People of the Big River 2025 - Raquel Sanchez Perez

  People of The Big River Location: Harris Park Campgrounds Day 12 Today we did a ton of stuff, we had breakfast, packed lunch and headed off to meet Gail Redberg. Gail runs a native plant nursery. She showed us all of the things she grows there from trees to shrubs and smaller plants. Some grow berries others the bark is used medicinally, and some are just super great because they grow big and provide shade for animals. The reason why the nursery was started was because the fisheries program at Umatilla needed some native vegetation to put along the river. They did this so that the plants would provide shade for the bugs and critters that thrive in cold water, in hopes that they would live within the river so the fish would be able to eat them and also thrive in the bettered environment. After that Gail said that they began to expand and find a ton of varied plants to grow. Not only do these go out in the natural environments but now other people within the community are buy...

  People of The Big River Location: Crane Prairie Creek Campgrounds Day 11   Day eleven was another travel day and we were trying to hustle because it was going to be another super long drive. I got up and I was pretty tired I think the exhaustion is catching up to me I can’t wait to sleep in my bed. I really didn’t want to pack up all my things, but we got it done. We left the camp like at 7:30 ish and we drove for about an hour maybe less and we went to see some obsidian in the national forest. It was super cool; we climbed up some stairs and the view was so pretty. Some of the bigger chunks of obsidian were so shiny it was really crazy to see how sharp some of them were. After that we hit the road again and we were in the car for like six hours. While driving through Oregon we got to see some more interesting things. Through some parts where there was a lot of long fields it made me feel homesick because it reminded me of South Dakota. Especially since Dr. Schuster ...

  People of The Big River Location: Crane Prairie Creek Campgrounds Day 9   Today we got to spend the day with some members of the Sisters ranger district. We met Alex Enna who mentioned that he has worked in many different things from nonprofits to fighting fire. He studied biology during his undergrad and also got a masters in in forestry. He’s been working with the forest service for a long time. We also got to meet Christine Mayor who has also worked for the forest service for some time, and she has done a ton of different things. Like being in charge of volunteer groups, youth groups, and habitat restorations. She mentioned how she’s been working in some kind outdoor career for over 19 years. She also told us that she went to school for forestry but really liked learning about botany and soil science so she found her way to a career where she could do a bit of everything. The last person we got to meet was Liz Day; she went to school at the university of Delaware ...

 People of The Big River Location: Crane Prairie Creek Campgrounds Day 9 Today we headed out to Sand springs at Fort Rock in Oregon we got to spend the day with Marlo Fisher who works for the Deschutes Forest area. She took us to count a rare plant called the Pumice Moon Wort which is a tiny little plant that kind of looks like a fern and succulent crossed together. It was pretty sunny but thankfully also a pretty breezy day. Marlo first showed us a picture of how the plant looked like since none of us knew what it looked like. The area we were in was super dry and the ground was entirely covered in pumice. Marlow also showed us some of the other plants and Dr. Black told us about the sagebrush and how its roots, like many of the other plants in the area, have long roots that extend down deep into the earth to they are able to tap into the water especially in such dry areas. Marlow lined us all up so that we could look together for the plant. This was difficult for us because s...

 People of The Big River Location: Crane Prairie Creek Campgrounds Day 8 Day eight was another science day, we did a lot more things with our water samples and the bacteria that we’ve been growing. But today breakfast we got some really good stuff; Monet had eggs, bacon, and potatoes on the menu. It was so delicious and such a treat to get warm breakfast. We took a bit longer to enjoy our meal before Dr. Black and Monet left to do everyone’s laundry, which we were all excited for since it’s been cold and a lot of our warmer clothes had gotten dirty the first couple of days. After they left, we began working with Dr. Schuster on getting more bacteria inoculated and he also had a few more test for us to do today. We began by grabbing our bio paddles from previous days to see if any new growth had come up. For my samples not a lot was going on except for the one from Swamp creek, so Kyal let me borrow one of his samples so that I could do all of the different tests with everyone...

People of The Big River Location: Crane Prairie Creek Campground Day 7 Day seven was another travel day, we all got up super early so we could get a head start on packing all of the campground things and our lunches as well as having breakfast. I realized that on travel days I can’t really sit and eat because I get really anxious that I’m not going to finish on time or that I’ll forget something of mine. So, what I’ve been doing is just packing myself an extra pb & j so I can eat it on the road. Anyways, we got everything all packed and loaded up, which I think we’ve been getting faster at. We hit the road, and it was a loooong drive, I think they said something like 10 hours from Wellpinit to our next campground within the Deschutes National Forest. It was pretty ok though because we got to talk to Dr. Schuster some more and we had more service, so we were able to watch shows and play music. Everyone was in and out of naps in our car but other than that the majority of the c...