It was quite the week in Lander, Wy. We got back from our training in Chicago and finished our first seed collection on Monday. As we were leaving the site we thought we would take a further look down the road but ended up getting our truck stuck in a wash out. Our first Seeds of Success collection followed by our first save our souls moment, a double SOS day. Luckily, our amazing mentor, Emma, came with snacks and shovels.

We made it home safe and sound and hoped for a better field day tomorrow, but the bad luck kept coming. Tuesday we checked on a population of Rumex only to discover it had all been eaten by caterpillars while we were in Chicago (learning about herbivory I might add).

Luckily we found an amazing population of bitterroot which happens to be Emma’s favorite flower, back on her good side after the truck incident (jokes, Emma only has good sides). We also collected seed from a Musineon plant and I have decided that umbels are my favorite plant part. It’s so satisfying to pour all of those seeds in your bag and not even come close to touching 20% of the populations.

On Wednesday we began a collection of Astragalus pershii, the woollypod milk vetch. As the name suggests it was awesome to collect. The seed pods were large and furry and I definitely played with the tiny rabbit’s foot seed pods in my bag while looking for more plants.

Thursday we finished up the A. pershii collection and started a collection of Astragalus spatulatus, which turns out to be pretty prickly. I got a bit distracted by the phenotypic shape of this mat former…

Isn’t it cute? Not to anthropomorphize, but I took it as a sign that this plant appreciates our conservation efforts. Here is a different species (did not have time to key out, too busy collecting seeds) reaffirming this message:

Friday I left to go to Portland, OR for the Evolution Conference where I met up with another CLM intern, Lia Leibman, who is stationed in Boise, ID. The CLM program is awesome for growing your network across the country. So far I’ve heard some great talks about Sagebrush, Oenothera, and Penstemon and feel extra prepared to jump back into seed collections next week back in Lander!

Leah Prescott

Lander, Wy