Graduation!!!

 

I GRADUATED from BYU in April!!!  I can’t believe I am done with college!  I graduated in Wildlife and Wildlands Conservation.  It feels so great to be done and sorta crazy at the same time!! 

Kelsey, Me, and Raylene (all friends from my major)

Raylene, Liz, me, and Kelsey (Liz and Kelsey were my roommates and Raylene was in our major.  Liz is an English major, but we still love her haha)

Me and my niece Morgan, she is such a cutie!!

Everyone!!  I was thankful for all my family for supporting me and sitting through the entire graduation for me!  Thank you!!

I was looking forward to some down time after graduation.  Just being to able to do some projects and organize our apartment the way I wanted it, but I started my new job the monday after graduation!…so much for a break haha

I am now working for the…..

on the Weeds/Botany Crew!  It’s been a lot of fun starting a new job and learning new things.  My plant ID class has definitely come in handy since starting this job!  It’s great being able to see the plants alive and not just dead and dried up on some piece of paper in the classroom haha  We are working on surveying an endangered species right now that is endemic to Spanish Fork Canyon, and it involves a lot of hiking which I love, but it makes me really tired at the end of the day and I have no motivation to do anything around the house after (this needs to change  otherwise my house will be a mess in no time! Which it may or may not already be haha)

Zions and Bryce Canyon!!

 

It has been FOREVER since I blogged last and a lot has happened, so here it goes… 

In March Andrew presented his masters research at the Utah Wildlife Society Meetings in Zions.  Since it had to do with my major and a lot of my professors were going to it, it counted as an excused absence from school, so of course I was going!!!  Andrew did a great job on his presentation and I was really happy I could be there to watch him present. 

After the presentations were over we took our mountain bikes and rode the JEM trail.  I have completely fallen in love with mountain biking, it is pretty much the funnest thing ever!!!  The JEM trail was really cool because at some parts we were riding just a few feet from a 30 foot drop off to the virgin river.  It was a really pretty ride once you get to the actual trail.  I wanted to die riding uphill the whole time to get to the trail haha but it was worth it.

Then we rode our bikes into Grafton, which is an awesome little ghost town right before Springdale.  It was fun being able to walk through the old houses and cemetery. 

The next day we met up with our friends Justin and Kalyn, who live down there. We drove into the Park and hiked to emerald pools. They have the cutest little girl named Avery who smiled at everything!

Justin, Kalyn, and Avery hiking to Emerald Pools

 

We were driving around one day in the park and spotted this guy in a tree by the road.  Porcupines are so cute!!

On our way home from Zions we decided to drive the other way home and stay a night at Bryce Canyon.  It was weird driving from Zions where it was warm and sunny and getting to Bryce where it was cold and still had snow everywhere!

haha I’m not exactly sure what Andrew is doing here….maybe just making it so you can see what’s behind him? haha..

It was so bright with the light reflecting off all the snow!

We forgot to get an actual picture of the bridge…but here’s the sign!!

Deer Capture

 

On Friday and Saturday Andrew and I helped another grad student capture and radio collar deer.  It was such a great experience!  I loved every minute of it!!  It was so neat being that close to the deer and taking measurements on them.  We got there right when the helicopter took off to find some deer to bring back to us.  Soon we could hear the helicopter and they brought in the first two deer. 

Once they would drop off the deer, the mugger team (this is the animal capture team) would take off and search for more deer.  We’d run over and place the deer on stretchers.  Then we’d take some measurements on them, weigh them, place a radio collar on them, and let them go.  They had a blind fold on the entire time to keep them calm.

Here’s Andrew taking measurements on one of the does. 

The first day I helped untangle the nets and fold up the bags they carried the deer in on the helicopter.  Near the end I was able to go inside the tent and help with some measurements. 

Once we were done taking measurements and putting on the radio collar we would release the deer.  Here is one of my professors releasing a doe. 

Waiting for the helicopter to drop off another doe.

A few times they would bring three deer in at a time!  This was really cool to see!!

A close up of the helicopter!

The second day during the first few captures the helicopter was close to where we were so we were able to watch some of the capturing.  Here the capture team just fired the net gun at a deer (that’s what all the smoke is from in the picture above)

The second day I was a data recorder, so I was in the tent writing down all the data while the others were processing the deer.  It was really neat to be able to be in the tent the whole day and watch everything happening.  A few times I was even able to help out with the measurements and weighing the deer.  Here we just placed the doe on the stretcher and are carrying her to be weighed.  Andrew was insane!  He helped with pretty much almost every deer!  I was very impressed!  I loved watching him work and being his data recorder.  I was really impressed with how everything went and how efficient everyone was who helped out. 

Weighing the deer

Andrew and I working together measuring and collaring a deer.  I really wanted some pictures of us working on the same deer together, so I asked one of Andrew’s friends to take some of us.  Thank you!

Andrew radio collaring the doe. 

DONE! She’s ready to be released!

The pilot was really gentle with the deer.  He’d nicely place them on the ground, and if one had its head cocked funny he’d pick it back up and move it until it was in a good position.  It was great to see everything and how well everyone worked together to make this work.  Awesome two days!

Tibble Fork

We decided to go snow shoeing today because we got a LOT of snow here the last day or so. We took our dog Gus and headed for Tibble Fork up American Fork Canyon. I couldn’t believe how much snow was up there!! There was probably around 2 1/2 to 3 feet of snow, it was great! It was nice and sunny today too so that helped a lot haha.

Gus was having a blast out there if you couldn’t tell. Andrew biffed it trying to climb up this huge mountain of snow and Gus ran over to check out the situation and he was met with a mound of snow coming at him haha.

The second try was a success!! haha

Climbing up that mound of snow with snow shoes is actually pretty tricky, so this was my attempt haha (sitting on top of a picnic table).

There was so much snow on this roof!! I started to hit it with my pole until Andrew brought it to my attention that I was standing directly below it haha Genuis!….oh boy.

We couldn’t decide what type of tracks these were, but they were everywhere! Probably a weasel or a marten or something.

Andrew sitting on his throne hahahahaha……JK!! He was just really excited that he could get on the roof.

We all had a great time, including Gus!! It felt so great to get out of the house, forget homework, and do something!! While we were walking up the trail, a family with some little boys walked with us a little ways. The boys kept calling Gus’s name and when he came running to them they would sorta freak out, but they kept doing it! hahaha We got a pretty good laugh out of it.