CLIP Week 6: Denver Flying Solo
Last Week at CLIP…
It was hot.
Jazzy and Anthony were on vacation and it was just yours truly, Denver, with TLC’s restoration team. With all of the workdays cancelled on account of the heat, I can’t promise a very riveting blog, but without further ado, let’s begin.
Monday was hot. We started the day early at 7:00 a.m. and headed to Boloria Meadows to brush saw and mow. After a couple tanks of gas, we headed back to the truck for a very much needed air conditioning break. Once we were cooled off, we collected Spiderwort seeds and had some lunch. We made our way to Spring Hollow to spray some Stilt Grass and pulled some Creeping Bellflower along the way.
Tuesday was also hot. Kevin, Daniel, Laura and I went to Wolf Oak Woods to brush saw invasive honeysuckle and
other woody plants. Before lunch, Laura and I did some bumblebee monitoring and saw a couple bees. It was a little bit cloudy, but still very hot, which is why I think the bees weren’t out. We had lunch in the van and took a nice air conditioning break before finishing off the brush sawing and heading to Dairy Queen for a treat.
Wednesday was once again hot, but the weather was getting better. We spent the morning brush sawing at the McHenry County Fairgrounds, and I tried to figure out if there was a European Starling in the bleachers. After lunch, we went back to Wolf Oak to spray Burdock and Great Mullein.
I found it very easy to learn how to identify these two plants. Burdock has huge leaves that are very easy to spray, and Great Mullein (also known as Lamb’s Ear) is fuzzy and soft. At this time of the season, both have bolted and are quite tall. With all the plants sprayed, we collected more Spiderwort seeds before heading to Blaine’s Farm and Fleet to get more oil for mixed gas. I treated myself to a weight bearing carabiner and a little figurine of a cat that looks just like Spock.
By Thursday, the weather had improved significantly, especially compared
to Tuesday, but was still hot. Kevin, Daniel and I started the day at Barefoot Savanna, a TLC conservation easement, looking for and pulling Sweetclover. We went to another area with a good amount of Bee Balm in bloom, or soon to bloom, where Daniel did his bumblebee survey. Unfortunately, we didn’t find any bumblebees.
Afterward, we headed to the oft-mentioned but never-before-seen (at least for me) Crowley Woods. Kevin did his bumble bee monitoring in a patch of thistle near the front. I should note that while we found at least three types of bumblebees, the thistles were quite sharp and monitoring was not the most comfortable. We had a quick lunch before promptly brush sawing the thistle we had just monitored. I’m not sure how the drastic decrease in foliage will affect future monitoring sessions.
Friday, we had the day off for the July 4 holiday. I helped my sister move into her new apartment in Chicago and got caught in the rain in a Target entrance area. It was quite the community building experience to stand with an increasing number of people, all waiting for the rain to let up, with the occasional reprieve of a soaking wet person running in to escape the rain.
In the previous blog, I introduced myself, but now I will give the floor to Anthony and Jazzy (now that they have returned from vacation) to introduce themselves.
Anthony – I am from a tiny town in Northern Indiana called Syracuse, and after this summer I will be entering my junior year at Indiana University – Bloomington. I have a double major in Animal Behavior and Biology, and my goal is to do fieldwork as a wildlife biologist or a wildlife-focused ecologist, focusing on research after getting my PhD.
I decided to be a part of this internship to broaden my knowledge of plants, of which I had very little before this summer. I think it’s important to understand plants as the foundation of ecosystems to be able to see the bigger picture and understand the various underlying interactions and where they begin.
Jazzy – I am entering my senior year of high school in Marengo, IL. I became interested in conservation through my AP Environmental Science class. I am looking to major in biology, potentially biomedical engineering. This internship has brought me new knowledge and insight on the outside world. I hope to retain everything I have learned so far and continue to use it in my daily life.
