The first three weeks here in the Jarbidge Field Office BLM, have been jammed packed full days with safety trainings and monitoring trainings. We planted 7,000 sage brush seedlings with the local high school kids. This was a collaborative rehabilitation effort with Idaho Fish and Game and the Bureau of Land Management.
Sage Grouse is under a microscope in the Western US and I have been checking their leks a couple days a week. I have to arrive at the first Lek a half hour before sunrise. So I am leaving the office at 4:30 to 5:00 am. It takes a couple hours to monitor the route; each route has approximately 6 leks. I count the males and females, temperature, wind etc… I have 4 Leks total to monitor and I will run each Lek 3 times during the strutting season. I am also being trained on Sage Grouse Habitat Assessment Framework (HAF) a multi-scale habitat assessment tool. This is great experience that can be added to my resume.