Greetings CLM interns,

After a wonderful and wild ride as a CLM intern in Fairbanks, I am here to tell you that this will be my last blog post.

I will be moving on from the Bureau of Land Management but will be staying in the Golden Heart City of Fairbanks, Alaska.  Life has taken me across town to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife where I will be the new botany biotech for Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

As such, this post will be bittersweet.  I’ve immensely enjoyed my year at the BLM, but I am also incredibly excited to botanize and explore in Arctic refuge this summer and beyond.

My last few weeks working at BLM were jam packed.

I first headed to Central, AK to finally set up the little brown bat monitoring project that I had been planning for months and months.  The plan was drive our trusty steed Big Blue (also known as an F250 Dodge Ram) to Central, transition to our other trusty steeds (King Quad 4-wheelers) and ride along the Harrison Creek trail up and over a ridge and down into a creek valley, deploying ultrasonic bat detectors along the way.  Anticipation was high as this was a project and field outing I had planned pretty much entirely by myself.   But alas, we arrived in Central and rode to the top of the ridge only to find the trail still snowed in.  An extremely unfortunate outcome but in Alaska the remoteness of these areas makes field work particularly unpredictable.  Nothing we could do but enact plan B and place the detectors closer to the main road.  Disappointment sat heavy, but in the end the project was passed along to the next intern in what I believe and hope to be a good state.

Immediately after this trip north, I turned around and headed south to spend a few days in Chicken, AK doing raptor surveys.  We flew via helicopter along the narrow river valleys of the Fortymile area and searched the cliffs and tree tops for Golden Eagle, Bald Eagle, Peregrine Falcon and Common Raven nests.  When spotted, we noted whether there were eggs, chicks and/or adults present and how many of each.  The weather was perfect and it was a gorgeous and productive several days.

I raced back to Fairbanks for my last day on Friday, and there ended my CLM intern adventure.

And now some reflections on the Life and Times of a CLM Intern in Alaska.

Looking back I am in awe of how much I’ve learned and experienced working with the BLM.  At times my experience was different than I expected, at times the same.  So without further ado…

Surprises:

• Alaska itself. Although I found it extremely exciting to be in the midst of such a pure and wild area, it was still a shock sometimes how remote Alaska is.  From things like grocery prices; to driving on a highway for several hours without seeing store, person, car or sign; to the concept of towns accessible only by plane, it was initially a very odd place indeed. And of course -40 degree winter temperatures were rather extreme.
• Working for a multiple-use agency. I have immense respect for my colleagues and the agency for striving to make intelligent and informed decisions on land use while considering many different views.  It was interesting to see how this functioned at the office level and how decision making ramped up from there and/or came down from higher levels and affected operations at the local level.  It was also very exciting to have so many different types of folks in the office—it really allowed me to get a broad range of experiences over the course of my internship.

Cherished Opportunities:

• Meeting and interacting with many wonderful people from all walks of life.
• Assisting with many types of different tasks/field outings.  I was able to do not only my regular job (which included invasive species inventory and monitoring, herbarium management, GIS, raptor surveys and bat project planning) but also experience the worlds of our hydrologist (through snow surveys), our mining compliance staff (through a combination invasive plant/mining compliance float trip), NPS biologists (through moose surveys) and many more.
• Living in a wonderful town surrounded by endless outdoor play land.

Highlights:

• Being able to work under an amazing boss.
• Witnessing 2 young black bears wrestle right outside our field station.
• Meeting many remarkable people.
• Looking at many interesting plants via herbarium preparations and plant ID.
• Flying over the entirety of Gates of the Arctic National Park for moose surveys.
• Getting lots of GIS practice.
• Driving to the Arctic twice—during the summer and the winter—and getting to see the difference.
• Doing a multi-day float trip down the Fortymile River doing invasive plant inventory.
• Flying in a helicopter along the Fortymile counting raptors.
• I could go on all day…

Final Thoughts:

I am a very lucky person to have had this opportunity.  It allowed me to be placed in a community I now love and allowed me to get my foot in the door for federal employment.  I’m not entirely convinced that government work is for me, and graduate school is still a looming possibility, but for now I am going to try another federal agency on for size.  I’m eager to see how things change while working for an agency with a single, more directed mission (vs. multiple use).

In the past couple months I have completed several projects and started a few as well.  First off I believe I have gotten the Phacelia formosula monitoring dialed in and ready for the monitoring that will be completed later in the summer.  The highlights in the past months include Astragalus debequaeus monitoring, Penstemon grahamii monitoring, Physaria congesta monitoring, Astragalus naturitensis monitoring, Sclerocactus monitoring and CLM workshop at Chicago Botanic Gardens.

Astragalus debequaeus monitoring was a success with relatively good numbers for the year and recruitment numbers that were better than excepted.

Macroplot location for Astragalus debequaeus

Vista from one of the macroplot location for Astragalus debequaeus

Penstemon grahamii monitoring was completed and a significant increase was seen from the previous year, which was a relief even though grazing pressure from native species as well as livestock was still present in and around the area of our macroplot.

Several new Physaria congesta plots were established near an oil and gas facility with White River BLM field office, USFWS, Colorado State BLM office and oil company personnel.  These plots will give USFWS and BLM information on how Physaria congesta populations are potentially affected by the proximity to oil and gas installations. It will be neat to see what accessory experiments will need to be completed to fully confirm the effects of the oil and gas installations.

Astragalus naturitensis monitoring was a new plot as well as new species to conduct monitoring on by the BLM Colorado State office.  Working with personnel from the Uncompahgre field office we survey for the species in areas that were rotochopped 30 years ago and probably chained before that, so the area was still recovering.  To our surprise we found the species throughout these areas in densities that we were not expecting and in one of those areas we found a population with a density that could support a monitoring macroplot.

Additional survey work was completed for Astragalus naturitensis with Lone Cone in the distance.

Sclerocactus glaucus monitoring this year was completed with the help of the Uncompahgre field office, Colorado State office, and students from University of Northern Colorado.  This year’s monitoring was a way to introduce how the BLM monitors rare and endangered plants throughout Colorado and give them the opportunity to participate in monitoring plants too. http://www.unco.edu/news/releases.aspx?id=8144

Even though we were monitoring cactus, when you see an animal posing for you, you have to take the shot

Sclerocactus monitoring area

This past week I traveled to Chicago Botanic Gardens to present at the CLM workshop about the work I did for the revision of the Phacelia formosula monitoring.

When at a botanic garden you have to take the time to take a few pictures of the flora they have growing on the grounds.

Regards,

Nathan

Blog 3

Oy, my third month here at the CO state office has come and gone. So what have I been up to? May has been full of Penstemon grahamii, Physaria congesta, and preparing for the CLM training in Chicago.

First, Penstemon grahamii. I talked about this species in my first post, and we have finally been out for monitoring. And we got to see it in flower! The actual monitoring was easy enough. This plot and the monitoring protocols have been established since 2005, so it was as easy as knowing what to look for and what to record. So, what did we find?

This population took a hard hit last year, with only 16 rosettes remaining. The species is rare as it is, and this plot is the largest population we have found to date on CO lands. We scouted some potential habitat in early May and found no new populations. All we did find was a cluster of 6 or so plants. So, for the time being, we have to make do with what we’ve got.  This year, we found 7 new plants and a total of 67 rosettes; which is statistically a significant increase. However, when compared to 2005, it is a significant decrease. By significant I mean we are 90% sure of detecting a 20% difference in mean population density. Here is a table of our data since 2005.

Overall, this is important information if for no other reason than the fact that the USFWS is currently being sued for deciding no to this, and another, species last year.

I still don’t know how to make this bigger.

I was also able to talk about this species at the Chicago training last week. I hope people found it interesting to hear a little about what we’re working on here, and see how the monitoring training they received in another class can be put to use. However, we presented right after lunch each day and had a hard time gauging audience interest. I only spotted one person sleeping, so that’s good right?

Over the past few weeks, I have been almost exclusively working on a grasshopper survey in the Panoche Hills region of Northern California. I have developed a protocol that will hopefully be published by the end of the summer (along with a literature review of other recent grasshopper studies).

I spent a significant amount of time since my last blog post in the field at three different test sites. One is located in Little Panoche Valley, one is located on the Panoche Plateau, and one is in Silver Creek. Each test site represents a zone where leopard lizards have been found. I completed several zone sweeps and transects in order to collect grasshoppers, and identify them down to species.

The next phase of the protocol calls for a genetic comparison and analysis to assess where and why each different species is overlapping with the observed leopard lizard populations. This will answer questions about the genetic composition of the community, overall gene flow, and dietary preferences of the endangered lizard.

I visited UC Davis this past Friday to work on IDing the grasshoppers with the head curator of the insect collection there. It is quite an impressive collection. Over six MILLION specimens! If anyone reading is at all interested in bugs, it is worth a visit! I now possess a great key that will help me identify down to species for each grasshopper that I have collected (more than 200 so far). It’s somewhat difficult to do because grasshoppers vary greatly in coloration and markings within a species. For example, taking each specimen through a key requires that I look at wing venation, pronotum structure, reproductive structure, and many other morphological traits. I will get through them all eventually!

Over the next few weeks, I hope to begin the genetic component of the protocol as well as the literature review. I’m really enjoying this project, and can’t wait to see the end results.

Jen Michalski
Hollister Field Office

GPS coordinates of where I spotted a leopard lizard in the field one day!

Panoche Plateau test site

Growing up in coastal eastern Massachusetts and having spent the last four years in Vermont, I would have never imagined myself living in New York City. I’ve always been surrounded by large tracts of conservation lands, particularly beautiful tracts of northern hardwood forest and dune communities. I was curious about the state of the natural areas in and around New York City and admittedly did not have high expectations for the areas. After spending a week with a few trips to natural sites around the city I’m happy to say that so far I have been pleasantly surprised by the state of the area. As expected, there is a fair about of trash strewn about and some areas have been subjected to heavy public use. However, the amount of plant diversity and native species still remaining in what seemed like a jungle of invasive species was surprising to me.

Over the course of the week we were able to identify about 15 species on our collection list. For someone who is fairly well versed in the flora of the Northeast, I was thrilled to find myself learning new species. I’ve recently been working on getting better at identifying grass and grass-like species. I find them somewhat challenging to key out if you can’t identify them through familiarity and gestalt. Everyone’s favorite so far seems to be the black rush, Juncus gerardii, due to its minute yet stunning flowers and ease of identification.

Our collection list also includes a few groups of species in what I consider to be troublesome genera and closely related genera, specifically Viburnum, Vaccinium, and Gaylussacia. We encountered a few mystery Viburnum during our field days, which we concluded were likely ornamental non-natives. We also found these Vaccinium and Gaylussacia species growing side by side, which helped us process the differences between the two. In this photo the Vaccinium is on the right and the Gaylussacia is on the left.

While of course the plants were interesting and I was excited to learn new species, the scenery wasn’t bad either! For such a developed landscape, there are certainly some hidden gems of natural areas in the city. In the next few weeks to come I can’t wait to discover even more hidden paradises in Long Island, New Jersey, and Delaware!

Paige Carncross

SOS East Intern for the Mid-Atlantic Regional Seed Bank

Here at the New England Wildflower Society, our goal for the next six months is to assist in preparing for restoration of salt marshes in New England, many of which have been degraded by natural disasters, such as Hurricane Sandy, as well as human activity. Since this project is the first of its kind for SOS on the East Coast and most of the land east of the Mississippi is not owned by the federal government, we have spent much of our time over the past week contacting landowners, state governments, universities, tribal groups, and watershed associations in order to obtain permission to survey sites for potential seed collection and restoration. Since associations between these groups and government agencies that provide them grant money are often complex and convoluted, it has lately been a little difficult to contact the right people who can grant us the necessary permissions. Nonetheless, we persevered, and we managed to visit three wildlife refuges in Rhode Island this week to scout for potential seed collection and restoration: Chafee and Satchuet on 6/10, and Ninigret on 6/12.

Common reed (Phragmites australis)

Blue iris (Iris versicolor)

White waterlily (Nymphaea odorata)

Oxeye daisy (Leucanthemum vulgare)

All three of these refuges featured a typical marsh ecosystem, with the cordgrasses Spartina alterniflora, Spartina patens and the rush Juncus gerardii dominating, with smaller amounts of the small succulent Salicornia and assorted sedges of the Carex genus, all of which we hope to collect from for Seeds of Success.  However, all the marshes also seemed to be significantly disturbed, especially by boating traffic.  And all three were plagued with nasty infestations of an invasive strain of the weedy reed species Phragmites australis.  On higher ground we saw a bit more floral diversity, including meadows of the daisy Leucanthemum vulgare and thickets of shadbush, Amelanchier.  Looks like we have our work cut out for us — but we’re excited to start!

James

Side-blotched lizard

Rain here in Escalante, I have come to find, is a double edged sword. On one hand, the recent rains in southern Utah have been a boon for the plants and animals. Enormous populations of globemallow and yellow beeplant have been bursting out from the sand and clay, coloring entire hillsides, valleys, and mesas bright orange and yellow. Annuals are adding sprinklings of reds, purples, and blues among the grey-greens of vast flats near Escalante. Thus the palette of the monument has greatly expanded in the past few weeks with the arrival of several big storms; but these same life-giving rains have prevented travel to about 2/3 of our target populations on any given day. All but one of the main roads on the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument are unpaved, and the majority of these are only navigable with high clearance, 4 wheel drive vehicles. So it is that even in the best weather and road conditions, some populations are troublesome to get to, but with storms, they become wholly inaccessible for days on end.

Collared lizard

As a result of extended weather delays, we were occasionally unable to monitor and collect during late May. On those days my co-intern and I lent our help to the wildlife biologists on the monument and collected data for hummingbird, bat, and lizard surveys.

Male broad tailed hummer

Understanding the animal life in these ecosystems is crucial to understanding the plant communities themselves and their true value in restoration and resilience, so I have found these forays into wildlife biology to be enlightening. Each of the animal taxa being studied on the monument serves integral roles in pest management, pollination, food web stability, and climate change research, both locally and regionally. The hummingbird survey data are especially interesting because many of the species found on the monument migrate through annually from southern deserts and northern forests, thus giving us clues into what surrounding climates are like compared to our regional climate. The data being collected are helping to paint a picture of the temporal changes in migration patterns for each hummingbird species, as well as for the genus as a whole which, in turn, are showing researchers the real-world impacts of changing climatic trends.

Collared lizard

Additionally, my co-intern and I have become particularly invested in the lizard surveys and have taken to catching lizards during seed collection and population monitoring trips, just for the sake of learning. There is no comprehensive list of herpological diversity on the two million square acre monument, and both Jessie and I have decided to help change this in whatever way possible. Herps represent important members of the food webs in these ecosystems, and I believe strongly that documenting biodiversity is crucial to any management strategies. Globally, herpological diversity is declining rapidly as species are being discovered, immediately listed as endangered, and then declared extinct with little more than a description and a name. While most of these tragedies are occurring to amphibians, which are naturally less common in such dry climes as Escalante, other herps are also eluding documentation and are thus at a unique risk of being lost. I don’t think that it is possible to overstate the importance of scientists and managers to know the biodiversity of their study sites, regardless of target organism, and I am thrilled that I am able to help gather data in the hope that the monument will soon gain insight into its herpological diversity and take steps to conserve the species here.

Desert spiny lizard

Despite the inclement weather, we have begun to collect seeds for two species of globemallow, three species of grass, and one species of mustard during the last two weeks. Rain is again preventing certain collections this week and may be knocking out our ripe seeds, but the rain is nonetheless a welcome visitor after such a dry winter and spring.

In the spirit of adventure,

Elise

Escalante Field Office, BLM

P.S. I’m building a theme with my titles because life is too short to not have a little intrigue every once in a while. If you can guess it, then I’ll send you an Escalante keepsake. I’m not joking. Hint: Mr Plant met an elf-friend and grew inspired. These titles are inspired by the resulting harmonious union.

“Lost now on the country miles in his Cadillac.
I can tell by the way you smile he’s rolling back.
Come wash the nighttime clean,
Come grow this scorched ground green,…”

Hello again from the steppes of the grand Northwest. While the Pacific Northwest (in the strict West of the Cascades sense) is notorious for it’s rain, these typically dry rainshadow leeward slopes of the Cascades have been soaking in precipitation on and off for the last three weeks. So much so that the roads to BLM land were in such a poor state I had to take nearly a week off (where I largely fretted about lost scouting time, but rejoiced about the speculative effects on the flora). However, this week the clouds finally cleared. The rain has been a blessing, the drought conditions were pretty bad-and a lot of sites were looking like scorched earth and not much else when I arrived.  However following the rain, the steppe (while some parts) has turned into a verdant lush paradise. Many taxa which have had their whole cohorts go to seed, now have a new cohort of seedlings to feast the eyes upon (and voucher specimens for my opportunistic collections! *evil chuckle*). While a few of the taxa which set seed quickly were unable to benefit from the moisture (and thus have a paltry amount of seed this season)- eg. Lithnospermum ruderale, which I have developed a keen fondness for- it appears to be a help with many other species.

When I showed up here I was initially a little flustered. By my April 20th start date many flowers had already faded, so I had to learn the local flora, and already be scouting candidate populations. Over the last few weeks I have caught up and have learned the “usual suspects of the flora” (ya know the plants that make up virtually all of the diversity in an area-except those uncommon treats).  A working knowledge of about 150 species is needed to feel comfortable here. These are more species than I have had to learn for a field position before. I enjoy it very much so and am now working on dialing in my field ID’ing of the Astragalus/Lomatium/Erigonum genera.

I was constantly berated in college by a certain professor for studying too many things, and too broadly. I have tried to take the advice to heed, accordingly now each season I try to become very familiar with a few groups. Last year I focused on Carex, Asteraceae, Poaceae, and other wetland graminoids (Sparganium, and Eleocharis bring back joyful memories). This year I have focused on Lomatium, and Astragalus, largely due to the West being the Lomatium center of diversity, and both of their prevalence amongst communities, and interesting secondary chemistry. It is always interesting learning the morphology of a very similar looking taxa, how distinct subtle differences can be!

I finished scouting the week of the 25th and during the week of the 1st, I finally started collecting seeds (I’m SOS). I have finished five collections so far (all Asteraceae and Lomatium) and I’m looking forward to getting more. While I was initially slightly intimidated by collecting, I now find it to be immensely pleasurable. Today I had to be particularly on my toes distinguishing different Lomatiums that intergrade (and hardly look different even in flowering) by dry and crispy senescent leaves.

Over the last few weeks I have had the pleasure of going to monitor with the UW’s ‘rare care’ team again. I participated in monitoring a couple large dune areas for Cryptantha leucophea– one site exceeded all hopes; at the other site not a single individual was found. Speculation regarding the factors causing this is interesting- I (and some others) most strongly suspect edaphic factors due to plants (dune stabilization) is the primary factor. This past week I had the fortune of seeing some Cryptantha interrupta (rare-but not quite as rare) in the Wenatchee Mountains.

Aside from my working hours I haven’t been able to get out botanizing as much as usual, due to moving houses, and various errands. Fortunately, my new residency is much closer to the Wenatchee Mountains and I can get out hiking in a fraction of the time I could before. Once back from Chicago, I cannot wait to get out there again habitually. Although, I have seen some real beauties in my few trips recently. A new book which I have been very excited about is “Plant evolutionary Biology” by Niklas- I always felt slightly odd about how glossed over our kingdom was treated in undergraduate biology curriculum in lieu of a focus on Animalia.  This is a wonderful lens to use to refresh and deepen my humble (partial and fragmentary) understanding of evolutionary processes. It’s exceptional in tandem with the environment here.

I’m in Chicago now and just had the fortune of visiting the CBG library, whereupon I had the pleasure of finally reviewing a fascimile copy of Vol 2 of Linnaeuss’ ‘Species Plantarum’.  I was able to partially translate the latin descriptors of several species, but had to borrow a Stearns text to complete them. After finishing a few, I was on the verge of tears of joy, and then the librarian let me see a second edition (1830 copy) of “Species Plantarum’ whereupon I started balling tears of joy, smiling wickedly, and laughing madly for the next several hours. Definitely my favourite part of this trip to Chicago! I was also able to snag an 8th edition of Gray’s “Manual of botany”- and the $5 it cost me will go towards the library acquiring more old rare texts. Finally, reading the texts of our forebearers is darn cool. I was also able to read excerpts of a text on seed biochemistry and physiology that emphasized some traits that are seldom mentioned in newer texts.

Uhm ok, so we all know why we really come to the blog. PLANT PICTURES!! So one final anecdote: my truck and I went through a struggle, and both came out unscathed (or “a stragal’ “- ok still not funny? I thought I’d try again). So I decided the bonding experience warranted a name for it, thus I have dubbed my gold dodge “Cassady” an homage to the notorious road dog of the western states. Without further ado PLANTS!

“fare ye the well, Let your life proceed by it’s own design, Let the words be yours I’m done with mine, fare ye the well, let the words be yours I’m done with mine”

Frasera albicaulis

Lomatium cuspidatum

Asclepias speciosa

Physaria alpestris

This month we had a break from the suckers and helped do a survey for Applegate’s milkvetch for a week. Applegate’s milkvetch is a plant in the pea family that grows low to the ground. It is listed as endangered and there are only nine known populations in Klamath County. The largest of those locations is the Klamath Falls Airport. The airport is looking to build a new taxiway, so the plants that will be in the construction zone were completely censused and flagged. The flagging was so that seeds can later be collected and also so that plants that are in the construction imprint can potentially be avoided. We also did random belt transects throughout the entire airport so that ten percent of the total acreage was surveyed. To census the construction zone we would walk in a line and just flag all of the plants we could see. This was much more difficult than it sounds because milkvetch grows very low to the ground with small flowers. There were also a couple of look a likes growing on the airport, which complicated things.

Flagging Milkcetch

Applegate’s Milkvetch

Working at an airport takes a lot of coordination.  While there are no longer commercial flights, there is a military operation still in Klamath. That meant a lot of safety concerns and a lot of coordination. For a lot of the project we had to be with airport employees, who had radios and could communicate with air and ground control.

The milkvetch project gave us a nice introduction to the Endangered Species Act and the role of Fish and Wildlife Service. The project on the airport was done partly with federal money and had to be signed off by a federal entity, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). For these two reasons the airport was required to consult with the Fish and Wildlife Service about the endangered species occurring on their airport. The FWS had to determine if the project would cause jeopardy for the species.  While jeopardy was not found, the FWS still put stipulations on the airport’s development. They required a full census of the construction area and seed collections. In addition the rest of the airport was sampled randomly. We completed the construction project but will be working on the inventory of the airport next week.

The other focus this month was the ponds at Lower Klamath National Wildlife Refuge. I have been going down to monitor the ponds before we put any fish in them. We have been setting traps in the various ponds baited with cat food to try and see if we can catch anything.  So far, no fish, which is good.  The two smaller ponds should not have fish, so we are glad to see that no fish were brought in with the water supply. The larger pond, however, does have fish, so it’s a little confusing that we haven’t found any. We also have been looking for evidence of mammalian predators around the ponds. So far we have found evidence of both otters and raccoons. The next phase of the project involves designing artificial structure. Structure is really important for young fish, as it provides protection from predators and numerous other functions; because of the time frame it’s not possible to do things like plant native plants. We are going to add aquarium plants and decorative rocks attached to tiles to the ponds to provide structure. I’ll be spending the next couple of weeks coming up with arrangement of artificial plants for the ponds, stay tuned!

Ponds at LKNWR

Baited Minnow Traps