I feel very fortunate to be here in Montana. Even on days like today, where we went out to do some monitoring in a place called ‘Big Sheep Creek’ and there was an all-out blizzard. Strange to feel that winter feeling in the middle of June, especially when the previous weeks have been gorgeous. All this precipitation is wonderful for our area, but we sure are itching to get back in the field!

The Dillon Field Office where I work is really collaborative.  The photos above are from ‘Bear Trap Spray Day’, a joint effort to spray noxious weeds from the first designated wilderness area of the BLM along the Madison River.  Since it is designated ‘wilderness’,  no vehicles are aloud on the lands so we carried backpacks of weed spray into the forest.

I also recently helped the BLM foresters re-plant white bark pine, Pinus albicaulis in an area that was burned in 2012.  Several factors are threatening the pine including blister rust, japanese beetle, habitat loss and climate change.  Its seeds have a high fat content making it valuable food for birds and mammals such as grizzly bears.  Foresters and horticulturists have been growing out plugs of the pine and plant them in the burned area near Pony, Montana.

Here is a photo of a sensitive plant known as Alkali Primrose, Primula alkalina.  It’s a regional endemic growing only in east-central Idaho and south-west Montana.  It is found on salty, wet soil that is actively grazed, so we have been monitoring it very closely to measure the effects grazing has on the primrose.

For the next few weeks I will be monitoring riparian areas on cattle allotments to assess stream health.  The photos above are from our training week where we went out and learned the ins and outs of all the different methods we will use to assess stream health. This helps the BLM decide which cattle allotments can safely be grazed.  Earlier this week we monitored a stream called Alkali stream, salt covering the ground so densely it looked like snow and then the next day it really did snow!

Best,

Leah Murray
Dillon, Montana
Summer 2014

*All photos from the Dillon, Montana BLM Field Office

Work at the Kremmling field office has been pretty slow the past few weeks since my last post, due to seasonal training. The seasonals and I had a week of training consisting of ATV, HazMat, Trailer towing, Radio use, and more. After that I went to Chicago for CLM training at the Chicago Botanic Garden.  Even though the training didn’t relate all that much to my specific job (Weed spraying) it was still useful information, and a good time. I met some good people and got in touch with a few people from the Lakewood district that said I could help out with some rare plant monitoring.

It is good to be back to work though, and we have a big week ahead of us. We will be spraying invasives at a burn site on Yarmony mountain and doing a campout on Thursday to make the most of our time. Once the water level goes down we will be floating the CO river with our raft sprayer and possibly camping again. I am really looking forward to getting some work done.

Kremmling BLM Office

It’s hard to believe it’s already been a month since my last blog post. We’ve been crazy busy here in Vernal and time is flying by!

Since my last post, we’ve revisited the White River and set up our monitoring plots. We had a larger crew this time as we were joined by two crew leaders from Utah Conservation Corps – as they’ll be in charge of cutting down the Russian olive this summer, they were scouting the area. One of the leaders was from Minnesota and we bonded over duck, duck, grey duck and how we pronounce the word “bag.”

Whilst on the White River, we hiked to “Goblin City” and got this great view.

The following week, we went into the field with folks from the BLM in Meeker, Colorado and from the Colorado Natural Heritage Program to scout for White River penstemon (Penstemon scariosus albifluvis). The first day was pretty uneventful, but on the second day we discovered a new population! We spent the day scrambling up and down steep shaley slopes, mapping the population. One of the women working with us later confided that she was 87 years old! She was trekking up mountains just as well as the young bloods. I’m totally going to be that person when I get older – still working field days in the desert after retirement age.

My partner in crime, Hector, taking in the view.

Hector and I also revisited some plant populations that we had been monitoring. Our first collection was the Streptanthella longistrosis at McCoy Flats. Collecting the long siliques  spoiled me as the seed picking was relatively quick and easy between just the two of us. Later that day, our field office hosted a safety day for all its employees and I got to change a flat tire and use an extinguisher to douse a fake fire.

For the rest of the week, we teamed up with botanists from SWCA, an environmental consulting firm, to conduct yearly Sclerocactus monitoring. We used quadrats to collect data on canopy cover, including that of Cyanobacteria and lichen. One of the women from SWCA had done her thesis on biological soil crusts and told us that in some desert environments, Cyanobacteria is the only nitrogen fixer present! Protocol also dictated that we collect 10% of the cactus seeds which was pretty cool since I’ve never seen cactus seed before.

All of my gear for Sclerocactus monitoring, including a stylish pink tool belt.

This past week was devoted to the CLM Workshop at the Chicago Botanic Gardens. The majority of this year’s interns were present and it was great to be around so many other young people with similar interests. Not only did I learn more about Seeds of Success, but I also got a crash course in Botany of the West, and a refresher on monitoring and management methods. All of the speakers who presented to us were fantastic and they definitely inspired me to continue on my path to be an ecologist!

The Chicago Botanic Gardens at sunset.

A close-up from the Chicago Botanic Gardens.

“The world is big and I want to have a good look at it before it gets dark.”
II John Muir II

BLM Vernal Field Office

This past week I was able to attend a training workshop as part of my CLM internship. Since my position started early in February, I elected to attend an alternative training workshop that focused more on plant identification in the field. The workshop took place on Isle Royale National Park, an island in the middle of Lake Superior. It combined learning about the various ecosystems on the island, practice using dichotomous keys, learning key characteristics of plant families to help distinguish them from similar species in the field, and learning about some rare and disjunct species on the island.

Barrier islands in Isle Royale National Park

Each day we hiked around different parts of the island to explore the various plant communities. The first full day we explored a small barrier island close to the main island and visited a fen and the rocky shores of Lake Superior. As we walked through the fen, we went through a key to identify some of the ericaceous species most commonly found there. Additionally, we learned about the types of habitat they prefer and how bogs are distinguished from fens (fens are fed from groundwater in addition to rainwater, while bogs are fed only from rainwater). We also found two carnivorous plant species in the fen – Drosera rotundifolia (Round-leaf Sundew) and Sarracenia purpurea (Pitcher Plant) – which use the nutrients they obtain from insects to make up for the nutrient poor conditions of their environment.

Chamaedaphne calyculata – Leatherleaf; one of the ericaceous species we keyed out

Drosera rotundifolia – Round-leaf sundew

Sarracenia purpurea – Pitcher Plant

Another highlight of the workshop was learning about “disjunct” plant species found on the island – species whose major distributions are distinctly separated from areas close to the island. There are both western and arctic/alpine disjunct species found on the island, which make it a particularly exciting area to botanize.

Primula mistassinica – Birdseye Primrose; an arctic/alpine disjunct species

Saxifraga tricuspidata – three toothed saxifrage, another arcitc/alpine disjunct only found on Isle Royale in the continental US

Empetrum nigrum – black crowberry, another arctic/alpine disjunct

Other things I will take away from this workshop are increasing familiarity with and comfort using more botanical terms to describe plants, as we talked a lot about specific parts of plants that are useful in distinguishing similar species. It was helpful to cement these terms over a week of seeing these plants in the field and observing the variety of forms plants can take. Our instructor showed us several botanical resources – field guides and manuals, online websites, and various books – that I can use in the future. I also learned a great deal from my fellow workshop participants by talking to them about their careers, sharing plant ID tips, and creating a network of people with a variety of skills and experience. All in all, the workshop strengthened my field botany skills and my desire to keep working in this field to protect places like the beautiful Isle Royale National Park.

Calypso bulbosa – Fairy slipper Orchid

Cypripedium arietinum – Ram’s Head Lady-slipper

Summer is ending but with our the northwest rain forbs for Seeds of Success collections are still in bloom. In reality this is good for us since all botany staff were at conferences or training last week and unable to collect!

The conference I attended is one that most first year CLM interns attend. It’s hosted by the Chicago Botanical Garden and is a wonderful crash course in monitoring populations, learning about Seeds of Success, and receiving an overview in the BLM and the CLM program. One treat is that Dean Tonneda, a botanist at the Carson City BLM, shares his collection of Mono Lake tribal ethnobotany. After this lecture I was left with the idea that though many of our cultures have lost the knowledge of wild plants, that knowledge can be gained once again by going out into the forest and playing around with plant properties. For example, finding fiber properties is as easy as walking in the forest and tugging on plants. Ethnobotany is not extinct, it is just dormant.

Chicago Botanic Garden

One exciting project I am working on is with a rare plant called Thelypodium eucosmum. First I organized past monitoring data on the species and was alarmed by the rate at which the species is going extinct. No need for chi square graphs or R programming; simple math easily shows the progression of this species. For example, there were 2,000 individuals in 1980 and now there are 200. Then I chose the most sensitive populations to monitor and made an ArcGIS map. This week or the next we will be climbing the steep ravines near the John Day Fossil beds where these populations exist. Hopefully our work will provide the data to create range land contracts that help protect this species while giving ranchers the wide open space they need for their cows.

Thelypodium eucosmum

Debbie Pattison
Prineville Field Office, BLM

Thanks to all the interns and instructors that made last week’s training in Chicago special. The Garden was beautiful and I finally have faces to the CLM coordinator names. Krissa is a rock star! We are excited to help her collect Oenothera in Oregon for pollinator research.

We made our first collection of Microsteris gracilis! It was painstaking, but we should have at least 18,000 viable seed to send to Bend. Our other seed collecting endeavors have fallen through so far. Cows ate the Lupine, Lewisia had it’s ovaries eaten by orthopterans and the Bud Sage frosted. We are looking forward to something not being eaten or shriveled.

The high desert is keeping us tempted with false promise of rain as we endure the drought. Surely our collected seed will reflect the best genetic varieties for sustained dry conditions. South central Oregon has a frost advisory tonight but the highs should be back in the 80s by Thursday.

Yesterday was my only day of rest in 8 days of training and travel. I spent it in my hammock watching fledgling nighthawks practice their maneuvers in the daylight and then took a drive in the Warner Mountains to a little lake where I again observed nighthawks. I compared grasses growing in lava scab-land and stared at the mountains and dreamed of having the time to hike to the top of each one. There were many animal tracks in the dust  but I only encountered birds.

Lucy Landis, Lakeview, OR BLM

Best shade of violet award

Phacelia linearis

Rare Eriogonum

Spooky snake

The Lamiaceae, of course. Get it? LAME-iaceae? I have now been working at my CLM internship for a full two weeks. I spent my first week in Cheyenne, Wyoming, where I am working at the BLM State Office updating the Wyoming Sensitive Species list and revising biological assessments for threatened and endangered species in Wyoming.  This past week, I attended the CLM training workshop at the Chicago Botanic Garden, where I received hands-on training in field botany, met some great folks, and added to my botanical pun repertoire.

The training workshop was a fast-paced rundown of native plant families, field sampling techniques, and field navigation, among other topics. Our pack of 50 interns tromped all over the CBG and a neighboring forest preserve in search of prairie plants to key out, landmarks to navigate to by compass, and native wildflowers with seeds to collect. I’m enthusiastic about botany, but my position is largely focused on policy and I don’t have a lot of field experience.  So, it was really great to get this opportunity to get out in the field and practice navigating using a compass, identifying plants using a dichotomous key, and assessing a native population for seed collection.

Nearly-mature fruits of Cardamine concatenata in the foreground; CLM interns in the background. Lovely woodland all around.

Just as valuable as gaining these skills, though, was remembering that I was part of the larger CLM network of dozens of young people engaged in conservation and land management field work. I met people working all across the west, from the Mojave Desert and Palm Springs in California, north to Northern California and Eastern Oregon, west to Boise and Twin Falls, Idaho and into Montana, and back into Wyoming— to name just a few places. Despite going to a liberal, eco-conscious college and attending professional meetings, I had never felt such a high concentration of people of my own age and enthusiasm level about plants and conservation! And after many conversations about restoration practices and the best ways to mitigate the effects of the ecopocalypse, I’m excited and encouraged to know that there are so many folks all over the country who are doing good work and thinking about solutions to the same climate-change-induced problems that I’m worried about. And let me tell you, their botanical pun game is Ranunculus.

Not a Ranunculus, but still pretty! Indian paintbrush sighted outside Cheyenne at Vedauwoo.

Buffalo, Wyoming: The Final Frontier… These are the voyages of a CLM Intern. His five-month mission: to explore strange new ecosites, to seek out new plant life and new allotments, to boldly go where no CLM Intern has gone before…

The Lost World

This week I spent my time in the Fortification Creek WSA. This area was located near Gillette, Wyoming and would be considered very isolated from the outside world. The landscape looked very similar to the Badlands in South Dakota. The steep topography would be a real challenge, especially for many advance hikers. There were many juniper (Juniperus scopulorum) stands, grasslands, prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus) villages, and many creeks that made this landscape very heterogeneous, making this area ideal for a variety of many unusual plants and animals. There were elk (Cervus canadensis) and mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) all over the place and they all looked very healthy. Probably due to the abundance of winterfat (Krascheninnikovia lanata). I went with a BLM employee and four wildlife biologist from the University of Wyoming: Laramie Natural Diversity Database Research Division. Our goal was to record, observe, and identify as many mammals, invertebrates, reptiles, amphibians, flora, and birds as possible. This was a five day mission of backpacking, doing transects, and collecting plant and insect pollinator samples! I was beyond excited. I will only include a couple stories…^_^;

A herd of elk!!

Bug Net Training and Animal Crossing!
One of my jobs on this trip was to collect as many different pollinators as possible. Lusha was a wildlife biologist who wanted to look for many different pollinators such as bees, moths, and butterflies. She would set up different insect traps to capture a plethora of different insect species. She gave me a net, a jar of ethanol, and a few wax paper envelopes. I would quickly run into the field with the net and look for all the pollinators. Now you may think catching insects would be easy. It is not! D: They were very quick, agile, and sneaky! Catching these insects was a challenge, but I learned all of their tricks. Handling the bug net was like an art. You had to be methodical, swift like the breeze, and as keen as a ninja. Most of my bug net training came from experience and the game known as Animal Crossing.

Checkerspot Butterfly

We were by a place near Bull Creek and everyone was surveying the area. Lusha was putting out many different traps and she would point out to me a pollinator she wanted. Bumblebees (Bombus spp.) were in abundance followed by different species of butterflies/moths (Lepidoptera Family). I caught almost all of them, but it was difficult putting them in the jar or envelope on a windy day. I also caught different Coleoptera beetles such as the dung beetle, darkling beetle, and tiger beetle to name a few. The tiger beetles were green metallic insects that ran fast and had large jaws. They were very interesting to catch, because they liked to hop around like they were throwing a tantrum before they flew away. Another beetle that was interesting was the dung beetle. I had never seen them before in the wild. They were in abundance in the WSA. They were rolling dung balls everywhere!

One of the most challenging insects to catch was the hawk moth of the Sphingidae Family. I had three opportunities, but they were so darn fast and I missed each one. I found a fourth moth on a white beardtongue (Penstemon albidus). I performed a left to right false swipe with my net near the moth to make it fly away from the flower. Immediately, I did a sky uppercut false swipe to make the insect fly upwards and I followed with net hammer down move. Three hit combo! ^_^ The moth was not injured at all and was in great health! Catching all of these insects was extremely fun and provided a good workout. I collected some nice specimens for the University of Wyoming: Laramie!

The Nature Hike and The Rabid Bat

Ian, Wendy, Bonnie, Lusha, and I were traveling up Bull Creek to find different flora and fauna. Bonnie was looking for as many flora specimens as possible to put in the herbarium. Wendy was in charge of looking for many different reptiles and amphibians in the area. Ian looked for as many birds and mammal species as possible (concentrating on bats). Lusha looked for all of the invertebrates. We hiked up the creek and came across many ephemeral ponds full of tadpoles and aquatic insects. I never seen so many different species of amphibian in one small pond. The experience was awesome! We encountered a pair of red tailed hawks (Buteo jamaicensis) who had a nest in the area. They would screech and fly close to us as we observed them. They had different morphs, which made them look like a different species! As we hiked further up the creek, we saw an elk herd standing on the hill. They were all staring at us making bizarre noises. I never thought an elk could sound like a whining shiba inu… With all of these great experiences, we always had to be on the lookout for ticks of the Ixodidae Family. Ticks were all over the place!! I must have collected over fifteen ticks a day by traveling on elk trails. Wherever we see signs of elk, we had to totally make sure to check ourselves for ticks after.

Tadpoles of various species!

One of the many ticks I found. I called this one Bitey! ^_^;

Later in the afternoon, Ian was setting up a bat microphone near one of the ephemeral ponds and then he saw a bat flying around. The tiny mammal was hunting for insects in broad daylight! The movements and behavior were odd for this kind of species of bat. Ian mentioned that this bat had rabies. O_O We were all shocked and kept an eye out for it. The tiny bat was following us as we hiked on. It came very close a couple of times making us nervous. Sometimes the bat would disappear and reappear unexpectedly! Ian and I tried to get the bat with the net, but the tiny little guy would dodge and fly into something and fly away. This kept on happening for a good twenty minutes. The creature eventually left, but seeing that tiny bat was funny and horrible at the same time! <_<

Bird Transects

We would get up at 4:30am in the morning and do bird transects for the week. Our goal was to go to twelve different transects and record the bird species we would find in that area. The landscape was very hard to navigate in, especially if you were carrying a daypack through very cold and hot temperatures extremes. Some days the grass would be so wet that your pants and shoes would be constantly dripping of water for hours. Some of the transects were located near steep inclines of topography, so I had to take a couple of breaks when hiking up the slopes. Good thing I carried a lot of water and food with me just in case. 😉 Many of the transect places I visited had a huge amount of petrified wood. I called them leaverites, because I had to leave them there due to the fact that we were in a WSA.

Petrified Wood!!

Most of my time I was following different elk trails to my next destination. I love the elk! They could always find the easiest path up the slope! \(^_^/) When I was bird watching I would hear many hidden birds, so I would have to listen to them by ear and identify them that way.

These are the birds we heard or saw. (Sorry, will not include the latin names. :/ )

Brewer’s Sparrow                   Vesper’s Sparrow                    Chipping Sparrow

Blue Gray Gnatcatcher           Red Winged Blackbird           Common Grackle

House Wren                            Rock Wren                              American Robin

American Goldfinch               Black Billed Magpie               Grasshopper Sparrow

Red Tailed Hawk                    Ruby Crown Kinglet              Mountain Bluebird

Lazuli Bunting                        Yellow Rumped Warbler        Yellow Warbler

Turkey Vulture                        American Robin                      Western Wood Pewee

Eastern Kingbird                     Western Kingbird                   Yellow Breasted Chat

Black Headed Grosbeak         Lark Sparrow                          Western Meadowlark

Spotted Towhee                      Mourning Dove                       Brown Headed Cowbird

Short Earred Owl                    Cedar Waxwing                      Violet Green Swallow

Bullock’s Oriole                      Black Capped Chickadee       Horned Lark

Unfortunately, we were expecting to see more bird species, but we did manage to see many unique birds! The overall bird watching experience was amazing, but trying to hike between transects was very exhausting. ^_^;;

Lark Sparrow (Chondestes grammacus)

Misadventures:

Dear Diary: Jackpot!!

On one of the weekends, I traveled with my parents to the Black Hills for a tiny vacation. I love to rock hound around the Black Hills and I would find all sorts of cool treasures. There was this one area I hiked up to that had a massive outcrop of pegmatite (very coarse grained granite). I hit the jackpot!!! There were massive pieces of milky and rose quartz everywhere!! ^_^ I grabbed a couple of specimens and took a picture before moving onwards.

Rose Quartz!!

Teaching The Next Generation

A couple of weeks ago, our boss offered Jill and I an experience to help out with an outreach project for the schools led by Allison and Dusty. We were supposed to go teach an elementary school class of 5^th graders (I think they were fifth graders ^_^;;) the difference between flora. We had to explain to them about forbs, shrubs, trees, grasses, and grass look a likes. The children were all excited about learning and doing the plant scavenger hunt. The BLM employees and the interns would go out and help identify each of the plants for the kids. The kids constantly took specimens to show us. I was in my element! I was explaining to them the history of the plant and how to identify each of the species. They loved to talk about all of their experiences which included nature hikes, camping, Jesus, and Pokemon. By the end of the program, many kids were taking grasses and other plant specimens back to their rooms. Overall, the nature class was a success!!

________________________________________________________________________

Thank you everyone for reading the entry for this week!! Have a great day!

Justin Chappelle

CLM Intern

Buffalo, Wyoming

I will leave you with a picture of some dung beetles. Enjoy!

Dung Beetles!!

Hola Amigos,
The last few weeks have been a whirlwind of finals, graduation, goodbyes, long distance driving, adjusting to the desert landscape of Farmington, NM, and of course, beginning my work as a CLM intern. My first week of work was really enjoyable and has got me looking forward to this summer and fall collaborating with the BLM on the Seeds of Success program. Even though I’ve only just started, my lovely mentor Sheila Williams managed to get me out in the field twice the first week! I met the New Mexico state botanist and a cool and endangered little plant called the Mancos milkvetch. There are so many new plants to learn because Maryland and the arid west share little flora in common. I’m going to be kept busy studying! My second week of work was spent at the CLM training in Illinois at the Chicago Botanic Garden. It was great to connect with fellow interns from near and far and I learned a lot of new and valuable things. One of the best gems I brought back from that experience is an understanding of how important the work I will be doing is, and how it fits into the bigger picture of future conservation of public lands. Its all very exciting to be a part of and I cannot express just how grateful I am that I have found my way here in the land of enchantment and in the midst of this incredible opportunity! More next time.
Hannah

My new backyard

Hello Bloggers!

After two months, I can say Montana now feels like home, and there are no complaints here! Being surrounded by mountains, wildflowers and some Ponderosa Pines is quite a marvelous experience. Missoula is located along the Clark Fork River, and it is absolutely breathtaking. While looking for the sensitive species bladder pod a few days ago, a humming bird came to greet us at the bottom and top of the ridge, which is a very good omen, so this is going to be a great field season. The field office is blooming with excitement of the summer and all of the seasonals are officially here!

I am primarily a Forestry technician, but a wonderful part about the Missoula field office is that we are able to dabble in a myriad of different types of fieldwork. As a forestry technician I predominantly preform forest inventories, which include: assessing the forests habitat type, age and abundance of trees, richness of understory vegetation, and what wildlife has utilized the land and we look for any sensitive or invasive plant species.

Xerophyllum tenax (Bear Grass)

I have also participated in fence building, which has truly tested my muscles. Fence building is definitely a tedious, meticulous activity. We had to set up “H” posts, that held the fence together at critical locations, and then put in posts intermittently until the next “H” post. Pounding in the posts is unquestionably the hardest part. We were on a really rocky, steep slope making it difficult to put the posts in, but we did it! Here are a few pictures of our success!

My Mentor, being a model fencing citizen

Until next time!