Looking at posts from the other interns, I’m as surprised as they are how fast my internship has gone by. It seems like just last week I was driving out to California, stepping out of my car believing I was in the Mojave Desert and abruptly realizing I had moved to the surface of the sun. Overwhelmed by my new surroundings and immediately missing hills, trees, and water. Thankfully things have cooled off since then, I’ve been many unique places that most people never get a chance to see, and I’ve learned to appreciate the beauty the desert can offer. I’ve formed many valuable relationships in the office and truly appreciate the people that I’ve spent time with. As with everywhere else I have worked and gone to school, it’s the people that make a place feel more like home.
Since my last post, we’ve continued our rangeland surveys. We’ve also performed a few Proper Functioning Condition surveys with the help of a botanist who recently retired from the field office. He worked here in Ridgecrest for almost 40 years–he’s such an interesting person to talk to and is an immense bank of knowledge. He knows the field office like the back of his hand and can point at just about any mountain and tell you the last time he hiked it and what populations of rare plants are found there. He’s also very well-versed in geology and hydrology, and knows all about how the features in the field office formed. I wish I could listen to him tell stories about the mountains here all day.
We’ve moved out of the northern portion of the field office and into a new allotment in the southern portion, and it’s been great getting to explore new areas. We’ve gotten to go through the Walker Pass area and have been spending many days up around Kelso Valley. The Starks would say, “Winter is Coming,” but they’d be wrong, because it’s here–I’m regretting not packing more winter clothes but that was the last thing on my mind in July! Apparently they don’t get much snow here in the valley, but some of the higher elevation areas have been turning white. Hopefully the weather holds out for one more week until I go home for Christmas.
Some final-internship-month highlights in photographic form:
