A final salute to the JTGP is in order. This New Year brings about the end of our six month stint with the USGS in Southern Nevada and the Joshua Trees. We have tracked, recorded, organized and outlined the details and info of thousands of baby JTs and are now handing that package of data over to our mentors and the future group of interns, along with a greenhouse full of growing plants with shiny metal tags, ready for out planting into the common gardens.

This internship experience with CBGs CLM program was round two for me (did an internship with the FS in Idaho in 2019) and while my first internship was a fantastic opportunity in plant conservation, management and all things botany, this JTGP internship has been a superlative introduction and lesson in botanical research. It has been an incomparable hands-on experience involving research design, time-management and troubleshooting, data collection efficiency and a dip into the statistical world.

As an individual who is intending on graduate school (and the inevitable design and execution of my own work), this internship was a much needed segue into the world of big time botanical research. I am now aware of best practices for managing study plants and just how much time and thought must go into all research. I have also experienced the struggles, set-backs and wrong turns, and have learned how to approach them with flexibility and curiosity. And most of all, I have learned the true value of working in a team. My JTGP co-interns have been with me through every one of our planning moments, hiccups, and victories. I have realized how incredibly refreshing it is to discuss courses of action with individuals who think differently and I know that we have been able to accomplish all of the work we did these past six months because of the constant support and healthy challenging that occurred as we worked together with these plants.

I also have to mention that being mentored and guided by top-tier research scientists at the USGS has been so so SO awesome. Receiving endless guidance and confirmation from Lesley and Todd has helped me to better analyze and understand the flow of this research project. I have tucked away many gold nuggets of advice and suggestions for use in my personal and professional life. They have challenged us as a group, and me as an individual, to truly dig in and open myself up to the new experiences and lessons that the JTGP had to offer.

So, it is with pride and excitement that I close this desert flavored chapter of my life. I’ll be checking in over the years to see how the JTs are doing and am so grateful to the CBG and USGS that I was able to play a roll in this amazing research 🙂

Good news from the JTGP CLM team! We are gearing up our baby Joshua Tree’s for their final transplant into the Common Garden sites across the Mojave. These little ones have come a long way and look very official with their field-ready metal tags.

We still have some maternal lines that are struggling to grow and it will be interesting to see if they pull through or if they simply won’t get to Gardens. As we all know by now: plant research is a dynamic and patient process! All tagged JTs will be transplanted in the gardens over this winter and will have at least a year to grow and develop in their given environments before JTGP leading scientists start to collect genetic and phenological from them (While my group of CLM JTGP interns will be long gone by then, I am excited to check in with our PIs and hear how everything is going in the Gardens).

Because our time here is quickly coming to an end our team has also been super busy organizing, cleaning up and structuring the many data we have been collecting over the past five months. We’ve mastered excel and dabbled in R and are continuing to develop and analyze the loads of info we have on the germination and growth of our JTs.

Happy late October from Southern Nevada. The JTGP team is basking in balmy fall weather here and working away in the USGS greenhouse, pampering our Joshua trees. You read right: pampering. Who would have thought these magnificent plants of the Mojave would be so fussy!

You see, it turns out that some of the seeds are quite particular and have decided to fight germination with stark determination. Tucking them into nice damp soil, regulating their day and night temperature in the greenhouse, and diligently watering them makes not a difference.

They simply weren’t having it.

But, little did they know, the same thing could be said for us: we were not having their complete lack of germination.

So, we decided to treat these most persnickety seeds like the royalty that they are: laying them out on a damp filter paper in a Petri dish and setting them in a temperature regulated growth chamber to imbibe in warm darkness. We visited them twice daily to alter the chambers day-time and night-time temperatures, gently cleaned them if mold popped up, kept each filter paper nice and damp, and crossed our fingers.

And what do you know-it was just what they preferred! In no time we had lots of happy germinates.

Now, every day more and more germinates appear in the Petri dishes and we scramble to transplant them into their respective plant bands (tall, bottomless cardboard ‘pots’ that allow the Joshua tree’s roots to grow long). And our success hasn’t stopped there. These Joshua trees are (finally) pleased enough to send up bright green hypocotyls and cotyledons. Up next are primary leaves and more, each plant growing as much as possible before its final transplant into the Common Garden sites at the end of the year!

And now we know: despite initial struggles, germination is indeed possible. So grow on Joshua trees, grow on.

Well, this is it. My five months are up. I’ll be leaving the Forest Service in beautiful Southeast Idaho in less than a week. More than that, I’ll be bidding the best co-intern ever good-bye. I have faced all the thrills and challenges of this summer alongside my CLM teammate: Claire Parsons. From our first exposure to the sagebrush steppe and glorious mountains of Idaho in May to our final botany adventures in the October snow, we have been quite the team.

Some final thoughts/advice regarding the friendship and CLM internship experience that I have shared with Claire:

1. Embrace working with a partner. Don’t be shy! Learning with someone is so much better than learning alone. Both myself and Claire started as interns here in Idaho with botanical knowledge of OTHER places, so we were both faced with the learning curve that new flora poses. Taking notes together and admitting ignorance regarding the new flora was such an awesome way to learn and build solidarity between us early on.

2. Seed collecting, and any other field work, is always easier with 2 people 🙂 Talk about your strategy and plan before heading out to streamline the process (e.g. while seed collecting Claire was a champion with photo and voucher taking while I covered collecting the necessary GPS points).

3. Communicate, communicate, communicate. With each other and with your mentor. Be honest about your boundaries, comfort zone in the field, and skill set! Don’t be afraid to tell your mentor about your interests and passions, they may be able to provide unique opportunities to you as a result. Don’t be afraid to share your life goals and dreams with your work partner, if you are as lucky as me, they will be such a great listener and provide priceless council and advice…or at the very least, commiserate right along with you 🙂

4. Share driving responsibility and road snacks! We put a lot of miles on the work truck because we had such amazing opportunities to do botanical work all over Idaho and in Wyoming and Utah. Soak up the places you work in and thank the many professionals and volunteers you meet. Write down names and network away!

5. Talk to the individuals in your office, seasonal and permanent employees alike. You will feel more at home at the office and may garner new/difference management and conservation insights from them. Thanks to the flexibility of our incredible mentor, Claire and I got to go out into the field with soil scientists, hydrologists, and the range crew. Ask for these opportunities!

5. The staff at CBG are amazing. Don’t hesitate to reach out to them with any questions you have or issues that arise with travel, paychecks, or time sheets! They are an incredible resource. Also, your mentor is a seasoned professional in their field-ask them questions, tap into their knowledge, take their advice! They can offer you so, so much 🙂

Well folks, that is a wrap. I hope the above reflections and suggestions are helpful! I’ll be leaving my CLM internship more skilled in all things botany and plant conservation and bidding a wonderful mentor good-bye. And, saddest of all, for the first time in five months, I will no longer be spending almost every day with my most favorite fellow botanists-in-training.

Thank you CBG and R. Lehman (best mentor ever!) for this outstanding internship opportunity, and thank you Claire for being such a gem, I am forever grateful.

We recently obtained almost 2,000 baby plants from the Coeur d’Alene Forest Service nursery (see my co-interns blog about our experience there!), all of them bright and bushy tailed with green leaves and even a few flowers! These native plants are special because their source was known and local to Southeast Idaho. This is an important feature because it greatly increases each individual plants chance of surviving, once placed in their ‘home’ habitat, and reproducing successfully because of local adaptations they contain. Our goal for these kid plants was to establish them down on the Curlew National Grassland as part of a stream bank and habitat restoration initiative. Because all of them are perennials, if we get them into the ground before the first frost they will die back this winter and be ready to roll next spring! In one overcast and windy day, we planted over half of them within and above the floodplain of Deep Creek on the Curlew. Volunteer master naturalists, citizens, and other Forest Service and NRCS employees came out to help. Shovels were flying, compost was distributed, and plugs were pressed into the ground. We were rewarded with a lunch of hot, homemade chili (made by our wonderful mentor) and then wrapped up the day by putting a layer of mulch around each plant, to tuck them in and discourage weeds from popping up.

We still had a handful of plugs after the Curlew planting effort so our mentor took some to local National Forest District offices to establish native plant displays and then we took the rest to a Juniper treatment area (where removal of Juniper trees occur in order to stop their excessive encroachment on meadows and shrub-lands). The piles of branches and twigs had been burned, leaving sooty circles of bare ground. Our mentor was interested in planting some of the native forbs in these bare areas to asses growth and reproduction potential over the years and to help establish pollinator habitat within the meadow itself. Our team of three (myself, my co-intern, and our mentor) quickly got to work digging, composting, and planting in the circles of dark soil and ash; the ‘forb islands’ we created sites of promising green. . At the end of the day we counted the plugs that remained-we had given all but 200 plants a home in the ground!

Our plan is to store the plugs securely over this weekend and then spread them in more areas that need some native plant TLC over the Forest the following week-we may even be able to donate some to a local University in order to help them in their effort to become a pollinator friendly campus!

I have to be honest, before this week, I had never been a part of such an extensive planting initiative. I learned that it is hard work that feels good and rewards you with a lovely visual of fresh green on the landscape and the knowledge that the baby plants are happy and at home, ready to grow and soak up the sun come springtime.

This past month we have been spending a lot of time at the Curlew National Grasslands for a very special reason: Monarch butterflies.

The Curlew is a grassland managed by the Caribou-Targhee National Forest and is composed primarily of agriculture land that was retired decades ago and now serves as expansive, rich habitat for a whole slew of species. It is a very special place whose location in southeast Idaho gives it the unique ability to serve as part of the highway for western populations of monarch butterflies during their yearly migration to California. Monarchs flock to the Curlew to rest, mate, and start a new generation in the shade of its riparian areas that are chock full of showy milkweed (Asclepias speciosa).

Unfortunately, loss of habitat and food sources have caused monarch populations to plummet. The western population is really struggling and where thousands upon hundred thousands of monarchs used to pass through the western United States now only a few hundred or thousand are seen.But the Curlew hasn’t given up on Monarchs yet! It still welcomes them with the promise of shade, food, and a possible mate in the area. For that reason, monarchs are still flitting through the expansive grassland.

As interns on the Caribou-Targhee we had the privilege of partnering with state agencies and citizen scientists to document the monarchs passing through the Curlew this year. (Here I was, thinking I would never see or experience what it is like to see monarchs migrating when suddenly I am thrown right into the science behind tracking and monitoring them!) Monarch surveys occur all over the United States and are fueled by the research and work of people like Dr. David James and organizations like the Integrated Monarch Monitoring Program-thankfully, there are a lot of people that care about monarchs 😊

Preforming monarch surveys means gearing up with butterfly nets, data sheets, sunscreen…and lots of water…and then getting to work. And let me just say, catching a butterfly is not as easy as it seems…but when you do finally catch one you cannot help the smile that spreads over your face, it’s the best combination of science and feeling like a kid again. Gently reaching in and grasping the little migrant in the proper way and sliding them out of the net is a surprise in and of itself because suddenly the vibrant colors of their wings and sharp white polka dots on their black body are no longer muted by the mesh of the net or the haze in the air. And my goodness are they are exquisite. Some of them are more tattered and torn around the edges letting you know they have come to the Curlew to mate and continue the migration through their offspring while others are almost fluorescent in color and itching to travel.

The butterfly patiently grasps your fingers as you attach a small tag to the proper area of its wing (so that its flying ability isn’t hindered) and reluctantly allows you to open up its wings (with which you get another pleasant shock of wonder as their deep orange wings, rimmed and webbed with velvet black, completely open in front of you) and look for the presence or lack of a small black dot on each wing. If the monarch has these dots it is a male (other butterfly species’ males emit pheromones from these dots of specialized scales, but the jury is still out on what monarch males use them for) and if not, it is a female. After checking that you have written down all the necessary data you slowly detach your fingertips from their wings. At this point, it is a 50/50 chance whether the monarch will leap back into the sky immediately or stay on your finger for a bit, gently flapping its wings and making up its mind (all to your complete delight). Experiencing monarch butterflies in such a hands-on manner was amazing-something I never thought I could have done!

But we don’t just pay attention to the adults; monarch surveys also include searching for instars on the milkweed plants and tiny monarch eggs. This means recognizing monarch instar leaf grazing and peering over and under the soft milkweed leaves in search for the happy culprit. When an instar is found you can tell what stage it is in by the presence or lack of stripes and antennae. Data is recorded and the instar grazes on; you can almost see it growing in front of your eyes as it chops away leaf after leaf! Monarch eggs are a bit harder because spots of dried milkweed latex on the leaf can fool you repeatedly. But when you finally find an egg, you realize that they have an incredible design: small and rounded at the bottom with a slight Hershey’s kiss top and vertical lines traveling up across its entire surface. Perfect looking and so small you must confirm it using a hand lens! We also care a lot about monarch habitat and need to document the characteristics of the areas they frequent in order to better understand how we can remediate the loss in their numbers. This means walking transects and using vegetation frames to collect data on the landscape that the monarchs love. The healthy mix of nectar plants, milkweed, and shade trees on the Curlew is what the monarchs really seem to key into in southeast Idaho!

Thanks to interagency collaboration and the help of citizen scientists the presence of a special section of western monarch’s migration highway at the Curlew was confirmed again this year with notably high monarch counts for the entire western half of the Unites States. I was so happy to be a part of it 😊

This week, Claire and I assisted with the absolute coolest long term vegetation monitoring initiative known to human-kind: GLORIA (GLobal Observation Research Initiative in Alpine environments). It is just as intense as it sounds. We went with a group of botanical scientists, fellow interns, and volunteers to the Lemhi Mountain range in Idaho to establish the fourth GLORIA site in all of Idaho. Just last year the first three were established, which is the minimum number of plots allowed according to GLORIA standards. This fourth peak would bring Idaho up to the preferred number of GLORIA locations and allow us to extract more data about changes to the alpine environment over the years.

Starting the day early we scrambled up to 10,000+ ft. with packs full of survey equipment. Once up there, we quickly began conducting the measurements and calculations needed to set up the many sections-essentially making a cardinal directional pie out of the mountain peak. We then got to crouching. The real work of a GLORIA plot is the thorough surveying of existing vegetation on the peak so that changes can be noted through the years. This includes monitoring soil temperature and snow pack by burying four tough temperature loggers up on the mountain (those little nuggets have a lifetime of 5 years! How incredible!)

The sun moved across the sky as data sheet after data sheet was completed and plot after plot was delineated. Our brains were steeped in the wonderful names of the teeny-tiny alpine plants, picking out some rare ones here and there and marveling at the flowers of so many others. After one task was done, there was always another to move to. The sun and wind kept us company and on our toes with multiple sunscreen applications and rubber bands on clipboards to prevent flyaways!

Right before the sun set we were safe off the mountain, marveling at the work we had accomplished and already missing the beautiful alpine. It was truly thrilling to be part of such a top-notch research team, preforming globally recognized science, and learning from the top notch botanists of Idaho. The entire experience had a surreal feel to it, and is one I wish I could rewind and live all over again.

The past few weeks have been popping with traveling, camping, and seed collection all around Idaho and Utah.

One of our many stops was on the Curlew Grasslands, it was an awesome day.

My co-intern and I, Claire, have been able to explore some awesome country and have continued to meet and collaborate with a whole slew of professionals (thanks to the top notch planning of our mentor!) including Forest Health specialists and a conglomerate of Forest botanists from both Idaho and Utah. We’ve even met other seasonal workers and shared SOS collection stories and techniques as we scouted for and collected seed together.

At one of our collection locations ft. Claire 🙂

Spending the day with other seed collecting friends and botanists in Utah.

Our primary plant for seed collection these past few weeks has been Arrowleaf Balsamroot (Balsamorhiza sagitatta). Just yesterday we spotted balsamroot growing on an unusual space on the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache NF in Utah-it was a rocky, scree covered slope within a canyon. The population was robust, so we split into groups and faced the steep climb head-on with paper bags in hand. As I climbed up using both hands and feet I stopped here and there to pop off a few seed heads and turn down my long sleeve shirt in the burning sun. The balsamroot continued to flourish the higher up I got-eventually I came to the top and found a clearing of penstemon, hawksbeard and balsamroot. The flowers were fluorescent in the sun and the darker seed heads of the balsamroot bobbed as warm wind moved through the canyon. I took a moment to breathe and located our trucks on the canyon floor-they were small, white dots far below! -and then turned to take in the canyon view.

Up on top!

I could see that to my left and right along the slope the balsamroot was loving the rocky habitat. I could hear the other collection teams communicating, their voices echoing a bit between the canyon and mountain walls. After roaming around to cover the extent of the population where I was I packed my paper bag in my backpack and headed slowly back down.

We all met back at the trucks, laughing about the bizarre habitat, the intense climb, and our surprise at the amount of balsamroot we found. It was a super successful day and a great end to the work week!

If anyone ever asks if you want to go hang out with entomologists and botanists-don’t think twice, just answer “YES!!”.

That is exactly what myself and my CLM partner, Claire Parsons, did when our mentor proposed learning and working with USDA entomologists and Idaho renowned botanists for a week on a Research Natural Area (RNA). RNAs are preserved areas that represent a habitat and can be used for education, research, and monitoring purposes. The one we happily raced to was a low shrub upland salt desert shrub habitat within the Salmon-Challis National Forest and BLM land in Idaho.

At the heart of the RNA: Middle Canyon!

Our goal was to verify the RNA’s integrity, plant diversity, document baseline pollinator presence, and search for some lovely rare plant species. Claire and I, besides having the opportunity to botanize and learn from the coolest and most knowledgeable people, received direction on the Seeds of Success (SOS) process-one of our primary projects this summer. We found two populations, one of Balsamroot (Balsamorhiza sagitatta) and Shaggy Fleabane (Erigeron pumilus) that we can come back to during seed-set!

Balsamroot (Balsamorhiza sagitatta).

Within the first two days on the RNA we found three rare species: Spreading Gilia (Ipomopsis polycladon), Lost River Milkvetch (Astragalus amnis-amissi), and the super dainty Alkali Primrose (Primula alcalina). All signs that the RNA is a diverse and special place that should continue to be preserved. Finding the plants meant that official documentation was needed; Claire and I were able to exercise our GPS know-how and complete the official field-paperwork.

Alkali Primrose (Primula alcalina), how sweet!

Such an awesome group of scientists-watching the entomologists at work was super cool.

We also observed pollinator catching, drafted comprehensive species lists, and asked as many questions as we had all while hiking through canyons, along rivers and alluvial fans, and crunching across the desert shrub steppe.

The river (you can kind of see it going around a bend here) gave us a chance to cool our feet down mid-day!

Going up Middle Canyon, we choose to walk off the trail a bit and search out as many plants as possible.

The fun didn’t end either, after field work we would all head back to the field station nestled below the Lemhi mountain range. Claire and I pressed our plant specimens, ogled and peppered the entomologist as they ordered their tiny, winged specimens, keyed out plants we had collected in the field, then enjoyed dinner while laughing and conversing below the mountain peaks.

A sneak peak of all the pollinators doing good work out on the RNA.

Keying out some paintbrush (Castilleja angustifolia) with M.M.-the coolest botanists in Idaho.

It was so refreshing to be surrounded by professionals who loved botany and ‘talked’ botany; I couldn’t get enough of it. I made connections, became so much more familiar with the plants of the region, and feel super prepared to execute SOS work, bring it on!

Caribou-Targhee National Forest, ID