A Summer of Conservation: My Internship with Colorado Natural Heritage Program
This summer, I had the incredible opportunity to immerse myself in the world of conservation through the Siegele Conservation Science Internship that took me to some of the most beautiful and ecologically significant areas. My experience was nothing short of transformative, offering not just a deeper understanding of environmental stewardship but also a chance to learn from some of the most dedicated and knowledgeable I could hope to work with and a reinvigorated connection to the natural world and its incredible diversity.
Weeks 1-2: Orientation and Training
The internship kicked off with an orientation that introduced us to the scope of the projects we would be working on and safety skills for the field. Our team was diverse, with students from different backgrounds, each bringing unique perspectives to the table. The first week was spent listening to and speaking with various CNHP employees and partners with different specialties and working on different projects and undergoing training in Wilderness First Aid.
This was followed by our training week in Rifle, CO, spent on a ranch owned by a donor who taught us about the restoration he was undertaking on the land. Here we were trained in species identification methods and data collection techniques and taught about plant anatomy and taxonomy. Perhaps most valuable were the meetings that were organized where we were able to speak to and learn from industry professionals in various positions, educating us on where we could take our careers. I left Rifle with a great sense of new friendship and camaraderie among my cohort.
Week 3: Weed Mapping
This was my first taste of botany during the internship and certainly piqued my interest. On the Air Force Academy campus in Colorado Springs, I spent the days meticulously documenting the locations and density of tracked weed species while learning how to identify them, their effects, and the process of a species coming to be classified as a weed. This data would later inform management strategies aimed at controlling these unwanted plants.
Week 4: Shack West Bioblitz
A “bioblitz” involves a comprehensive survey of all life on a specific tract of land, and I was fortunate enough to be able to participate in one on the land around a cabin built and maintained to this day by the family of Aldo Leopold himself. I spent time among botanists, mycologists, zoologists, and entomologists as they combed the area collecting information about the state of the ecosystem and cataloguing species they encountered. I assisted by setting small mammal traps, identifying plants, and catching butterflies (definitely the most fun part).
Weeks 5-6, 9-10: Zoology Surveys
The next phase of the internship took me into the forests, up mountains, and down precarious Forest Service roads where we focused on wildlife monitoring. Our task was to track and document presence of various species of small mammals, butterflies and moths, birds, and amphibians. This involved following up on previous sightings and checking likely areas based on the habitat while using various methods of detection such as playing bird calls and listening for responses and checking still waters for toads. One of the highlights was spotting a rare species in a snow field near Loch Lomond, the white-tailed ptarmigan, which I had never seen before in person.
Weeks 7-8: Prairie Dog Plague Study
The most intense project I worked on was a prairie dog plague study where I had the opportunity to work with Arizona Game and Fish to treat and monitor prairie dogs. For two weeks, I walked the prairies west of Flagstaff counting holes, distributing plague treatment, setting and checking traps, and processing prairie dogs and other small mammals by weighing them, counting their fleas, taking blood samples, and tagging them before releasing them back into their colonies.
Weeks 11-14: Native Seed Collection
After the official end date of the internship on which I presented my experience to donors and CNHP employees, I was able to continue working for several more weeks before the beginning of the fall semester, this time collecting seeds from native plants in various environments around Colorado. This was my favorite project of all. I assisted a dedicated team with returning to previously marked locations where we surveyed populations of native plants to ensure we would be able to get enough seed and that the plants were in the proper reproductive stage before collecting the seeds and storing them, taking an entire plant specimen from each population and recording pertinent information about the habitat and state of the population.
