Hello again! I can’t believe how quickly these past 2.5 months have passed by! Time flies when you’re having fun. Weather in Pendleton these past couple months has been superb. Winter has felt like spring and spring has felt like summer, which means it will probably be a very busy fire season in the Umatilla and the surrounding areas. Early last month we had our first fire and it burned a total of 100 acres. Hopefully that is not a sign of what’s ahead but I’m sure it is.
Nothing much has changed around here since my last blog. I’ve done a few more career fairs and still have a few more on the horizon before school is out for the summer. Our Fire and Fuels Career Camp was a success last month and I was able to be the photographer/videographer for the weekend and everything came out quite nicely. We have been prepping for both the Salmon Summit and Watershed Field Days that will both be in May. Schools from the area will spend a day learning about the environment through various topics such as weather, soil, wildlife, water quality, and plant identification. This will be interesting since there are so many presenters from the field participating and it should make for a fun and exciting week. We are also prepping for the Natural Resource Camp for Young Women which should be a great time at the end of June.
Fire & Fuels Career Camp
We had our first POD meeting a few weeks ago, and although I’ve never been to one before, I would consider it a great success! We all (on the eastern side of the state) met up in La Grande, OR at Morgan Lake. It was a beautiful day and I enjoyed meeting up with the group. We walked around the lake then had a short meeting over lunch afterwards. We talked about our Community Action Projects and helped each other out with ideas. I was not much help and felt like the odd duck since everyone else works in the same forest and I’m all by myself in the Umatilla. (Insert Eric Carmen one hit wonder here) Haha. However, Kimberly who is the VetsWork intern in Baker City and I have similar project ideas, so it was nice to have someone else that I could bounce ideas off of.
Preparing tree seedings
There was an Arbor Day event this past weekend. We teamed up with the Parks Department, prepped and passed out nearly 500 native trees to people in and around the city of Pendleton to be planted. It was a fun experience and I was able to interact with the locals and the Parks and Recreation people a little bit.
Handing out baby trees.
I’m really looking forward to this summer. I was able to get a taste of it last week. I went up to the Pomeroy Ranger District with Silas. He is the wilderness/trails manager in the North Fork John Day Ranger District and will be my supervisor this summer. Our mission was to catch 4 horses and 2 mules that have been on hiatus for the winter in their off season vacation grounds. Silas executed it very well. I on the other hand had difficulty breathing as I was going straight up that hillside (The heart is willing but my lungs are weak). I am happy to report that I did make it eventually and even caught myself a horse before Silas was completely done. I wish I had my camera with me because it was a beautiful day and I even got close to a herd of elk. The day certainly left me with a great memory of amazing scenery that will not be forgotten anytime soon.
Civilian Conservation Corps in Ukiah, Oregon
As I mentioned before, we have a required Community Action Project (CAP) that we must each organize during our internship. I am being helped by Beth Davidson the community gardener for the tribes in the area to create an area for the senior citizens to have access to fresh produce and also a place to encourage interaction with the environment. We will also try to incorporate plants that encourage pollinating animals such as bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds to hang out and also integrating plants to discourage the deer population since we don’t have a fence surrounding the area. We shall see how it plays out and hopefully by the end of it I will be able to share awesome before and after photos!
On another note, “Good news everyone!” I have officially decided to focus my bachelor’s degree on Fish and Wildlife! I am extremely excited about my decision and I hope to be able to make a great career out of it someday!
Well, that’s all I got for now. Thank you for reading and hope you enjoyed it.
Until next time…
