It has been a bittersweet time this month as it will be on of my last in this part of the state. I am going to be leaving intern status to start my Permanent GS 9/11 gig in Rawlins, Wyoming.  I have been applying for permanent archaeology jobs for 5 years and never getting callbacks.  Then all the sudden I had 3 interviews at once. However leaving a place you love for a job is tough, but a career has to start somewhere! This last month I have been doing tons of fieldwork in some of the more interesting and scenic parts of the field office. This field season I have surveyed hundreds of acres of BLM surface and found very few sites, however a lack of sites is important scientific information as well. It’s going to be tough to leave a  office I have been in for four years, but I am sure many cool new mountains and archaeological sites await.

Recently while talking to friends and family everyone asks me how my new life in the city is going. I’m a pretty honest person, so I tell them how it is – I adore my internship (Hiking around to scout and collect seeds all day? Best gig ever!) and my coworkers and I are all already really close friends… But for someone who just spent most of the last four years in the nature lover’s paradise that is Vermont, the city is just about the worst. It’s loud, there are always trash bags everywhere, trying to get anywhere is insane, stores try to charge you $6 for a box of cereal, and in general it is terribly inconvenient. Thankfully I took this position knowing that I’d be travelling outside the city a lot for work and this past month the MARSB team finally got to go on some scouting and collecting trips!

For our first trip we spent three days scouting state parks and learning our collection list species on Long Island. While the traffic was still awful and most places were either fancy residential areas or a giant tourist trap, I was surprised that the conserved land on this built up island still appeared to have healthy ecosystems. Many of the beaches were even gorgeous to boot! We focused primarily on dune and beach species there, most of which I was already familiar with from growing up on the coast. Our mentor Clara also taught us about how to tell when certain seeds are ripe. Below is her sharing some very unripe beach pea seeds (Lathyrus japonicus).

We also went back to some areas closer to the city on Long Island for two day trips at the end of the week. Probably the most exciting moment for me on the trip was getting to see one of these beauties (below). They’re called Grass Pink (Calogpogon tuberosus) and are an orchid which grows in bogs and other wet areas. A small colony of them were growing in a boggy swale between dunes with other (in my opinion) exciting species such as two sundews (Drosera spp.). We were intent on covering ground though, and I regret not being able to key them out, although they were probably the typical roundleaf sundew (Drosera rotundifolia) and threadleaf sundew (Drosera filiformis). I’m not sure where the guys on the team had run off to at the time, but my female coworkers, Clara, and myself had quite the laugh after what we thought was a frustrating mystery orchid we had found growing along a clearing edge. After many attempts to key the plant out Clara finally pulls it out of the back of her mind that the plant was actually a strange, showy-flowered plantain (Plantago patagonica) and we had managed to be looking at a specimen with poorly developed leaves the whole time!

Hello all!

This past month has been quite exciting and fun! What I love about this internship is that the types of work we do is always changing and we always see new places. My mentor here in Richfield estimated that we cover 8 million acres of land! It is so great that I am getting to see more of the state of Utah than I have seen in any other state I have lived! At the end of May/start of June, we began taking vouchers for our seed collections for Seeds of Success and then shortly after, we all had the workshop in Chicago. So far our crew has made about 25 collections, so currently we are really on a great pace!

Having fun during seed collection!

A lot of the collections we have made are of Needle and Thread (Hesperostipa comata), Indian Ricegrass (Achnatherum hymenoides), and Globemallow (Sphaeralcea parvifolia). But we have also made a few collections of Machaeranthera tanacetifolia, Astragalus lonchocarpus, and a few others. It is a great experience to look at all sorts of different habitats and try to find big enough stands of plants to get a sizable collection from.

Buckhorn Wash in eastern Utah

Seed collections for Astragalus lonchocarpus!

Searching western Utah for new possible seed collections

One of the other things that I have enjoyed so far is when I have the opportunity to go out into the field with other people from our office, or other nearby offices, and we look and discuss different treatments that have been done to various areas. It is really cool to see and hear about what the area looked like in the past, what it looks like now, if the treatment worked or did not work, what could have been done differently. And hearing everybody’s insight makes for a more complete answer to these different questions.

I imagine by the time of my next post our crew will have even more collections completed, and possibly more then our target of 40! Until next time!

Sam

Richfield, UT

Another project I am working on is surveying established populations of rare orchids at Catoctin National Park in Thurmont, MD.  Let me do some introductions.

Coeloglossum viride – Long Bracted Orchid (LBO)

The Long Bracted Orchid (Coeloglossum viride) was the first orchid for which I surveyed.  LBO is threatened or endangered in 8 states, including Maryland, and the population that we have here at Catoctin Mountain Park is the largest population in the state! LBO may not be the most charismatic orchid, but it certainly does have some strange habits.  This orchid has been surveyed since the early 1980s and has seen a significant amount of decline, most likely due to deer browsing.  What is interesting about LBO is that since a deer management plan has been implemented in the park, the population has been steadily increasing, but only in one specific area.  The only place that LBO has been found in the park is on the outer edge of a campground parking lot and along an adjacent horse trail.   The LBO thrives in the disturbed edge habitat that the parking-lot and horse trail provides!

Another orchid I have been working with this season is called the Purple Fringed Orchid.

Greater Purple Fringed Orchid

The Greater Purple Fringed Orchid (Platanthera grandiflora) is found in moist habitats and has a strong associated with skunk cabbage.  PFO has been surveyed since the later 1970s and has also seen a sharp decline likely due to the over population of deer in the park.  Measures have been taken to protect the orchid and the recent implementation of the deer management plan has also done good things for the populations of the Purple Fringed Orchid in Catoctin Mountain Park.

Platanthera grandiflora

I was able to get together a team of other interns and seasonal rangers to help me survey some swampy stream areas and we were able to find a total of 50 individuals!  We took GPS points and data on numbers of flowers and buds and were able to compare it to the previous years of data.  It is interesting seeing how the population ebbs and flows as the years go by.

The last orchid I ran into this summer is called the Large Round Leafed Orchid (Platanthera orbiculata).  While surveying for the Long Bracted Orchid along a horse trail I stumbled upon a strange looking orchid-like leaf with a stalk full of buds.  Back at the office I told the biologist about it and she directed me to a paper published in 2014 that documented a long-term study of the orchid populations in the area.  (http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10531-014-0698-2)  After reading the paper and doing some research on the orchids listed in the paper I was able to get a good idea of which orchid I had found….

Platanthera orbiculata – Large Round Leaf Orchid

Platanthera orbiculata

After the orchid flowered I was able to positively identify it as Platanthera orbiculata.  The exciting thing about this orchid find is that this plant was listed as extirpated not only from Catoctin Mountain Park, but the entire Catoctin Mountain region!  Needless to say I was excited.  The paper draws a correlation between orchid decline and deer over population.  Considering Catoctin Mountain Park has had their deer management plan put in place for only 5 years, it is possible that the decline of deer browse has allowed this orchid to re-emerge.  Imagine what else could pop up!

Until Next Time,

Emily

I’ve been in Dillon, Montana for several weeks now, working at the BLM field office there. My mentor, Kelly Savage, is primarily a range specialist, but is also the plant specialist of the office. Kelly has taught me a lot about everything, from range land management to edible native plants to Native American cairns. I’ve also been out with range technicians doing different vegetation and stream surveys; one day I went out with a wildlife technician, Melanie, and looked for Goshawks on a timber sale allotment. The variety has been fun and I am looking forward to collecting seed this week.

As someone who does not come from a ranching background or even from the region, I quickly learned a lot about how life and work go out here. Several words and phrases have taken on new meanings for me since moving from Portland, Oregon to Dillon.

Looking out on Sage Creek

Land- On the first day my mentor and I drove around the grazing allotment she manages and discussed just about everything. Something that struck me though was her use of the word land. “Really, everything I am doing is to improve the health of the Land. If we manage it well, the Land can continue to give and teach us for many years.” I capitalize Land because when talked about in this sense, the word loses its stale meaning of a portion of the upper crust of the earth and becomes something that is a dynamic unit. “Land” means the dirt, rock, and debris (DAUBENMEIER) that hold up the flora, fauna, fungus wrapped into an inseparable package, interdependent and specific.
Land is also tied to ownership, which, depending who you ask, can mean responsible for or control over. Even the idea of “owning” land comes with controversy and implications of capitalism, exploitation, and inequality. (Tangent: some academics have claimed that the privatization of land coincided with the spread of written language, thus a shift to right brain values. I digress.) It is strange to think that while doing a seed collection if I walk ten steps to my right I could cross the imaginary boundary into “private land,” where the plants are now loyal to only the name on the title. However, proprietorship also allows for care for the designated plot of earth. It avoids the tragedy of the commons and ties a sense of commitment to its future. My job this summer will hopefully provide the data and tools to make informed and sustainable decisions concerning the use of the Land.

Binos- Rhymes with “dinos.” I spent a day with wildlife and had to bring my binos to do Goshawk surveying. I’ve never seen a goshawk, but after listening to the call box all day I will recognize its call until the day I die.

A bull and cow

Cow/Bull- Before my first day at the BLM, cows and bulls were cattle. Now one must distinguish between cow cows, cow bulls and cow elk, bull elk. I’ve seen plenty of cattle cows and bulls, but also a handful of elk. My co-worker Berett found three elk shed this week and let me keep one! It makes me feel like a real Montanan.

Big Country in Medicine Lodge

Big Country- In contrast to Land, country cannot be owned, despite the fences designating plots and borders. When driving on Old Bannack Road towards Big Sheep Creek, the sky, hills, and plains expand before me. Big Country is not only a geographically large area, it is space you can see. The nothing between the mountains becomes something, and that something is enormous compared to anything humans could build.

A visitor at a potential collection: Northern Sweet Vetch (Hedysarum boreale)

The past month has been spent analyzing our annual vegetation data from juvenile Desert Tortoise sites, and we’ve come a long way! We have also been searching across most of Utah and some of Colorado (Colorado Plateau) for potential post-oil well vegetation monitoring sites! This new project is a departure from our previous work, and will be a nice getaway from the heat in the Mojave! This has involved a tremendous amount of filtering through GIS data and looking at satellite imagery for promising sites. The criteria involve clusters of sites, each containing: sites where Artemisia tridentata and/or Coleogyne ramosissima grow (or would, if an oil well hadn’t been established), a site from each decade from 1950-2000 (when the oil well was plugged and abandoned), and that each cluster fall within certain climatic constraints. This is no small task when faced with over a thousand potential sites! But it has been a great way to learn more about GIS and get a look at post-restoration oil well from the air!

In other news, the weather has been incredibly unpredictable, with temperatures climbing well above 110 F and incredible thunderstorms at the same time! Incredible precipitation events have led to flash floods and sights like this dry lake bed near Primm, NV, which is not-so-dry anymore!

Meanwhile the perennials are sending off seed, and the summer annuals are waiting for their moment to sprout from this monsoon weather!

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!