After 6 weeks of adult sucker work for USGS we have made the move back to FWS.  Getting to work for two different government agencies within the same internship has been an awesome learning experience in and of itself.  In this area USGS serves almost as an private contractor that helps to fulfill the research needs of FWS and BLM in this area.  BLM and FWS both have a special interest in many of the local large management decisions (in a simplified way, water for farmers and endangered fish respectively), so USGS helps to provide unbiased data.

We’ve said goodbye for now to adult suckers and are moving on to some lost river and short nose juvenile work, plus prep for other upcoming projects.  Currently we are working on a man-made pond created in the Lower Klamath Wildlife Refuge where suckers have been stocked to gain a better understanding of their response to an artificial environment.  We set fyke nets over night and then collect length data and PIT tag numbers to measure their growth since being moved to the pond.  Hopefully the data we collect will begin to shed some light on whether an artificial stocking program is a viable option for these endangered suckers.

Pulling the fyke net

Juvenile sucker

Collecting juvenile data