Hey! This is my second post and month of being here, in Carson City. First of all, I must say that it’s never boring here and every day I discover more and more of new things. In particular, this time I’d like to share a maybe less practical but still amazing story which I’ve been thinking about for the last couple weeks. The case is, we finally met a winterfat bush!  Almost every time we’re in the field we are chatting about and guessing which bush is, this mysterious plant with the longest Latin name ever – Krascheninnikovia. What attracted my attention is of course a genus name. The first thought was, why is a genus with such a Russian name here, in North America? Well, there is an answer to this – Krascheninnikovia species’ range occupies East Asia and west coast of North America. But also, we were curious who was Krasheninnikov and why the genus was named in his honor. Actually I’m writing this mainly because of the answer I’ve found. Stepan Petrovych Krasheninnikov – a prominent Russian botanist of the 18^th century who made an amazing expedition to the far East of Eurasia where he spent almost 10 years!  A graduate student of a theological school who fluently spoke Latin and Greek, he started his 10 year botany expedition still as a student (Faculty of Natural History this time), assisting in herbaria collections and writing field notebooks during the first couple years of his journey. It would probably take quite a few pages to describe all his achievements, but what amazes me and what I’d like to mention is what type of a scientist Krasheninnikov was. A true naturalist whose knowledge covered not only botany or even a narrow branch of this science, but also zoology, geography and cartography, geology, meteorology, speleology, hydrology… and surprisingly he also did a great contribution to linguistics studies of local languages in Asia. This is indeed amazing!

Approximate itinerary of Krasheninnikov’s expedition

Due to his dairy during his unbelievable trip he made about 16.5 thousand miles on foot and a horseback. I wish I could have a cup of coffee with such a personality… Though it’s hard to imagine such expeditions these days, the courage and enthusiasm of the first botanists and incredible Scientists, I guess, will live and inspire our future generations. Well, I think this is just the right point to stop and start the next observation of nature and try to understand what is happening around us and in particular in Carson City on Morgan Mill Road. Until next time!

Andrii

BLM, Carson City, NV

PS: Apparently another German botanist Johann Anton Güldenstädt who re-described the genus and named it for his colleague, was pretty amazed by him too…

Stepan Petrovych Krasheninnikov

My name is Andrii Zaiats and this is my first post on my CLM blog. I arrived in Carson City almost three weeks ago and since then I’ve tried different activities that I’ve never tried before. And so, my first post I’d like to devote to one of such experiences – identifying plants in February. First of all, I am really excited about identifying species, especially when it involves magnifying glasses, microscopes, keys, counting different small structures and identifying indumentum type, subjective and objective arguments etc. But I’ve found out that it’s much more challenging to identify herbaceous plant by leaf-shape, rosettes, possibly some stems when there is nothing else to base your judgment on. At first it was frustrating, but I guess that sharing experience, having some field excursion and practice, practice, practice are the best choices to get a grip on identifying “plants youth.” Another thing that is really helpful in the field is dry plants, and everything else that have remained from previous years (seeds, glumes, prickles, phyllaries etc.), and gives you an imagination of plant appearance.

So far, we’ve spent three days in the field and I find fascinating types of activities we are involved in and work organization here in Carson City BLM Field office, and on BLM lands as well. In addition I’m grateful to be a part of the team I currently work with and, of course, as a part of CLM program!

Until next time,
Andrii
BLM District Office,
Carson City, NV

Poa secunda -Sandberg bluegrass’ leaves

Bromus tectorum – cheatgrass

Holodiscus dumosus – oceanspray bush