With only two weeks left of my internship here in Miles City, Montana I’m overwhelmed with the dauting to-do list in front of me. Top priority – collect Baker sagebrush until my fingers freeze off. Our goal was a lofty 120 pounds of rough picked seed, equated approximately 60 pounds of clean seed. After spending five days out there picking with 2-4 other people helping me, we still only have 35 pounds of rough picked seed. However, that’s okay, we’ve been working our butts off and everyone is still proud of the amount of seed we’ve be able to pick. The sagebrush in Baker is small and scrubby and grows surprising well in that area which has been affected by oil and gas development. Though we might not of met our goal of 60 lbs of clean seed by collecting in Baker (as opposed to collecting at other sites nearby with bigger more robust sagebrush) I truly believe that what we collected will grow better because it is what is found in that area. I’d especially like to thank the guys on the fire crew who were out there helping me!!! Couldn’t of done it without you!

Aside from sagebrush, I still have to get out and collect Prairie Cordgrass (which is what I’m planning on doing today) and work on mounting herbarium specimens, writing the annual report and updating program information, and hopefully creating a database for all of last year’s and this year’s data. So much to do and so little time! The next two weeks are going to fly by.

Additionally, I have the office Christmas party and two upcoming job interviews to look forward too. My time here has been wonderful and I’d like to thank everyone here at the field office for making that happen. I have learned so much and really feel much more focused on where I would like my career to eventually head. Thanks again Miles City!!!

Here’s to the future and the opportunity to climb many more moutains!!!…um or hills!