Hello everybody a little late but it’s sure here. My first blog entry for my second CLM internship. This time I got a botany position with the botanist at Vernal, Utah BLM Field Office. My first weeks here went by really fast and it was all fun.  First day, of course some paperwork, a few trainings and certifications and get all the gear ready for the rest of the week.  We would be rafting/floating in the White River, a river originating in Colorado from snow meltdown. The project in the river consists of removing non-native shrub and tree species, in this case Tamarix ramosisima and Elaugnus angustifulia, salt-cedar and Russian olive respectively. The removal of this species will improve native wildlife habitat. Our team consisted of two wildlife biologists, our mentor and botanist Jessi, fellow CLM intern Dani, and myself. The wildlife crew would take us to the spots where treatments would be applied and then plants crew (us) went in and assessed the area to try to come up with a monitoring plan for before and after treatment plots.

The following week I starting out by going out in the field with the weeds tech Jim. The plan of the day was to spray with herbicide the invasive species white top, which mostly occurs in riparian areas. The first half of the day went well but after we returned to the truck and loaded the UTV spraying vehicle, we noticed we were missing a pin from the trailer gate. We had to go back to town get it fixed before any serious damage happened. After we fixed that we went out and did a little more spraying. During this week I also completed another certification.  Then I explored the Seeds of Success database from previous years’ collection seasons and tried to figure out where to start scouting/collecting this season’s seeds. We ended the week by touring around the Vernal BLM resource area with two biologist from the US Fish and Wildlife Service Utah state office who were interested in seeing the work and progress being done in the conservation-monitoring of various sensitive species; a few of them were two species of penstemon as well as two different species of barrel cacti; Sclerocactus wetlandicus and Sclerocactus brevispinus.

So far this internship looks promising for a fun and learning work experience in the conservation and natural resource management field.

Until next time!

Hector Elias
2014 CLM Intern
BLM Vernal Field Office
Vernal, Utah

Hello everyone,

Since last month we have made good progress on the ESR monitoring on the Lost Fire burned pastures. After completing the data collection on the grazing allotments, the data was analyzed and the decision was made that grazing is not yet recommended.
After completing the Lost Fire monitoring project we moved on to collect post-treatment data on fuel reduction (Juniper tree cuts) projects that were completed last year. We decided to adopt the same monitoring protocol that we used for ESR since we were familiar with it and the data could also be used for grazing and management decisions.

With two more collections made we have also scouted possible populations for various sage-brush species collections. Hopefully there is still some time left after the government shutdown is over. Time also has been spent entering data in the SOS database, which includes plotting population points on a GIS database for future reference.

A fun experience we had was a day when large numbers of dead geese were reported on a dry lake bed. So we went out on a UTV which is the only fast way to get there and did the survey for birds (which in the end the result wasn’t nearly as big as they had reported). Close to being done, we sunk in a mud pit and the UTV got stuck. After trying our best to get it out by digging and adding rocks etc. etc., our attempt failed, so we radioed the office to send help and ended up waiting there for three hours before we could head back home.

One of the last projects I will be working on is part of the restoration of burned areas, which consists of seeding and planting seedlings of native plant species to return wildlife habitat and grazing lands to a stable site. So far we have gone out and verified the soil characteristics of the possible planting sites to plant bitterbrush and sagebrush seedlings that were grown in the local high school greenhouse.

Hopefully we can get back to work on our projects real soon!

Until next time,

Hector
2013 CLM Intern
BLM Surprise Field Office

Hello all,

With the seed collection of two more species and continuing with ESR monitoring on the Lost Creek fire, this past month has been definitely one of the fastest of my time in northeastern California. The seed collection season on the resource area is almost over, we are now only waiting for sagebrush species to seed out to be able to make some good collections of the various species present in the area. In the meantime we have been working on ESR monitoring, which is one of the most time consuming tasks that I have worked on. After GIS selects random points on the different pastures on the burned area, we drive and hike to the site and verify the site to match with the Ecological Site Descriptions so that we can compare it to the paired unburned site. After positively verifying the sites, we began the data collection through transects and different methods mentioned in the protocol. And of course all that data collected needs to be entered in database somehow, so some hours are spent in the office doing that.
Besides from ESR monitoring and seed collecting. I have also worked on surveys on pre and post fire fuel reduction projects (juniper tree stands cuts).
Another interesting activity was a day of riparian areas assessment with a complete team of the range specialist, the wildlife biologist and ecologist where they assessed a few springs on pastures that were up for grazing contract renewal. It was interesting to see the different points of view collaborating to come to a decision for management actions.
I also got the opportunity to join a field office tour of the high rock canyon trail. It was a fun learning trip where we got to see that very remote place with such an amazing geology, soil and elevation diversity.

So far it has been a fun learning experience here at the Surprise Valley looking forward to more learning opportunities.

Until next time,

Hector
2013 Conservation and Land Management Intern
BLM Surprise Field Office

Hello again,

Another month has fled by here at the Surprise Valley. The month of July started out by attending a week long great workshop with the Great Basin Institute, Eagle Lake and Alturas Field Offices staff going over the Assessment, Inventory and Monitoring (AIM) Strategy- ( Emergency Stabilization and Rehabilitation (ESR) monitoring protocol) the workshop was presented to us by researchers of the ARS Jornada Experimental Station. The protocol covered the whole process of establishing and running a monitoring plot. Several techniques include site characterization; in which the general area is described, soil profile description, plant species list, line intercept point, gap measurements, quadrat density and belt transects. It was a great opportunity to meet people in our field of work and of course acquire more useful knowledge to work towards managing natural resources.

The rest of the month we have been working on the ESR monitoring on an area disturbed by a wildfire last year. The whole process did not look that hard or time consuming during the workshop compared to how it really works on the actual site. We are still getting the hand of it but it is going smoother as we get more experience on it. Also on the days we are not monitoring I get some time to work on the seed collection which is going good, we have collected a good amount of species and still waiting for others to seed out. On one of the collections we partner up with the FFA club students from the local high school and collected Purshia tridentata (antelope bitterbrush) seed which will be started on their greenhouses and later on the seedlings will be planted on areas recovering from fire. I still get to help out the wildlife staff with which I had the chance to do some surveys on big horn sheep, help out in sage grouse habitat improvement projects and earlier this week I got the chance to help out the Modoc Wildlife Refuge do some duck banding which was a fun learning experience.

Until next time,

Hector Elias
2013 CLM Intern
BLM Surprise Field Office

With this my first post I would like to thank the CLM Program, and its staff, at the Chicago Botanic Garden for this great opportunity of working with the BLM at the Surprise Field Office in Cedarville, CA. My first official work week of the internship started with the workshop at Chicago. At the workshop I had the chance to meet lots of fellow interns and of course the CLM staff (Krissa, Wes, and Matt) who throughout the week exposed to us the objective and purpose of the internship program. The training included vegetation monitoring and analyses techniques, plant ID practice, and navigation with compass and GPS units. Also, the Seeds of Success program was explained, and the protocol for species collection was reviewed to make sure it was followed for a successful collection this year.

Following the workshop week, I arrived at Cedarville in the Surprise Valley. The week started with a staff meeting where I was introduced to the people working in the different departments at the BLM office. The first day continued with driving, computer and first aid certifications and laying out the plan for some of the projects I will be working on.

So far, I have worked with the wildlife department improving sage grouse habitat by recognizing and assessing areas for potential thinning of juniper tree stands to open up the area for more suitable habitat. The removing of trees will also improve hydrology as more water yield from snow melt and rainfall is expected. Other work with the wildlife program has include installing game cameras in new water developments created for recently introduced big horn sheep.  I have also spent time scouting the resource area for seed collection sites, and so far I have made four collections, and am waiting for more native plants to seed out.

I hope to keep enjoying my job here and, of course, keep learning and applying new principles and techniques for conservation and land management.

Until now this is all.

Hector
2013 CLM Intern
BLM Surprise Field Office