I came into this internship with not a lot of expectations. I thought I’d learn more about plants and get to experience what botanic fieldwork was like, which sure I did, but I never would have thought I’d also learn this much about rangeland and natural resource management. Even more so, I was not expecting to become this interested in rangeland management, but here I am, currently pursuing job opportunities and graduate school programs (whichever comes first at this point) where I get to work with rangelands and grassland plants. Never would I have imagined that my job experiences would have led me here, these last 5 months have been incredibly educating.

I’d like to thank my mentor Greg, everyone at the Grand River ranger district office (Kyle, Vivian, Patrick, Larissa, Lacy, Dave, Zac), everyone I’ve met across the other DPG districts (JJ, Jack, Cale, Alex, Russ), everyone I’ve met with NDSU (Kaylee, Ben, Daniel), and all the lovely people I’ve met around Lemmon (Ann, Chad, Joey); you all have enriched my life and I will forever be grateful to you. While I’m excited to return to Oklahoma, I am going to miss my time working up on the DPG. Feel like I should have more to say with this being my final blog post… but I think all my previous blog post have done a good job summarizing my experience here haha.

I hope all of my fellow interns at other forest had a great season!

–

Jenna

Dakota Prairie Grassland, SD