As I hiked through the Wonderland trail of Mt. Rainer, I reminisced about Nuevo Leon, Mexico. Last fall was the first time in my adult life that I had experienced being on a mountain. Mt. Rainier reminded me very much of my two month stay in that amazing country. It Read more…
Field work can be fun but sometimes it can get rough! I was up in Washington this week helping set up a macroinvertebrate study at Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. The first thing we did to prepare for work was to suit up with waders! Unfortunately there weren’t waders small enough Read more…
The heat couldn’t reach us as we sat under the shady cottonwood trees. Next to the vernal ponds, we were hosting our third activity for the Chicas field trip. Here, the chicas learned about the mammals of Oregon as well as careers in the environmental sciences. While these chicas were Read more…
There are 5 flocks at the Friends of the Refuge’s Nature Camp. These are the bees, owls, bobcats, coyotes, and the turtles. I was the leader for the bobcats this week. Every morning and at every activity we do roll call and each flocks makes their animal sounds. The bees Read more…
I constantly recognize and appreciate all of the hard work my parents put into giving my brothers and me the life and opportunities they didn’t have when they were growing up. Although I don’t have any kids of my own, I can relate to this parental goal. There are children Read more…
One of the best parts of this internship is learning about the different government agencies my EFTA peers are partnered with. This week the Oregon interns united at Lewis and Clark National Historical Park. The interns from Newport, Sherwood, and Astoria set camp up along the beach and shared jokes Read more…
I reach my right hand over to the areas of my back where it aches… just behind both shoulders. Who would have thought that two gallons of herbicide weighed so much? Actually, it wasn’t so much the weight of the backpack sprayer, but more so the plastic pressed up against Read more…
The heat of the sun feels like it’s roasting your skin. According to the residents, its been a bizarre year for the Portland area with dryer winters and so far a scorching hot summer. A fellow co-worker, Dhara, who has grown up in Portland explains that this weather is strange Read more…