Cenchrus tribuloides – Sanddune sandbur

Definitely one of the more interesting plants in our range here. If you’ve never had the misfortune of encountering these jerks of the grass family, let me paint the scene for you. Imagine you’re walking along, heading toward the beach with your family and friends, dragging a beach chair and complaining about how hot the sand is on your feet, despite the sandals you’re wearing. You’re just getting to the part of the conversation when start feeling hopeful about the cool water you’re about to step into, when – BAM! No, that wasn’t your beach chair unfolding on its own and bruising your ankle. That was a sanddune sandbur. 8 mm long spines have pierced your flesh, and its not just one, but 15 burs that are sticking out of you like you’re made of Velcro.

Now you can stop imagining – because you have to collect the seeds of this gem.

But seriously, how do you collect something like this? My partner Maggie and I had planned on buying a raggedy old bed sheet from a consignment store, and dragging it across the landscape to collect our burs, however, we forgot to get the bed sheet. Luckily though, Maggie had two old towels in her car, so we decided to try our luck with them. Towels are more like Vecro than human skin, right? And more so than a bed sheet.

Anyway, we tried that, and as it turns out, there is a critical mass of burs that will stick to any given towel. I’m going to approximate that the number is around 200 burs per side. Seeing as how we had two towels, two sides per towel, that only gives us about 800 burs. I was finding there to be 1 seed per bur, so in the grand scheme of things, 800 seeds will do us no good when our goal is 20,000.

We then tried a different method – walk through this big patch of Cenchrus tribuloides wearing our rubber boots, and clip the mature inflorescences with our pruners into a paper bag. That worked for a while, but after noticing how many burs were sticking to our gloves and pants, I decided to take matters into my own hands. Quite literally. I threw my pruners to the ground, readied myself, and grasped an inflorescence with my (gloved) hands. Applying only the slightest amount of pressure, I attempted to strip the stalk of its burs – and voila! The mature burs stuck to my glove, and the immature burs remained on the stalk.

After that we were able to collect our goal – and then some – in record time. The sheet was an inventive idea, as were the towels, but lo and behold, our hands were the best tool we had.

Never again will I underestimate what my hands can do – and neither should you.

Till next time.

It’s hard to believe I’ve been here in Ridgecrest over 6 weeks now! It has been quite busy. On the seed collection front, we have managed to make a few seed collections and are monitoring a few other sites for harvest-ability. Last Thursday we were picking Cleome sparsifolia, and let me tell you–it took quite a while to get rid of the pungent odor on my hands. Yuck.

In the office I have been helping put together a grant proposal which I’m enjoying doing research for, but my main side project has been digitizing the RIFO herbarium. Entering all the data has been a bit tedious, but having a digital copy of the herbarium contents will be a valuable resource to the field office, and I’m a little surprised no one had done it yet! Going through all the vouchers has also helped me familiarize with more of the species we encounter and get a better idea of what can be found in the area.

I’m enjoying the field office here so far. I’ve finally made some friends which has helped, and my mentor is an outstanding guy with lots of great advice for my career. Outside of work, I’ve been enjoying having access to the mountains, and my favorite weekend trip so far has been the visit to Mammoth Lakes!

Mojave Tarweed: We encountered a rare plant, Deinandra mohavensis, during our most recent visit to Short Canyon.

California Loosestrife: Got a collection of Lythrum californicum in some damp areas of Short Canyon.

California Kingsnake: I was very excited to see my first snake since being out here! A friendly Lampropeltis californiae. Still keeping my eyes peeled for rattlers.

Olancha Dunes: Collection site for the Cleome sparsifolia. Quite a pretty area, though be ready for eyes and airways full of sand if it’s windy.

Amphibians! Found some unk tadpoles in Surprise Canyon. In my opinion, the surprise was that there was running water somewhere out here!

Surprisingly colorful: I’m taking a lichen to California! Eh? Eh?

California rocks! The noun, or the verb.

Paintbrush: We collected seed for Castilleja linariifolia at Short Canyon recently.

Mammoth: A beautiful place that realize how much I missed trees and water.

As my internship begins to wind down here at the Eugene BLM office I find myself basking in the anticipation of my first term as a masters student at Oregon State University.

Two summers ago I took an intensive 2-week course in ecological restoration and knew from that moment onward that I wanted to one day become a restoration practitioner. I still had over a year of course work ahead of me to finish my B.S. and had not given serious thought to graduate school. When the professor of my summer restoration course recruited me to be in his new lab at Oregon State University it felt like one of those moments when you just have to say yes without a second thought. I did say yes, and I’m truly glad I did, but I never would have expected how things would actually play out.

It’s two years later and I just now feel like I’m starting to understand how all the pieces fit together. I had so many misconceptions going into this whole process that it’s kind of amazing it worked out at all. One of the hardest lessons I had to learn was how to tell the difference between things I had control over and those I didn’t… to put my future in the hands of my advisor and a host of strangers… and to just hope everything would work out. I also had to learn to be my own advocate.

After several years of constantly feeling like everything was either just about to work out or blow up in my face I often look back and think of many things I wish I had known or done differently. Other times I look back and am glad that the road was rough because it forced me to navigate a very confusing and nebulous bureaucratic system, gave me an appreciation for how difficult it is to find funding for research, and to accept that there are many many things that are just simply out of my hands. Maybe the emotional roller-coaster I’ve been on the last two years was a product of my stubbornness to learn these lessons.

For anyone thinking about graduate school, (and more specifically a research-oriented M.S.) I cannot stress enough how important it is to lean heavily on at least one faculty member who has lots of experience advising graduate students and who has consistently found grant money for said students. At face value it seems like you can do most of the heavy lifting to get a research project up and running by yourself so long as you get accepted into a graduate program, but in reality for things to go smoothly one (or several faculty members) have to essentially pave the way for you (and they have to pave it well).

I’m just about to start school in 2 weeks and have a grant with enough funding to get me most of the way through my degree. Since I first embarked on this journey I’m just now about to start working towards my degree for real, all after hopping between half a dozen research ideas, three different departments at OSU, authoring several grant applications, and arriving at many many dead ends along the way. Despite the rough road I still feel very fortunate to be where I am now. I also can’t shake the feeling that I’ve already made it though the hardest part. At least now I can mostly see the path forward and have gained the confidence to know that with the help of my committee and and others I will be able to see this through.