Helicopters!

We've been working on this project with a bunch of other agencies,
By we I mean my bosses. Who am I kidding, I AM JUST THE FEET
Anyways
The project is to see if helicopters could be used to spray buffle grass in terrain too remote or too steep for us to work in. We've been setting up these plots for, like, EVER, and on the 18th it finally came to fruition



AWESOME



We were about 100 ft away from the test plots. Test plots! It felt like I was doing science again.
The protocol was beautiful



The helicopters were pretty cool too. I was put in charge of 2 test plots. My boss was one of my underlings. Oh ho ho, I said, let me tell you how I feel about walking in straight lines.

Also this



Then I ate Chinese food and got on an airplane.

GUYS. HELICOPTERS.

Off Trailing

The best part of this job? We get to go everywhere in the park, not just the trails.This means we get to see a lot of really neat stuff and wayyyyyyy more wildlife than we would probably see. I've been better about bringing my camera into the field.

HERE'S A LOT OF PICTURES

This is the day I was working on a graduate student's tortoise project. I was a little concerned about the physics of tortoises existing in this plot. Behold, this was the line I was walking


Riiiiiight across that cliff face. I was 90% trying not to fall to my death in the wash below and 10% looking for tortoises.

We searched a 200x200m plot of similar terrain and we found 0 tortoises. We did however find one on the way back to the rigs



It looked really sad and didn't have any toes on it's upper right foot. Booooooo000ooo

Check out these sick ass petroglyphs! One of my co-workers is an archeologist. She tells me interesting things about the time period of these, none of which I can recall now.



I did ask her "DO YOU EVER WONDER IF, LIKE, IT WAS JUST ANCIENT PUNK KIDS WHO MADE THESE DRAWINGS?!?"

She said sometimes



This is a picture of two frogs doin' it. They are so losing their college scholarships now. NEXT TIME MAKE BETTER LIFE CHOICES FROGS


Look guys! FERNS. Also, there is some moss in there! ALSO I saw some lichens! (mostly dust lichen but some foliose too!) ALSO ALSO PUFF BALLS. Who remembers my Fun Fungi Fact about puff balls? I ONLY KIND OF DO


Can you deny the cuteness of this pin cushion (genus Mamillaria) cactus? No. You cannot.


Can you deny the awfulness of prickly pear? no. You also cannot. I'm constantly pulling its gloccids out of my extremities. Shame. Face kick.

Check out this cute ass baby tortoise that wanted to hang out with us at our staging area. We made so many high pitched noises, then we hover crafted it to a root which it promptly buried it's face in. More high pitched noises were made.


Views. And this is kinda a wussy one



Guess who came back to our blue tarp burrito the next day. BABY TORTOISE. There he is in the fold of the tarp by the top of the yellow dry bag. We decided that he needed a name if he was gonna keep showing up. I nominated Stanley. We decided on MegaBaby

GUESS WHO ACTUALLY GETS TO WORK WITH HELICOPTERSSZZZZZZZZZZZ NEXT WEEK?
(It's me. I do.)
(I don't get to ride in them though.)
(I'm just ground ops)
(...still bad ass.)

Work

So far so good. The hiking we'll be doing is pretty flat, which is fine by me because it is DAMN HOT and we'll be carrying heavy stuff. When I asked how much I found out it's never gonna be more than 4 gallons of water, which is like, 34 pounds.
Oh.
Well
I can do that!

I have been having a bit of trouble with the heat though. I've been drinking water like a person who drinks a lot of water and I still am getting headaches. Whats the deal? I'm totally hydrated, peeing all the time, still with the headaches? Is it because I have low blood pressure? Maybe I need more electrolytes? ("it's got electrolytes in it!") Is my hat too tight? What the helllllllllccckkkkk. I'm trying electrolytes tomorrow. The next day I will try the hat. One variable at a time people.

So far my crew seems pretty cool. I'm excited to get to know them better. I haven't been as loud as I normally am because we are still indoors. Gotta use my inside voice. Sometimes I slip up though. Today I told an abbreviated version about the history of Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr to the crew at lunch and gave my "elevator research talk" to my boss.
Ruh roh, my nerd is showing

But, the crew seemed mildly entertained(mildly) and my boss said this about my research
Boss "Sooo is this for your masters or phd?"
Me "ummm, it was just for undergrad..."
Boss "Woah, was undergrad research required?"
Me "No....I just love science"

Boss says there is a lot of research at the park and they will try and get me hooked up with some mad chill research and send me out with the ologists when they can. Wah hoo!

Did I tell you about all the cool research that there is at the UofA? There is a lot. They pioneered tree ring studies. Climate change. Cool stuff.

Today I saw baby Javalinas. Oh my goodness. The cuteness. THE CUTENESS.
And Lizards! I still get excited.