Adventures in Conservation – CLIP Week 11 – The final week!
Hi all, and welcome to our final week of TLC’s Conservation Leader Internship Program (CLIP)! This week’s blog is written by all four interns!
Monday was a full day of tiring invasive control at Tryon Grove where Emma sprayed leftover triclopyr on invasive resprouts while the rest of the team pulled wild parsnip. Although it was hot and buggy, we were able to clear the area of all existing parsnip!
On Tuesday, we split up into two teams so we could tackle invasives and plant monitoring at the same time. One group went to Yonder Prairie to monitor using the quadrant method while the second group headed out to Remington Grove to install TLC easement signs behind the newly built houses. Once eight or nine signs were successfully installed, group two headed to Prairie Ridge to tackle any remaining parsnip. We met back up after lunch to cut any invasive purple loosestrife we could find together before heading back to Hennen to tie any loose ends on any projects we hadn’t fully completed yet.
On Wednesday, we went to our last full workday at Crowley Oaks to join the TLC volunteers in clearing an area of buckthorn. We helped haul any ground cover or fallen trees to their designated piles to be burned so native flora can grow in their place and improve the quality of the site. After a few hours of hard work, site steward Larry and the team treated us to cherry pie and Isabel’s Restaurant for lunch!
After lunch, we went back to Hennen to begin prepping for our graduation celebration. On Friday, we planned to invite those that we’ve worked with over the summer, as well as CLIP alumni, family, and friends to hear about what activities we had done over the 11-week internship. It was an overall chill but productive day, and it was both exciting and sad to think that our summer experience was coming to an end.
Even though it was our last day of work, Thursday began with learning a brand new topic: Archaeology with Ders Anderson, TLC board member! After getting a quick lecture on the history of ancient people and their relationships with the flora and fauna, we headed over to Yonder Prairie to attempt to find some ancient artifacts ourselves. Ders gave a demonstration of the techniques that can be used to find what we were looking for, possible artifacts made from chert, and we quickly set off to seek out our very own chert pieces. After only a few minutes, we had all discovered a few pieces of rock, which were collected for later observation. Once Ders claimed we had gathered enough pieces, we headed back to Hennen to wash off our rocks. We ended the session with a few dozen pieces of chert, five of which Ders claimed could actually be tools from ancient camps!
We then drove over to Country Ridge to join Kim, Megan, Caroline and the TLC volunteers to clear an area of buckthorn, gray dogwood, honeysuckle, and other non-native shrubs. Once the area had been cleared to satisfaction, we moved on to monitoring the easement border for any violations, like dumping, mowing, or destruction of signage. Thankfully, we only found a few problems, and were able to go back to Hennen and continue prepping for our celebration on Friday.
CLIP has given us the amazing opportunity to learn an abundance of valuable skills that we otherwise would have likely never learned and the chance to see what the world of conservation and ecology looks like as we enter the workforce. We’ve met so many people along the way who have helped us on this journey and many friends who have used their time to teach us valuable lessons. Thank you to all the wonderful people who have helped us on our summer journey and those who have been reading our blogs along the way!