New Beginnings in Ridgecrest California

I arrived at the BLM Ridgecrest, California Office on March 3rd, and things have been a whirlwind since arrival! On top of the paperwork and necessary training, we have been involved in Rangeland Health Assessments, Allotment Monitoring, Endangered Species Monitoring in the El Centro Office, SOS surveying, NOPA writing and the Sand Canyon Environmental Education program. The Ridgecrest BLM office is responsible for about 1.8 million acres of land and apparently our opportunities for expanding our experiences will be very numerous. We have also been lucky this year – we have already received more rain than last year, so the annuals have been very plentiful and it looks like we will have quite a few collections for SOS. Being from Reno, NV, part of the Great Basin, I am pretty familiar with most of the flora and ecosystems in the area, but it is exciting to be in a new area, seeing the differences of the Mojave and learning how the BLM works.