Hitch 5 Travel/Vegetation
A small crew of core members Kyle and Eric spent the first week of
this hitch finishing up the BLM Travel Management project. This
involved using GPS and maps to find primitive roads and install signs.
Kyle and Eric continued the vegetation project during the second week,hiking through previously burned areas to measure tree re-growth.Megan and Jenna also helped with the vegetation project.
We spent our time sampling seedling regen near Blackbird Mine. For 10 hours a day, we traversed through fallen trees and debris looking for plots using Garmin GPS units, topomaps, and compii. We also sampled huckleberries from time-to-time, which grew in thick mats on the forest floor, lush from the acidic soil and burn debris. Lodgepole pine were struggling for recruitment, bunching in waist high clusters. Even the devastating clear creek fire eventually mends. 10 years later, early succession is in full swing in the Salmon-Challis.