POBR 2024 ilenegoudy

Day 13: June 28, 2024                Today we were scheduled to wake up at 7:30am. However, I woke up at 6am to shower and get ready for the day. Turning into an early bird here. Monet cooked up a big breakfast, it was fire. Very much appreciated. After breakfast, we were scheduled to meet up and start working on our posters. Dr. Black had us delete a lot of our work that was done on there and then started working on the methodologies. An hour into this grind, Warren Seyler stopped by to chat with all of us. We gathered into a circle, then Seyler had us introduce ourselves then share what schools K-12 we attended. He wanted to get to know who we are and where we come from. Then he also asked what our career goals are. So, we went around the circle to share our goals.  Seyler emphasized how important it is that we continue to pursue our degrees then work for our tribes.                 After the discussion, we went back to finish up our methodology section of our poster. Then we jumped

 Day 12: June 27, 2024             The class was scheduled to wake up by 6:30am. Today we were scheduled to meet with Fisheries from the Spokane tribe. Brian Crosley, a fisheries biologist took us out to a few of their properties for habitat restoration data collection. A year ago, Crosley had some beaver dam analogs (BDAs) in their watershed. However, Crosely decided to use rocks (basalt) instead of actual wooden posts or logs. Crosley also shared how they have to build relationships with a lot of land owners/neighbors to work on part of their land. Unfortunately, this can limit their capacity of work--meaning that if a landowner isn't willing to allow them to work on their land then they can't.  Croseley also shared the history of the channel as well, where the stream that we were working on was heavily used as an irrigation cannel. Crosley's goal is to help the stream ordinate it back to a healthy stream system.           Today's activity involved measuring the amoun

Day 11: June 26, 2024                     Travel day. Class was class scheduled to wake up by 6:30am and left Harris campgrounds by 8:30am. Packed up and headed north. Once we part ways, we dropped off one student off in Tri-Cities. We arrived to Wellpinit around 2pm. Waited for Dr. Black to catch up and then we set up camp. We had a few hours of freetime to relax. Virginia and I decided to go check out the culture event happening at the powwow grounds. We ended up getting thrown on a stickgame team that was going on. The family that was there was super nice! Being around my people and my culture made me miss home! They also invited us to a feast, but sadly I don't think we can go.  😥                     After dinner, we jumped right into our lab coats to start the process for bacteria culturing and starch hydrology testing for the water samples for Crane Prairie and Keyes Creek. The process for this step was to pull the agar plates (from the bacteria isolation) out of the incubat

Day 10: June 25, 2024                     The class was scheduled to wake up at 7:30am. We at breakfast and hit the road by 8am. Our first stop was the Imtuwana WallaWalla Fish Hatchery. Where we first met TeLa Branstetter, a habitat biologist for the CTIUR. Branstetter took us out to a field to observe and identify invasive weeds. Then John, the technician caught up with us to take us to the SF Wallawalla River to look at microvertabrates. Both John and TeLa emphasized that microvertibrates are a good indication that the river is healthy. TeLa also explained that having log structures in the stream helps recharge the floodplains. The SF Wallawalla River has bulltrout, rainbow trout, sculpins, and chinook salmon present. John also showed us a sculpin and cattes flies that were found on rocks.  It is interesting to learn about the different management of habitat restoration. Definitely eye opening.                      After our small tour was over with the habitat restoration project,

Day 9: June 24, 2024 The class was scheduled to wake up at 5:45am. The OSU geology camp staff was kind and generous to share a hot breakfast with us. After breakfast, we broke down camp and then class was scheduled at 8am with Dr. Schuster. After I broke down camp, I had about 30-40minutes before our class. So, I decided to work on our blogs. In class, we started working our poster on “Assessing Water Quality and Bacteria Load Across Washington and Oregon.” After class, we went out and collected a water sample and conductivity for Keyes Creek which is located right by the geology campsite. This day was also considered a travel day for us. We were scheduled to leave by 12pm. We started traveling around 12pm and then got to Harris Park in the Umatilla area around 4:30pm. We unloaded and set up camp and got dinner started and called it a night.

  Day 8: June 23, 2024                     The class was scheduled to wake up at 5:30am. The plan for the day was to go out to the field with a geologist. We got out in the field by 7am. Brennan Van Alderwerelt, a geoscientist was our field guide. Van Alderwerelt works with the Washington Department of Natural Resources but is very familiar with the landscape and history of this area we were stationed at. First and foremost, Van Alderwerelt started off with a land acknowledgment. He stated that the first people of this land were the Northern Paiute (Numu), Western Shoshone (Sosone), Cayuse, Sahaptin (Tenino, Celilo, Tukspust, and other Warm Springs bands), Snake, Wasco and Wishram (Chinook), Bannock, WallaWalla, Nez Perce, Wanapum, and even Molala. Van Alderwerelt stated that the historic evidence holds a strong indigenous perspective in western science. Van Alderwerelt also shared that human habitations (rock shelters and pit houses) in the John Day area have been dated as over 5,000

 Day 7: June 22, 2024 The class was scheduled to wake up at 6:30am. We got up and then started backing up and breaking down our tents. We ate breakfast and then started breaking down camp. We left the Crane Prairie campground around 8:30am and then traveled into town. Once we got to town, Dr. Schuster dropped us off at the Downtown Bend Library to work on our blogs.  Then after that, we stopped by the High Desert Museum in Bend, Oregon. My favorite exhibit is “Sensing Sasquatch.” This exhibit shared the local tribes’ beliefs and stories of sasquatch. It was interesting to see him being recognized in a respectful manner by the indigenous peoples and by the High Desert Museum. Day 7 was considered a travel day. We finally arrived at the OSU geology field camp in Mitchell Oregon around 6:30pm. We set up camp and called it a night. 

Day 6: June 21, 2024           The class was scheduled to wake up at 6:30am. We completed our assigned chores. We all loaded up and met up with the Deschutes National Forest Botanist—Marla Fisher. Fisher’s project focuses on a rare plant survey for the plant species pumice moonwart, Botrychium pumicola (BOPU). Fisher also calls this project BOPU (pictured in figure 1) for short. We started out with introductions and then started with a meaningful question. The question was, “what does the natural world mean to you?” It was nice hearing the answers from everyone.            Fisher briefly explained how pumice moonwart was a native plant species within the volcanic ash/rock and how it the plant species is declining. The project site was located at two different spots at the Bend Fort Rock in the Deschutes National Forest. The location is specifically in the shrub steppe habitat. Also note, that the soil/rock type there was dominantly volcanic ash and white rocks. The rocks that were pre

Day 5 June 20, 2024   The class was scheduled to wake up at 6:00am but no one started moving around until 6:30am. However, I waken up by the bird singing away at 5am. Early birds! Once everyone started moving around, we all had our breakfast and coffee. Then we jumped right into lab work at 7:30am. We took our water samples out for bacteria isolation. We took swaps from each water sample (Birdcreek, Snow plow creek, and Blockhouse creek) from the cultivated tubes and put them in agar plates to incubate for another 24-28hours.  After we finished up with our labs, we met up with the US Forest Service- Deschutes National Forest partners (pictured in figure 1). Partners included was Cynthia Anderson (assistant program manger), Alex Enna  (partnership management-fire management), and then Sophia zoll (Ameri core conservation educator) was our tour guide for the first trip. Our first trip into Lava land was in the Lava River Cave (pictured in figure 2). The lava river cave is where the lava

  Day 4: June 19, 2024 Travel day:  We were scheduled to wake up around 5:30am. Completed our assigned duties and then started packing up camp. We left the Bird Creek Campground by 7:30am. Then we went to the Glenwood General store to upload our blogs. We hit the road around 9am. Once we crossed the river, we stopped off at the gas station to wait for the other car to catch up to us. After that, we stopped off at Safeway in Madras, Oregon for gas and to stretch. Then we stopped off at Redmond, Oregon to get gas. Then we stopped off at Safeway in Bend, Oregon to stock up on groceries. During our last stretch of the day, we got to see the Sisters and Mt. Bachelor. It was so beautiful. We finally arrived at Crane Prairie Campground (figure 1) around 4pm.   Figure 1: The view of the three sisters from the Crane Prairie Campground.

  Figure 3: Virginia pulled out a selfie on our trip to Snow Plow Creek. 🌲⛰ Firgure 4: Virginia and I on our trip to the field. 😃