Hello,

I am on the last month of my internship and cannot believe how fast it has gone by! The past month I have learned some basic GIS skills, such as drawing polygons. We have also conducted some monitoring of our pupfish ponds to check populations as well as remove the plethora of invasive that find their way into these ponds.

Pesky crawfish in pupfish habitat.

I am also working on the finishing touches for SOS collections; picture uploads, herbarium labels and shipping vouchers. In addition, I have begun the process of uploading herbarium specimen pictures from the plants we have collected and identified this season.

Eschscholzia parishii herbarium voucher

We also went to check out the aftermath of a fire that went through part of Big Morongo Canyon Preserve. It had gone right through a riparian area that is home to two birds of concern so plans for restoring the area are now under way.

Aftermath of a small fire in Big Morongo Canyon Preserve

Palm Springs, CA