Daily Archives: 4 September, 2014

It’s not over yet!

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Many things have happened since my last post in May, the highlight being that I have been extended for another two months! I feel very fortunate to have this opportunity. My supervisor has really gone out of his way to make this happen. I am being treated as if I were a full BLM employee, handed tasks that carry the responsibility and weight that comes with decision making. For example, due to an employee retirement, there was no one in the office who was familiar with writing a Rangeland Health Determination. I volunteered for the undertaking and finished the document almost single-handedly. I have also been assimilated into compiling three Environmental Assessments. I have never before worked somewhere where I felt so respected and appreciated for the quality of work that I produce. They are willing to invest in me and in return I am able to produce better quality work.

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The Deep Springs Resource Management Team meeting on site, where the cowboys tend the herd of cattle.

Aside from office work, I still manage to get a few field days in. The Ridgecrest Field Office is part of an interesting arrangement with a local farm/college, Deep Springs. Deep Springs’ ranching operations are supported by the Deep Springs Resource Management Team (DSRMT), which consists of representatives from the College and Trustees, BLM, Inyo National Forest, Natural Resource Conservation Service, and California Department of Fish and Wildlife. The DSRMT meets bi-annually, collects and analyzes monitoring data on Deep Springs’ BLM and Forest Service grazing allotments, and participates in inter-agency coordination and planning to develop best management practices and to inform agency decision making processes. During the summer meeting in the beautiful White Mountains, Deep Springs was gracious enough to feed everyone great farm raised fresh food, we experienced a flash flood and also had amazing cooperation among the agencies. By hearing the concerns about an allotment from all agencies, I was able to experience the development of a very thorough land management plan. It almost made my head spin with how organized it was.  I really hope this inter-agency hands-on model spreads to more offices.

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Some arrowheads found onsite while performing surveys of the pastures.

The farm fresh steaks, potatoes and corn provided by Deep Springs.

The farm fresh steaks, potatoes and corn provided by Deep Springs.

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The horses the cowboys use to manage the cattle. They forage in the same campsite with the cowboys after work is done. Cowboy life is a rare sight to see, and we were very lucky to be invited to be a part of it.

Cheers and happy botanizing.

Leah Madison

BLM, Ridgecrest CA

Surprise Valley Time

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Since my internship has been extended, I have transferred from the Alturas office to the Surprise Valley office. So far, I like it here. Since Alturas and Surprise are about 30 minutes from each other, I have worked within the Surprise boundary earlier in the season. I have some knowledge of this area, but since it is towards the end of the season, I feel like I have a lot of catching up to do in terms of where things are out in the wilderness.

At the Alturas office, the word on the block was that the interns last year and my mentor did not get along so well. I feel as though I was really able to leave that office with a good reputation and the respect of my former coworkers. This gives me a since of pride in knowing that I did good work, or at least worked to the best of my abilities. In my experience, people notice your mindset and attitude more so than the work you actually do. Not to say be happy everyday and you dont have to work, but if you are learning something new, whether skills, information, or just how to navigate a new area, you are bound to make mistakes and therein lies the importance of coming into work everyday ready to try again and not be negative about your task or abilities.

I do feel like I am living in a whirlwind right now. Many things are happening back home in Ohio with my family while my friends are getting married. Here I am, living in a 14 foot trailer driving around the wilderness where people can’t get a hold of me half the time. During this summer, I also began a move across the country to Oregon and all the planning and communicating that goes into an endeavor like that has become rather distracting. My new home is about 2,500 miles from my old home and also about 315 miles from where I currently work, yet my only internet connection is in the office, so I have to use my time wisely.

All in all, I would say that we have it easy. Back in the day, there would be no emails, no phone calls, and no long weekend drives to check on things. I would be here, family, fiance, friends, would be somewhere else, and it would take a long time to send letters back and forth. I would be down here working and saving my money so I could move my fiance here where we would probably live in my 14 foot trailer and scrape through a cold desert winter. Puts it in perspective a little bit.

High Peaks and Hot Springs in Idaho

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Our time in Idaho is winding down and Alexi and I are scrambling to finish up our projects and to go on as many adventures possible before we have to leave this beautiful area. The last several weeks of our internship has been focused on digitizing riparian photo monitoring sites and then checking them in the field. We also have been doing a lot of bat monitoring. After we finished the cave surveys searching for maternity roosts, we started doing acoustic surveys using a program called AnaBat to monitor the presence of bats.

Microphone mounted on the truck during the bat acoustic monitoring vehicle transects

Microphone mounted on the truck during the bat acoustic monitoring driving transects

We’ve set up passive stations and have also conducted driving transects. AnaBat reads the frequency of noise that the microphone picks up and graphs it on a PDA attached to it. Each bat species has a distinct call with different shapes and different minimum frequencies. Some of their calls can be really similar, so it has been a challenge differentiating each species. But it has been a lot of fun seeing how many bats are actually all around us and also uplifting to see that their populations out west are still doing okay.

AnaBat software recording bat calls

AnaBat software recording bat calls

Silver-haired bat calls occur between 25 and 30k and have distinctive hook at the bottom. There's also a little brown bat call at 40k

Silver-haired bat calls occur between 25 and 30k and have distinctive hook at the bottom. There’s also a little brown bat call at 40k

Last week we had the opportunity to attend the First Annual Eastern Idaho Bat Bio Blitz at the Sand Creek Wildlife Management Area, a tranquil area dotted with ponds. This was an awesome opportunity because we were mist netting bats and got to see them up close. I had the opportunity to do this last winter, when I was in the Chiricahuas, and was very excited to do it again. We set up the mist nets right in the water and had to wear waders to get them in place.

Mist netting bats at the Eastern Idaho Bat Bio Blitz

Mist netting bats at the Eastern Idaho Bat Bio Blitz

Measuring the little brown bat's forearm. Don't worry it's not painful, he's just being dramatic.

Measuring the little brown bat’s forearm. Don’t worry it’s not painful, he’s just being dramatic.

We had a lighting storm come through and we all had to jump in the trucks to wait it out, but as soon as that was over all the bats came out to feed. We only caught little brown bats (Myotis lucifugus), but it was still very exciting.

This past Labor Day Weekend was one of the most exciting weekends we’ve had so far in Idaho. For me it started out on Friday night with an outdoor concert with The Head and the Heart in Sun Valley. This was only my second concert of the summer (last summer I went to six), so I was pretty stoked. The next morning I met up with fellow CLM interns Alexi and Emily and some other BLM friends in Stanley, Idaho and began a day of hot spring adventures. We started out at this hot spring called Boat Box that is literally right on the side of Highway 75. The hot water feeds out of a pipe into a metal tub and then into other surrounding pools along the Salmon River.

Boat Box Hot Springs near Stanley, Idaho

Boat Box Hot Springs near Stanley, Idaho along the Salmon River

The tub at Boat Box Hot Springs

The tub at Boat Box Hot Springs

We lingered there for a while and then made our way to the secret Goldbug Hotsprings outside Salmon, Idaho. Alexi told me about Goldbug at the beginning of our internship and ever since then I’ve been dying to go. To get to Goldbug you have to hike up about three miles through private property and then BLM land. On our way up we noticed a plume of smoke on top of the mountain. Then we saw a helitack crew with buckets flying toward the mountain and witnessed them putting out the fire.

Small fire near Goldbug Hot Springs (which is situated at the notch)

Small fire near Goldbug Hot Springs (which is situated at the notch)

Once we reached Goldbug I was not disappointed. There were about 20 different pools at various levels with waterfalls flowing into them. It was hard to believe this place naturally existed- it felt like a waterpark. The pools were all at varying temperatures and we hopped from one to another.

An oasis of pools at Goldbug Hot Springs

An oasis of pools at Goldbug Hot Springs

 

Goldbug Hot Springs

Goldbug Hot Springs

We met some interesting people while we were there, including two unabashed naked men who insisted on talking to us for a while. We stayed at Goldbug for a couple hours before driving down towards Mackay, Idaho to camp at the base of Mount Borah, the tallest mountain in Idaho.

The next morning we woke up to snow on the mountains and clouds hovering above us. We got up a little later than we intended because none of us slept well that night. This actually proved to be advantageous to us because in the morning clouds covered the top of Borah, obscuring the views. We met up with Jonathan, a fellow CLM intern and started hiking around 8:30am. The trail is only 3.5 miles up to the peak, but you ascend 5,262 vertical feet, which makes for a nice strenuous hike. As we got closer to the top there was a lot of Class 3 scrambling over loose rocks. The most difficult section is aa Class 4 arête (a thin ridge of rock) infamously known as “Chickenout Ridge”, since a lot of people will turn once they see it. Luckily we were with someone who has done the hike four times already and he knew exactly how to go. We actually ended up staying at that place for 45 minutes as our friend helped about 20 people get through that area.

"Chickenout Ridge", the Class 4 arête near the top of Mt. Borah

“Chickenout Ridge”, the Class 4 arête near the top of Mt. Borah

We ended up making a lot of friends and we all reached the summit at about the same time. The clouds had cleared away and the wind stopped making for perfect summit conditions. We all basked in the sun, shared some honey whiskey, and took a giant group picture. We were the tallest people in Idaho that day and we were having a great time.

View from the top of Borah

View from the top of Borah

Group picture at the top of Mount Borah

Group picture at the top of Mount Borah

Descending Mt. Borah

Descending Mt. Borah

Until next time,

Avery

Shoshone BLM Office