If you’ve been keeping up with the latest and greatest of the CLM blog, this post might sound familiar. That’s because my fellow intern, Sophie, is working on the same hydrology project, and you could say that we are both pretty pumped about it. So since this project is also taking up most of my time, I thought I’d give my take on the experience as well. If your interested in the details of the project, Sophie did a great job explaining them in her blog.
As someone who has done work in headwater streams before, I was excited to return to this kind of work in a larger river and on a greater scale. Waders were a fun addition to our typical work wear and trying them out was a little scary but a lot fun. Lets just say hiking through water on a hot day is much more enjoyable than hiking through open sagebrush. As Sophie mentioned, colder weather to come will make these thick neoprene waders more cozy than constricting and we have already been experiencing much cooler weather this week (we officially have snow covered peaks in the Bighorns!). But waders aren’t the only new gear we have been dawning throughout this project. Pile on a safety vest, Trimble, walking stick, transect tape, pins, and usually some heavy metal monument caps and you have the full ensemble (pictured below).
What I have enjoyed most about working on this project is the opportunity to learn new skills and perfect old ones. The hydrologist at the BFO that we have been working has been extremely open to questions and patient as we learn new methodologies that will be very valuable in the future. It is also great to hear about the context of this study and the way that the data we are collecting in these final months of our internship will be useful in years and decades to come as this river changes and hopefully improves. As someone who was already interested in stream ecology and hydrology, but was unsure if this was a direction I wanted to go, I can now whole-heatedly say that I could wade around in a stream for a while and be content.
Buffalo BLM Resources Intern