{"id":17636,"date":"2012-07-03T13:53:17","date_gmt":"2012-07-03T20:53:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev-clm-blog.pantheonsite.io\/?p=17636"},"modified":"2012-07-03T13:53:17","modified_gmt":"2012-07-03T20:53:17","slug":"my-third-month-in-southern-california","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/?p=17636","title":{"rendered":"My Third Month in Southern California"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hi all!<\/p>\n

Just finished up my third month here in the Bakersfield Field Office with the Bureau of Land Management, and boy is it getting hot!! \u00a0Silly humans, making cities in the desert.. anyway, this last month has been a little trying, as we are having to be patient and wait for the few accessions of seeds we’ve targeted become ripe. \u00a0It has been an especially dry year here and so my co-worker and I have only gotten about 15 collections in these last few months. \u00a0Better than nothing for sure, but in a good year, we would have come away with a lot more. \u00a0Oh well, ya do whatcha can. \u00a0Most of what we’ve been doing though, has been Seeds of Success work. \u00a0We also out out on RHA’s (rangeland health assessments) and travel to sites for maintenance tasks like fence repair and invasive species removal, but a lot of our our summer has been traveling between sites with our fingers crossed that we’ve come at just the perfect time to collecte seed. \u00a0Recently, we were back up in the San Joaquin River Gorge and managed to collect four different species on our overnight trip –\u00a0Brodiaea elegans<\/em> (Harvest Brodiaea), Castilleja attenuata<\/em> (attenuate Indian paintbrush), Collinsia heterophylla<\/em> (purple Chinese houses) and Phacelia egena<\/em> (rock Phacelia or Kaweah River Phacelia).<\/p>\n

I also went to Lamont Meadows recently, on the Back Country Byway, where I saw my very first Western diamondback rattlesnake. \u00a0I also saw some great, showy plants which have been lacking down in the dry, sunny valley. \u00a0I saw some western columbine (Aquilegia formosa<\/em>), a sweet penstemon (I believe it’s Penstemon grinnellii<\/em>, not sure of the ssp.), the lovely indian paintbrush (Castilleja sp.) and a beautiful native thistle (Cirsium occidentale<\/em>, did not key to ssp.). \u00a0We were at 5600 feet, which availed itself to \u00a0 flowers still in bloom for me to ogle over!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Castilleja sp.<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Aquilegia formosa<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Western diamondback rattle snake<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Penstemon grinnellii<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Cirsium occidentale<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Digging up the invasive bull thistle, Cirsium vulgare<\/p><\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Yep, we got a flat! \ud83d\ude42<\/p><\/div>\n

I’ve yet to experience all the reaches of our field office, as I haven’t been up into the Sierra foothills or over to the coast yet, but our mentor already had a lot on his plate before<\/em> we came along, so it’s understandable that he doesn’t have all the time in the world to show us around our area. \u00a0There’s a small chance though that I’ll get over the coast, to Point Sal and up to Case Mountain in the Sierras before I leave, so I’ll keep my fingers crossed! \u00a0The weather has been showing its muscle as it was in the low 100’s for three or four days straight, recently. \u00a0I am really scared of this hot weather! lol \u00a0I just fill up my camel back and bring some extra bottles of water and hope for the best! \u00a0We are in the middle of a high 80’s stint right now though, so I am just stoked about that! \u00a0I love seeing how my temperature baseline changes depending on where I live.. a couple months ago it was only<\/em>\u00a0like 75 out and I had goosebumps! lol<\/p>\n

I hope everyone is having a great summer and is staying cool and hydrated<\/span>! \u00a0Best wishes to everyone for as much education and adventure as you can handle! \u00a0\ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

Until next time,<\/p>\n

Rachel Snyder<\/p>\n

BLM, Bakersfield, CA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi all! Just finished up my third month here in the Bakersfield Field Office with the Bureau of Land Management, and boy is it getting hot!! \u00a0Silly humans, making cities in the desert.. anyway, this last month has been a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1696,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17636"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1696"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17636"}],"version-history":[{"count":28,"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17636\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18176,"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17636\/revisions\/18176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.clminternship.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}