Well, all of a sudden the summer is coming to a close, and my internship soon will be too. I’ve continued to enjoy my position here in central Oregon as a range technician, trying out lots of different vegetation monitoring techniques and going out with other crews around the office to see what they do. Pictures might be able to adequately sum up most of what I’ve done this summer…..

I’ve been able to see sage-grouse hens and do habitat surveys,

figure out ways around private land to get to trend plots on BLM property,

learn about plants that I’ve never studied or seen before,

establish long term trend plots on sand dunes,

see tons of amazing wildlife, including bighorn sheep, wild horses, long nosed leopard lizards, robber flies, and golden eagles,

and of course I’ve learned to do all new kinds of paperwork in the office, which unfortunately I don’t have many pictures of.

Being a CLM intern this summer has also meant being lucky enough to be in the heart of the West with plenty of weekend time to explore. It has been so incredible to explore all over Oregon and California, seeing more National Parks and Forests than I ever have before, allowing me to camp and have a great time as well as learn even more about conservation and environmental programs. Crater Lake, Yosemite, and Lava Beds were just some of the places I got to visit this summer:

But most importantly, I’ve gotten to work with and for so many fantastic people this summer. Being around so many other great interns in Lakeview has been wonderful, and I’ve been fortunate enough to have supervisors that are as driven as they are down to earth and easy to talk to. I’ve learned so much about what the BLM does here in Oregon and how important ranching is for people here.  Getting this first-hand  understanding of the BLM and local people has made me realize how important it is to monitor the grasses and shrubs that I have been evaluating all summer.  Keeping these habitats healthy, looking for invasive species, and measuring shrub cover for valuable species all help to maintain the resources that we have and try and keep our use of the land sustainable.  I’m not sure how else I would have been able to learn so much about this area and the people who work here without this internship opportunity. I am sad to leave it, but excited to see what future opportunities it will bring me!

Signing out from Lakeview, Oregon,

Katie Laushman

I’m here in Lakeview, Oregon, interning with the BLM with a handful of other interns. We’re all working on different types of plant projects, and so the past few weeks have been a whirlwind of getting to know everything we’re seeing out here.  Being from Northeast Ohio, I’m used to identifying forest wildflowers and deciduous trees, but in Lakeview I’m becoming a pro at getting to know grasses,  shrubs, and little scrubland flowers.  As a rangeland monitoring intern, I help to check long-term plots within BLM lands that ranchers periodically use for grazing.  Some of the plots we check have been established in the 1970s, and so the photos and data we take are used to compare the health of the land to what it used to be.  We record what species are in certain areas and try to assess the health of the rangeland. We also have been measuring shrub cover, mainly of sagebrush, to help collect more information for the infamous sage-grouse.
The transects that we run to get all of our data can get a bit repetitive, but the BLM has a ton of land here and we drive out to lots of different sites and see a lot of landscape.  The driving itself has proved to be a bit of an adventure, with lots of old bumpy roads that take some practicing to get a handle on. We’re near an Air Force base and so we often see low flying jets and hear roaring sonic booms out in the middle of the scrub desert. A little eerie, but being out so far from big roads and any towns has also been really refreshing. It seems that every day I find a new plant that I haven’t learned yet to take back to the office and identify.  I’m excited for more flowers to start blooming and the grasses to get greener and fuller as the season continues.  We see lots of pronghorn out in the field, as well as hawks, eagles, rabbits, and lizards. No snakes or mountain lions so far, but we’ll see how the summer goes!

Typical views from work