Well, it is that time of the year and we have all said our final farewells. Ridgecrest is definitely not the same without all the beautiful souls of the DRC and especially my beloved “Grassholes”. Thank you all for making this season a tremendous success. Your care, time, devotion, humor, hard work, engagement, dependability, flexibility ; to name a few thing, have been the backbone of the success of the Grass Valley crew. I have enjoyed working with each of you and wish you well on your next adventures. Know you always have a home here in Ridgecrest (and a guest room), well at least for the next few years!
I would like to also extend my thanks to the entire staff at the BLM-Ridgecrest Field Office. They have been such an integral part of our success. They have provided their time and expertise to enable us to better complete our projects. We appreciate the endless amount of time and effort they invest in managing and protecting our wonderful public lands. A special thanks to Mary Dickes, our agency partner; for her support, trust, vision, and dedication this season. Thanks for directing and guiding us to complete a successful season of conservation stewardship. It has been a pleasure getting to know and work with her. I would also like to extend thanks to Dana Jacobs, Carrie Woods, Jason Woods, and Don Washington for assisting us in training and much more throughout this season.
This wonderful crew along with the Ridgecrest Field Office has been able to make great strides in all the stewardship projects in the El Paso Wilderness, Golden Valley Wilderness, and the Grass Valley Wilderness. We were able to comprehensively monitor all three wilderness areas. In the El Paso Wilderness, we spent the bulk of our time there effectively monitoring restoration from a few years ago. We were also able to apply camouflage restoration on a few new sites, monitor water guzzlers, monitor several small fences, and hike wash systems for signs of trespass. Golden Valley was also an area that has seen work over the last few years. We spent a lot of time of effectively monitoring restoration sites, then moved into new restoration, fence monitoring, hiking interior route systems looking for trespass signs, and constructing a number of hard barriers. Toward the end of the season, we moved to Grass Valley and began with effectiveness monitoring all sites. We also moved on to camouflage restoration for new site, constructing hard barriers, sweeping tracks, and fence monitoring. Finally, we moved on to our big season project. We constructed over 6000 meters of fence with the help of the Kiavah crew and the other DRC crews. It was a successful end to our work this season!
Below are our work totals from this season:
|
Field Work Totals |
|
|
Intern Conservation Service Hours |
5241 |
|
Restoration Sites Restored |
48 |
|
Sites Monitored |
54 |
|
Sites Effectiveness Monitored |
105 |
|
Line of Site Meters |
2681.18 |
|
Sq. Meters Restored (Area) |
9680.89 |
|
Vertical Mulch (#) |
630 |
|
Seed Pits # |
630 |
|
Berms (#) |
7 |
|
Berm (meters) |
164.79 |
|
Hard Barriers Installed (#) |
14 |
|
Hard Barriers Installed (m) |
881.66 |
|
Fence Constructed (m) |
3554.965 |
|
Fence Maintained (m) |
545 |
|
Signs Installed |
48 |
|
Signs Removed |
2 |
|
Kiosk Installed |
3 |
|
Trash (lbs) |
70 |
Thanks again! If you would like a more in-depth review of our season, check out the attached report.
Cat Ford
Project Leader
Grass Valley Crew 2012-2013
