Hi y’all, my name is Katherine and I am one of the two CLM interns based in Boise, ID. For the next four months, I’ll be working with my mentor Jessica Irwin, my teammate Liza Chang, and a wonderful crew of scientists at the Rocky Mountain Research Station to continue monitoring common garden sites and collecting native plant seed throughout the Intermountain West.

It’s hard to believe a month has already gone by since arriving in Boise. Before a few weeks ago, I had only ever passed through Idaho on my way to the West Coast. Having limited experience with xeric ecosystems, I hardly knew what to expect. So far, the answer seems to be “anything!” — at least, weather-wise. The first week brought rain and even snow on some nearby peaks, followed by a super sunny week in the 90s, and then back to rain again. I’m lucky to say our work has been similarly variable.

We began our season at the common garden sites in Richfield, ID; Orchard, ID; and Orovada, NV. Working with the USFS crew, we collected phenology data on three forb species installed at each site. Because the sites are typically in pretty remote places, we get to camp at the garden and hang out with the crew. So far, we’ve consumed innumerable PB&Js, startled a few snakes, and collected hundreds of teeny tiny leaves. Each week brings new flowers, weeds, and seed “poofs” along with new adventures after work.

For example, on a recent vegetation survey in the Santa Rosa Range we traveled far up a road into the Red Hills, winding through cow pastures and along steep cliffs to a peaceful grove of cottonwoods and mining debris. Though the plants in the area weren’t quite grown enough to collect herbarium specimens, we made the most of the evening by hiking up to the top of the ridgeline. There, we not only found a cactus that had not yet been documented in the area, but were also treated to the most beautiful views of vast, empty valleys. I’m looking forward to more of each in equal measure – new plants, off road adventures, and expansive nothingness.

“Try chewing on a twig,” suggested my mentor, Ian. He held a branch low for me. At first, it tasted like nothing, but as I broke through the smooth bark, a distinct minty flavor emerged. He explained to me that the tree was a yellow birch. Recognised by its unique peeling bark and serrated leaves, yellow birch branches bear a strong wintergreen flavor. 

It was my first week interning at Ottawa National Forest. Two weeks after graduating from college, I had found my way to the small town of Ironwood, Michigan. The iron in Ironwood is gone now; the last mines closed decades ago, but there is no shortage of wood here. The town sits on the western edge of the forest, a million acres of aspen, pine, oak, maple, ash, tamarack, willow, cherry, birch, and more. 

In the time I’ve been here, I’ve just begun to learn the local plants. Interrupted ferns have sporangia in the middle of their fronds. Sweetgrass with warm tan spikelets dots roadsides, and lily pads shaped like pies with a slice cut out float on calm ponds. While I’m here, I want to try and learn as many plants as I can. The forest is vast and changing. I want to know it all. 

Some of the change happens naturally —  a stand of aspen dies back and hardwood trees grow in succession — and some of the change is brought about by people — a stand of aspen is cut, so new aspen can grow in its place. Much of the change currently happening in the forest is driven by a warming climate. Ian told me that the elk and caribou that used to roam here have almost entirely been replaced by deer from the south. The deer eat young hemlock trees in the winter, making them rare in the forest. This summer, I will be focusing on a different source of change, invasive species. 

Brought in from far away by boats, birds, firewood, and a thousand other sources, many invasive species throw local ecosystems out of balance. Without natural checks on growth carefully forged by thousands of years of evolution, these species can start to take over and greatly reduce ecosystem diversity. As CLM interns assigned to the invasive plant team at the forest, fellow intern Tessa and I — lovingly termed the “Weed Crew” — are tasked with heading out to sites in the forest with known infestations of “Ottawa’s most wanted,” the invasive plants with the most potential to harm the forest’s ecosystems if left unchecked. Armed with hand saws, trashbags, gloves, and hardhats we venture into the depths of the forest looking for Japanese barberry, invasive honeysuckle, garlic mustard, and others.

Though some invasive species have native lookalikes, each is distinctive in its own way. With glossy leaves and delicate thorns that will splinter into unarmored hands, the yellow stumps of Japanese barberry look like specks of gold against the dull forest floor. Invasive honeysuckle can look similar to native honeysuckle species on first inspection, but if you snap a twig, the dark bullseye inside lets you know you’ve found your mark. Garlic mustard can be identified visually — small white flowers with four petals crown erect stems — but true to its name the smell of the plant gives garlic mustard away. It has an odor that would make any vampire turn and run. 

Spending long days in the forest, Tessa and I travel from site to site. Sometimes, despite the best efforts of past invasive plant crews, infestations have gotten worse. This week, I went to a trail entirely lined with dense clumps of garlic mustard. Sometimes, though, we will go to a past site and walk it diligently, concluding, after thorough inspection, that the invasive species has not grown back. 

After cutting down a dense clump of invasive bushes, the forest can look barren, littered with rocks and stumps. In these moments, I remind myself that by removing the invasive species, we are creating the opportunity for new plants to grow. These past few weeks, we scattered many native seeds — primrose, sweetgrass, St. John’s wort, white asters, and black-eyed Susans. We also planted hundreds of native trees, making sure the little seedlings’ roots were straight and pressing the dirt family around them as if tucking them into bed. 

On Wednesday this week, Ian and I traveled deep into a wetland, my black rubber boots getting stuck in the mud, until, straining with all of my weight, I pulled them free. Tall moss and orange mushrooms grew over decaying logs, and light filtered in through the leaves of black ash trees. An invasive bright green beetle called emerald ash borer has just reached the edge of the Ottawa, so in a few decades all of the ash trees in the wetland will be gone. That’s why we were there. Carrying hundreds of silver maple fruits, we walked in a wide circle watching them twirl like helicopter blades into the mud. We are hopeful that as the ash trees die, the silver maples will grow in their stead. 

Over the next few months, I’m looking forward to learning more about the forest, meeting new people, and continuing to explore the diverse ecosystems here. Thinking far into the future, though, the thing that excites me most about our work this season is the chance to come back to the Ottawa in twenty years. I will walk the places that are by then familiar to see all the ways the forest has changed, how it has stayed the same, and if the trees we planted have grown. 

Hi! I’m Emma Greenlee, and I’m a CLM intern based out of Winnemucca, Nevada this year. I moved out here a few weeks ago as I was finishing my last finals period at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. Now that I’m settled in and have been at work for a few weeks, I’m here to report what I’ve done and learned so far!

I’m working for the Forest Service on the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest, which is the lower 48’s largest national forest, spanning Nevada and some of California. I’m stationed at the Santa Rosa Ranger District in Winnemucca, and am working primarily with Sierra Sampson, the zone botanist for the northeast part of the forest. So far I have liked the Forest Service vibe (maps on all the walls, animal skulls and other natural specimens everywhere, and kind people who know and care about the area) a lot, while also seeing the challenges of working in an understaffed and underfunded office with more land to manage than time and resources to accomplish everything. Sierra is awesome and I’m excited to work with her and hopefully other people around the district and forest.

After a week of training on noxious weeds, UTV operation, herbicide application, and common invasive species identification, Sierra and I drove to the Bull Run Mountains, a range north of Elko, NV near the Idaho border on the Mountain City Ranger District, to meet two botanists from the University of Nevada-Reno (Jerry Tiehm and Jan Nachlinger). Jerry and Jan are prolific botanists who have been collecting specimens for UNR and other institutions’ herbariums for decades together and it was very cool to get an introduction to subalpine and northern Nevada flora from them. I have a very long ways to go but I was able to commit at least some species to memory and start to recognize others and think about how the plant communities in this area are organized. We camped with those guys for several days and then went our separate ways to spend one last night camping in the Ruby Mountains east of Elko. The Rubies were a stunning mountain range that I was surprised wasn’t a national park! (And that’s how everybody knew I wasn’t from here…) Sierra and I saw a few marmots and a last awesome sunset of the trip and I jumped in the stream running through Lamoille Canyon. I can’t remember how cold Lake Superior is anymore but this felt like it came close!

Throughout the trip I saw Sierra take the time to build positive relationships whether it was with seasoned botanists, campground hosts, or members of the public. Although I’d thought about the role of land stewards like the FS in interacting with diverse stakeholders, I hadn’t thought about how this might play out in small, everyday interactions like Sierra demonstrated, so this was a small but important part of the trip that I will keep thinking about along with all the new species of Eriogonum (wild buckwheat) I learned. I also have a soft spot for geology and I’m dying to get my hands on a copy of Roadside Geology of Nevada after all the amazing rock features of northern NV I saw this week.

Until next time!

Emma

USFS-Santa Rosa Ranger District, Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest

I pulled into Alamogordo, NM, my Honda Fit stuffed with everything I had to my name (which admittedly, is not a lot), ten days unshowered and racing to my second-dose vaccine appointment. I had been driving since 4am, just coming off an extended road trip routing that included the Grand Canyon, Bryce Canyon, Escalante, Joshua Tree, Yosemite, Lake Tahoe, and down Highway 1 on California’s coast (my first time seeing the Pacific!). I’d just finished a 6-month term in Americorps’ ACE program based in Flagstaff, AZ, and took advantage of the time in between my end date in AZ and starting here in the Lincoln National Forest to do some solo-travel and live the #van (Fit) life. After 6 months of hard manual labor consisting mainly of trail construction, much of it backcountry, I was excited to get back into the world of botany, data analysis, and actual beds!

Coming from rural north-central Indiana, a flat hunk of land consisting mainly of corn and soybean fields, the West has been an entirely different planet full of jaw-dropping vistas and crazy conservation corps misadventures. This is my first time in New Mexico, and I’m excited to see what new experiences the Chihuahuan desert has in store.

 Here in Lincoln NF, my co-intern Natasha and I are going to assist a small part of the ongoing South Sacramento Restoration Project by conducting rare plant surveys that will contribute to the project’s database of federally listed endangered and threatened plant species, as well as regionally sensitive species that exist in the forest- this data collection will also help with building a dataset for a habitat sustainability model that is being developed for the Lincoln NF. Although we’re in the Chihauhaun desert, much of the Lincoln NF consists of sky islands, isolated areas that are ecologically radically different from the surrounding desert, often found in mountain ranges such as the Sacramentos. This leads to an extremely biodiverse region, with high species richness and many endemic species. 

While waiting for our rare species’ to flower so we can accurately identify them, we’ve had several different learning opportunities working with different Forest Service employees- we’ve been helping the natural resources crew here build one-rock dams to control soil erosion in riparian areas, as well as learned about local wildlife through some birding with a local expert. We’ve also been collecting plants to practice keying them out and refamiliarizing ourselves with botanical terms and plant families, and have been practicing driving out to sites and using our GPS units to track and find points. My favorite find so far has been Viola canadensis, which is not one of our rare species, but a familiar sight to me after having done research on prairie violets during my Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) internship at the Chicago Botanic Garden itself. I was excited to see Viola again for the first time in the West! 

Working with Aurora, the forest’s botanist, as well as the other Forest Service seasonal techs has been great and I’m already learning a great amount from them! The flowering season here is almost upon us, so we’ll soon start our rare species’ data collections. I can’t wait to update everyone on how they go!

Hi! My name is Megan Crapo, and I am so excited to start sharing about my time as a CLM intern working with the US Forest Service at the Monongahela National Forest in West Virginia. To start, I am from Phoenix, Arizona and went to college just outside of Chicago, Illinois. Coming to West Virginia has pushed me farther east than I could have ever imagined and these first three weeks have exceeded my expectations. I can’t wait to see how the rest of my time here will turn out!

These first three weeks have been filled with many adventures. Since my co-intern Katie and I are still waiting on our federal driver’s license and other trainings like pesticide application certification’s to be completed, we have been able to tag along on other USFS projects. This has allowed us to meet our other co-workers and learn about different projects and maintenance needed to help preserve the ~1,400 square miles of the Monongahela National Forest. Some of the projects we have helped with have been botany surveys to keep track of rare and threatened plants in the forest, salamander surveys to help with a local research project on the effects of large woody debris on salamander abundance and species richness (pictures 1&2), and helping with a local restoration project with CASRI by planting red spruce, red maple, and other native plants with the Appalachian Conservation Corp (pictures 3&4).

These first three weeks have shown me just how much work goes into maintaining national forests and I am excited to see what there is in store for the next five months! Soon Katie and I will be able to go out on our own to work on projects such as invasive species management, habitat monitoring, and more!

Hello and welcome to my first blog post as a CLM Intern! My name is Katherine Sparks and I am currently working with Megan Crapo at the Monongahela National Forest in West Virginia. I am so grateful for this amazing opportunity and am super excited to gain such valuable experience!

My journey to becoming a CLM Intern was an adventure in itself. Through a frenzy of trying to complete final projects for my previous internship with Oak Ridge National Laboratory, recovering from the stomach flu, and applying to graduate programs, I came across the CLM program entirely by accident. After spending 40 hours a week staring at a computer screen for the past year, working outside in a national forest seemed almost too good to be true – but I am so glad it was true! I have now made the long journey from Missouri to West Virginia and am living amongst the beautiful Allegheny Mountains.

The majority of my first two weeks here has consisted of reading training materials and studying to become a certified herbicide applicator, but this week Megan and I got a break from our computer screens and joined the botany crew for a training field trip at the Cranberry Glades. The goal was to see several sensitive, threatened, and endangered species in order to properly identify them for botany surveys in the future. We specifically looked at Canada Yew (Taxus canadensis), Heartleaf Twayblade (Neottia cordata), Appalachian violets (Viola appalachiensis), and Winterberry (Ilex verticillata).

While out in the field, we also came across several species that – while not on our list – were interesting to see and fun to learn about! Cranberry Glades has a population of carnivorous pitcher plants and we were able to see them as well as an open sundew plant. It is believed that the pitcher plant population was artificially introduced into the system, but it was still interesting to see carnivorous plants in a “natural” setting.

After we finished learning the species for the day, we went out as a group to Summit Lake to conduct a botany survey and practice everything we had learned. We made it through the first plot without finding any of the species on our list and had made it through the majority of the second plot when the wildlife technician from the Gauley Ranger Station spotted a heartleaf twayblade hiding amongst some beech brush. It was an exciting way to end a fun day!

Hiking through the woods with individuals who are just as excited as I am to learn about plant species and their habits and ecology is a relatively new and undeniably refreshing experience for me. It was a great way to get to know my fellow coworkers better and an even better way to start the field season. I can’t wait to see what adventures the rest of this internship holds!

Hi everyone! My name Liza Chang. Never having visited this part of the country, I am excited to be doing work for the Rocky Mountain Research Station in Boise. Although I’m based out of Boise, I will be doing a fair amount of traveling to places I never would have seen on my own. We have already visited some remote places in Idaho and Nevada, and have scheduled trips to Utah and Washington.

So far, work consists of orientation tasks, data collection from the common gardens, scouting new sites, and lots of camping. I work with another CLM intern named Katherine, under the mentorship of Jessica. For the first couple weeks, we worked in tandem with other biotechs that we will occasionally see throughout the season. Camping together, we very quickly developed a strong sense of community over the first couple weeks. I can only imagine what 4 more months of camping will bring.

We learned the ins and outs of collecting data on forb species in the common gardens. Not only did we learn about the different species, or how to use Survey 123, but we also learned that bur buttercup is painful to weed, and some good stretches to unkink your back!

On our first scouting trip in Nevada, we drove the trucks off the beaten path. It was a good thing they had four-wheel drive because we drove down steep mountain passes and rocky streams, alongside plenty of cattle. There was not a lot of vegetation in flower, but we recorded the first cactus in this specific mountain range!

I made the trek to Klamath Falls in two days, coming from Downers Grove, Illinois. The Saturday before leaving was spent celebrating my sister and her fiancé at their small backyard wedding. Sunday was full of ranging emotions, but I was ready to start my adventure. I hugged my mom, brother and dog goodbye and left at 5am Monday morning. The roughly 30 hour drive consisted of several podcasts, reading, and gazing out of the window admiring the views of states I was seeing for the first time.

I was traveling with my partner, Charlie, who I’m grateful for taking time off work to come with me. Having traveled to Colorado in the past, long car rides were something we were prepared for, but we were clearly poorly prepared for the change in climate when reaching Wyoming. We were wearing Teva sandals and shorts, when it was snowing and 30 degrees outside. But it was definitely beautiful to see the landscape and quick change of weather.

Utah was also a state we bookmarked to come back to, even though we just saw a small portion. Driving through the Great Salt Lake Desert was incredible, except for the fact we were cutting it close on gas. But we made it! Spent a whopping $4.60 per gallon.

Arriving in Klamath Falls and having the rest of the week and weekend to settle in was a treat. We used that time to get myself packed and organized, as well as check out some of the nearby hiking trails and restaurants. Come Sunday night, my nerves about the first day were building, but after meeting Nolan (mentor and FWS Fish Biologist) and Justus (co-intern) the nerves turned into excitement.

Arriving in Klamath Falls and having the rest of the week and weekend to settle in was a treat. We used that time to get myself packed and organized, as well as check out some of the nearby hiking trails and restaurants. Come Sunday night, my nerves about the first day were building, but after meeting Nolan and Justus, the nerves turned into excitement.

This first week has shown me a glimpse of working for a federal organization and the amazing conservation work being done by staff at KFFWO. I’m so looking forward to starting field work next week and gaining any and all knowledge and skills I can!