Things have began to wind down here at the Eagle Lake Field Office! My three fellow interns/roommates have departed Susanville, and moved onto their next adventure. It is a lonely place in the field without them and I’m missing their laughter like crazy!
The last day of work together!!! :'( Miss these girls so much!
It hasn’t been too bad working solo these past few days. I have been wrapping up the remainder of the SOS collections. All the seeds have been sent, herbarium specimens mailed to the Smithsonian Institute and UC Jepson herbarium, and photos have been organized. All that’s left is to send in the final forms and our season will be complete! All in all, we collected 33 collections of about 23 different species. Our collections included everything from grasses to forbs to shrubs. We were happy with the number of collections we made, and the variety of species we managed to collect. Working as an SOS intern, I was able to see parts of Northern California that most people will never have the chance to see and I have learned a tremendous amount about ELFO’s native flora.
In addition to working on completing the SOS collections, I also had the chance to work on my mentor’s planting project. My co-intern, Rachael, and I picked up over 2000 Mountain Mahogany and Bitterbrush seedling from the Washoe Nursery near Reno, NV. We were also sent a stack of about 20 boxes of sagebrush seedlings.
Some of the boxes weren’t so pretty when they finally reached us. They had already been on a long journey.
We packed the little guys up and drove them up to our field office to be planted by a GBI crew. Over the span of a week, we delivered seedlings to the interns, learned to use hand tools and oggers for planting, and had the chance to work with like-minded individuals who cared about the environment. It was a wonderful, but chilly experience! Of course the snow would hit the one week of planting. However, it made for some beautiful scenery!
The Mountain Mahogany planting site near Pilgrim Lake.
Here is a picture of my favorite peak in the field office, Observation Point. The fog was awesome!
I was also lucky enough to get some last minute exploring in before the snow hit! I explored the beautiful, bird filled Antelope Lake. The drive was absolutely gorgeous and the views, incredible!
Spent the morning of Halloween on a scenic bike ride along the Bizz Johnson Trail. I can’t believe this was my first time on the trail all since I moved here!
The beautiful Antelope lake.
I also made the trip to Point Reyes, just north of San Francisco, to soak up some sun! It was a beautiful trip, filled with good food and great views!
A view from the Point Reyes lighthouse! This has been one of my favorite mini trips I have done since coming to California. The color of the water was absolutely breathtaking.
That’s all that I have been up to lately; an exciting month (with some sulking over missing my roommates), and many more adventures to come. I will be sticking around Susanville for a few more months, so expect some more posts in the near future!
Until next time!
Jill Pastick