Out of the Field and Into…the Office

Well folks, I’m back! Once again I find myself amongst some of the most adventuresome, hardworking and environmentally conscientious of America’s post college youth – The CLM interns. I’m a veteran at this point, as it is my 3rd time in the internship. I’m returning after my first season as a real government employee. Through my second internship in Prineville Oregon, I was able to be hired on the following season as a Biological Science Technician – Plants. Whew! What a handle. Lets keep it simple and call it a Botany Tech. There, that’s much easier. As a Botany Tech here at the Prineville BLM I was able to mentor the next generation of CLM interns tasked with seed collecting. I also had an introduction to performing Botany Clearance work. This entailed “ground truthing” projects before they are approved. For example, someone wants to build a fence, or create a new trail system. I go out to the field site prior to the action and ensure that no Special Status plants will be harmed in the course of this project, and to make suggestions as to minimizing the impacts of the project on the native flora at the site. Then, I go back to the office and write a report of all my observations. Much of my time during the field season was spent doing Botany Monitoring (I got to do this a tiny bit in my internship the year before as well.) This is by far the COOLEST part of the job. It’s a rare plant treasure hunt. I went to some very distant and extraordinarily beautiful places on our district, hiked up to 6 miles in a day over isolated and rugged terrain, all the while searching for rare/endemic plants. Much of the time I was locating populations that are mapped (it can still be a challenge to find them) but in a few cases I actually discovered new populations unknown to BLM humans. Or most likely, any humans. So these discoveries were quite exciting. The other large chunk of my time was spent doing AIM, (Assessment Inventory and Monitoring). This is a very specific protocol for monitoring the landscape. The effort is BLM wide. Myself and my partner set up AIM plots on areas that had burned in intense and large scale wildfires in year 2014. We collected really detailed and extensive data on vegetation and soils. I learned tons of new skills such as driving trailers, digging and interpreting soil pits, and how to perform the Point Line Intercept method. We completed 26 plots! Our data will be used to make management decisions regarding how to best rehab the native plant community and control invasive annual grass infestations. After I wrapped up my work as a Botany Tech, I accepted this 3 month CLM internship to act as a general Botany Program assistant. I will be mapping all the populations I monitored over the summer and my newly discovered populations into a GIS program the Oregon BLM uses called GeoBOB. I’m attending a training for that next week. I’m also handling the load of office and herbarium odds and ends that pile up during the field season. While I do love the field, I think this will be a good opportunity to see the behind the scenes work and planning that makes a good field season possible. Cheers to all of us sticking it out in office winter internships. We are tough cookies. I’m looking forward to the next few months. Following are some photos from my field season. I thought they would be nicer to look at than my desk!