed not by sheep and cows but by deer and rabbits. As we walked the transects we noted changes in cover type (grass, shrub, or tree) and whether the majority of the cover was native or exotic. This monitoring project aims to learn how the land is changing without the agricultural grazing pressures. Are native grasses or invasive grasses becoming more or less dominant? Are shrubs replacing the grasses? Are trees replacing the shrubs? As the park aims to preserve the National Historic Park and the ecology of the landscape this study will give natural resource specialists an idea of how the land is currently changing.

Data collection

For the second half of the summer I have been working in the forests of the North Cascades. Here we are in the early years of a forest monitoring project to track changes in the forests. We visit established forest plots and relocate marked trees that are part of a study tracking growth, death, and recruitment patterns and shifts. This data will be used to track forest changes as the climate of the Northwest changes. The last month of field work has been monitoring whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis), a subalpine five-needled pine. Throughout western North America whitebark pine is suffering from an introduced white pine blister rust (fungus). Whitebark pine plays an important role in the subalpine ecosystem. The trees are extremely hardy and can establish on unstable, exposed slopes with extreme weather conditions. As they establish they increase slope stabilization creating more hospitable habitat for other plant species. This makes whitebark pine trees ‘nurse’ plants. In addition, the seeds are an important food source for Clark’s nutcrackers, squirrels and bears. I have loved the whitebark pine work. I have been inspired by the whitebark, from the steep slopes where they grow their roots, to their purply cones with tasty pine nuts, to their funky gnarled growth forms, to their beautiful high elevation view of the world.

This internship has been an incredible experience. My work has taken me on week-long backpacking adventures to places that many folks dream of visiting for vacation. Field work has allowed me an up-close view of a spectacular landscape, working alongside the most knowledgeable people on the area.

Vaccinium deliciosum... blueberries!

Each time I am out in the field the park reveals new secrets; enormous glaciers, hidden alpine lakes, subtle vegetation patterns, showy alpine flowers and many blueberries. Spending my summer in the North Cascades has confirmed for me the important role that the National Park System, and all of the land management agencies, play in protecting some of the most beautiful places on Earth.

Annie Bossange, North Cascades National Park, Marblemount, WA

Ah, to be a native seed collector.  Might sound like a soothing, peaceful and valuable job, one that allows you to wander beautiful landscapes, gaze at incredible flowers, ponder ecological/historical questions about the land… and sometimes it is all that!  Then there are the times when it is the diametric opposite, a frustrating exercise in patience and perseverance.   Patience is what I always find in short supply.  The Worland field office primarily covers the Big Horn Basin of north central Wyoming where precipitation ranges from 5-14 inches/year.  Wyoming big sage, greasewood and rabbitbrush dominate a sandy, saline and dynamic topography.  It is a harsh place to make a living, many of our forbs and more desirable reclamation species are simply hard to find in any great density but are scattered about in a dispersed continuum.   As Forest mentioned, these types of populations don’t fit easily into the SOS protocols, nor do I feel that I can justifiably spend 2-3 days crawling around for a couple thousand seeds (alas these aren’t T& E’s).   I have those moments at the end of the day, filling up my truck with gas- are these handful of seeds worth the $50 dollars in gas, my days wages and the price to ship and clean them?   I tell myself yes (I might be out doing it again tomorrow and need the motivation) and remind myself of the larger cause, that those Plant Materials Centers will cherish these gems and within their confines they’ll flourish.  Obviously, yes I have doubts sometimes.  In general I’ve found it hard to break out beyond the grasses, I may not enjoy keying them but they’re a boon to collect- typically more abundant, not too low to the ground and not as readily tasty for the native fauna.  Thus far I’ve made about 20 collections about 60% which are grasses.

There are other interesting things out there- one can't always look at plants!

Ah, what I am looking at?

Aside from seed collecting which comprises about 65% of my time, I help various folks out with their monitoring projects, PFC’s, weed and fire treatments.  This has been a great opportunity for me to observe the interface between management and science- a contentious exchange, but a necessary one.  The utility of either one depends on the other.  And yes like everyone I drive, drive, drive.  This seems to be the way of life out here, both for work and pleasure.   My highlights are always days when I get to work with others or a group—ha ha!  I live by myself in small town in Wyoming and many days I drive around and collect seeds alone, so company is always more than welcome!  I’m starting to realize how much I appreciate time to myself and have begun to savor the slow life, yet I’ve also learned I definitely am a social creature.

A specific highlight was collecting limber pine cones for a USFS genetic study on white pine blister rust.  Reading Elizabeth’s comments made me recall our ordeal.  I just gave up on the tree pruner- found the limber pines too limber and my arm strength waning as I tried to maneuver this thing above my head for more than 10 minutes.  So I just started to climb the trees and had a sticky blast chucking cones down to my mentor while she scurried to get them.  Then I pretty much took a bath in rubbing alcohol to dissolve all the pitch.  Fun, beautiful and productive- what I wish every day could be.

Fremontodendron californicum ssp. decumbens or Pine Hill flannelbush. This species is federally listed as endangered and state listed as rare. This species is known to be endemic to the Pine Hill area of El Dorado County. There is a similar plant found in Nevada County and experts are unsure as to whether it is the same plant or just closely related.Photo credit: Graciela Hinshaw.

As a CLM intern I have been fortunate to participate in the operations of a rare plant preserve at many levels. I have attended cooperative management meetings, met with developers to discuss the possibility of land acquisition, conducted rare plant surveys as part of long-term monitoring, participated in the creation of a fuels break, met with conservation professionals to discuss the rare plants and their relationship to similar species, participated in the NEPA process, assisted in rapid response invasive species removal and gathered native seeds for seeds of success. My mentor has been very active in exposing me to many aspects of land  management. I get exposure to a little bit of everything.

Salmon Falls. My favorite and the largest parcel of the Pine Hill Preserve.

I am working for the 4,122 acre Pine Hill Preserve at the Sierra Foothills in El Dorado County where eight rare plants are in need of protection. This is a fragmented preserve made up of five non-contiguous units. The mission of the Pine Hill Preserve is to “conserve in perpetuity the rare plants species and plant communities of the western El Dorado County gabbro soil formation.” There are five federally listed species and four of the plants are endemic to the Pine Hill area.

Unfortunately, much of the land where the rare soils, and thus the plants, are/were found has been developed. Therefore, a lot of what goes into protecting the plants on this fragmented preserve is acquiring new lands to prevent further development and loss of habitat. A new acquisition is being considered where the very small and federally listed El Dorado bedstraw is relatively abundant. If this land is acquired, it would be wonderful for the preserve and for the little Galium californicum ssp. sierrae. It would also increase the amount of open space to be enjoyed by future generations and could be a good site for scientific research.

Monitoring at the Cameron Park parcel prior to fuels reduction. Due to the abundance of fire prone chaparal throughout the Pine Hill Preserve, the creation of fuel breaks is imporant to prevent wildfires. While prescribed burning would likely benefit the rare plants, the proximity of homes makes the creation of fuel breaks a safer option.

I feel very lucky to be experiencing conservation at work on the fringe of urban sprawl. While I am definitely not channeling John Muir in my day to day experiences as an intern (sometimes I am quite literally working adjacent to backyards and not backpacking through the wilderness), I am experiencing what will continue to be an important aspect of conservation, protecting endangered species surviving at the edge of modern development.

Jennifer Bartlau, BLM Field Office, El Dorado Hills, California

Inventorying for trails from top...

Popping into my head immediately, when I try and sum up my CLM Internship Program with the Chicago Botanic Garden is a single word.  Gratitude.   Hypothetically if you could hop into a time machine, go back in time and visit 10 year old Bryon, and you surprised him with an interview and quickly asked, “What do you want to do for a job when you grow up?”  Ten year old me would probably have hummed and hawed, kicked the dirt and eventually responded sheepishly like little boys tend to do, “Uhhm….Is their a  job where you just kind of explore around in the woods?”

...to bottom.

Well little boy Bryon, you would be pleased to find out, indeed there is a job where you do that.  For three field seasons I have been at the heart of a route inventory across the Medford District BLM, an accumulation of public lands totaling approximately 866,000 acres scattered across Southern Oregon.  Another Chicago Botanic Garden Intern and I began the project in 2007, from which I continued on as the crew lead and data steward for the following two field seasons.  During this period my crew and I have inventoried 204,431 acres and mapped 197 miles of previously undocumented trail.  The breadth and extent to which I have been able to, “just kind of explore around in the woods,” is so staggering I often have to remind myself of how lucky I have been.  This of course brings me back that single gracious word.

The essence of the project has been to cover as much ground as possible, as thoroughly as possible.  Sounds simple right?  Well sure, but remember in order to cover ground, you have must first know the ground.  That is to say, to do the job correctly one must know exactly where they are, at all times.  Most folks would think this means relying on GPS machines but I quickly learned it is the other way around.  Satellites move, signals are slowly lost to entropy, and batteries can die.  On the other hand we can count on contour lines, creek beds, and good ole Magnetic North to stay put (at least within our lifetimes).  When things get confusing, or there is a bit of a (cough) internal dispute about location, UTM Coordinates can offer laser like precision.  That being said nothing beats the ability to read contour lines like a book and the landscape like the face of an old friend.  Map and compass navigation, like any skill, is improved with practice.   When refined though, these skills can broaden our view of the landscape and free up the GPS machine for taking data instead of giving it out!

Giving orders to the machine, not taking them!

Besides navigation the other primary challenge to, “covering ground,” is the obvious part; actually getting around.   Once again, this is easier said than done.  Between crushing winter snowpack’s up in the “snow zone” (over 4,000 feet in this part of the world), dizzyingly steep ridges, and a summer fire season which can seriously restrict the use of motorized vehicles, selecting the most appropriate mode of travel has been much more than an afterthought.

Easy does it coming down!

The ultimate tool for covering ground is of course the dirt bike.  Slim enough to squeeze through the tightest of spaces, and with power and speed that can cut travel time by a factor of 10 or 20, the dirt bike trades in any chance of being discrete, for quite simply, the fastest mode for moving to very specific locations.  This makes it a very effective tool for this kind of work.

"Steep enough for you?!"

Even dirt bikes have their limits though and some trails are simply too steep to ride.  Needless to say, the ability to judge for a limiting slope, which I like to refer to as, “The point of no return,” (particularly when going downhill) is an essential skill.  At this point it was always back to the basics, scrambling and zig zagging up or down the crumbling trail by boot and foot.

Golden Fields of Fire Danger

A yearly summer occurrence here in Southern Oregon is fire season.  During fire season the risk of wildfire can be so high the combustion engine of a motorcycle is deemed an unacceptable risk.  During those periods our crew traded burning gasoline for burning carbohydrates.  Mountain bikes usually make a good pairing with the slope of the winding mountain roads.  When the roads become too steep to pedal up, they offer a cool breezy downhill reward to crew members who were willing to push the bicycle up the hill.

Just around the next bend...

The most common, and certainly most lasting, occurrence of the internship is perhaps the most simple.  The act of walking up a shady mountain road, closed in by canopy and trunk, ears alert to the squirrels and birds skittering in the brush, tasting the weather of that day, and inevitably lulled back in time to that exact spot.  It is wonderful feeling; kinship with those who have came before on this very path, taking the same crunchy steps, and entranced by the ancient thrush calls.

Remnants of Another Age

The world of yesterday is gone.  Quiet Native Americans and crusty old miners will never walk these mountains as they once did.  But if we get off the paved road, go up onto the dirt towards the summits, and turn off onto a smaller route once, maybe even twice, continuing up, out, away into the wild; something special will begin to happen.  As we make our way the quiet grows, and the smallest of sounds begin to amplify.  Our eyes become accustomed to the chlorophyll glow and manmade objects suddenly pop out as the exception grabbing our attention.  We share feelings with the deer, both listening carefully to each other, cautious of any hidden threats.   As the hours go on and on out there it becomes clear the greatest honor that we can serve to those that have come before us is to quietly walk in their footsteps and let the ever thriving sense of place gently fill us the same way it once filled them.

In my view public lands are the most essential and perfect representation of our country.  Not only a living breathing example of freedom but our public lands offer endless inspiration with their mystery, beauty, and resilience.  The American author Edward Abbey has a quote to the tune of, “I may never go to Alaska, but it sure is nice to know it is up there.”  This quote is as true for our public lands as it is for Alaska.  No matter whom you are or where you live across this broad country, even if you never even make it down the block to the town green, you should feel comfort to know there are more spectacular places than you could visit in 1000 lifetimes.  And they all belong to YOU!

I can’t properly express with words, the pride I feel for these lands, and the pride I feel for the work I have done to help protect them and allow them to be enjoyed by others.   The phrase, “Life changing experience,” doesn’t really seem to fit because I now feel like this is my life.  Our land is so far beyond us, in quality and in quantity, that all we can do is hope for the chance to let some of it inside of us.  To have received that chance, from The Chicago Botanic Garden and the BLM, I feel nothing but pure gratitude.

Bryon Harris, 2009

Pride for Our Land!