Tu Casa at Patuxent Research Refuge

Hispanic Access Foundation intern, Abraham Lopez Trejo is right at home and doing what he loves best at Patuxent Research Refuge. Be sure to join us all summer as we hear from our interns about their work and experience. 

As time passes and cities grow and become more heavy populated, a concerning disconnection from nature becomes greater with each generation. Thankfully, we have organizations like the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that  have made their goal not only to protect wildlife but also to bring nature back into our daily lives. This quest to find the equilibrium has translated into a partnership between the Service and Hispanic Access Foundation. This is when a group of thirteen young Latinos,  including myself, have become the fruit of this partnership.

As an intern, myself, I have happily accepted the invitation to be that piece that connects the Latino communities in urban areas to nature. Personally, I believe strongly in the power of community engagement to improve the way of life of the public, and this internship presents this opportunity.

Although, it has been only a couple of weeks since I started my internship I cannot help to feel like I am at “casa” (home) at Patuxent National Research Refuge.  This warm feeling of community that can be experience at Patuxent its only possible because of hard work that everyone does at Patuxent. It is stunning to see so many faces willing to be the change in this world. This is reflected on the hard work and passion that goes into their educational programs and their outreach to the urban community.

As a part of this change, and as Hispanic Access Foundation and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service intern, I will be playing a key part, by encouraging the younger Latinx and non-Latinx generations on being active members of their communities. All this is a coordinated effort between many parties to lift underserved communities (in this case south Baltimore city area).

As an intern at Patuxent, I’ll working at the National Wildlife Refuge Welcome Center. However, half of the time, I will be working as well with Chesapeake Bay Field Office, on community engagement in south Baltimore. So far there is a plan to work in community engagement in neighborhoods like Brooklyn, Cherry Hill, Westport. Also, if time allows, we are envisioning to work in parks like Carroll Park creating pollinator gardens and planting native wildflower species.

Recently, we have been encounter a great opportunity to work with the YMCA. After contacting the YMCA, we have found a couple of schools in south Baltimore and near Patuxent that might be able to join us for Latino Conservation Week events.

Besides planning for Latino Conservation Week and future events, we have participated with the Chesapeake Bay Field Office in events like Play in the Park Day; where we teach kids about nature and simple ways to entertain yourself outside. We have also participated in fishing events at Patuxent National Wildlife Refuge and Masonville Cove Environmental Education Center. Also, there has been a great opportunity learn about barn owls and osprey.

Likewise, I have the great opportunity to be working as a team with JoAnna Marlow (the other Hispanic Access Foundation intern at Patuxent National Research Refuge). Working as a team has improve the efforts on outreach events for the community and creating connections with possible partners. There has been a lot of learning and growth in the last couple of weeks as I become more aware of the responsibilities and efforts that are required to engage the community and educate them.

 

Conservation from an (unlikely?) source

From left to right we have Logan Kline, Sarah Carpe, Sheldon Mason and Adler (AJ) Pruitt

Today’s post comes from Sarah Carpe, one of our Masonville Cove Baltimore Urban Conservation & Education Interns, in conjunction with the National Aquarium in Baltimore, MD.

My name is Sarah, and I’m an Urban Conservation and Education Intern at Masonville Cove. From June 13th – 24th, I spent time at Patuxent Research Refuge with three other interns and my field supervisor, Molly Finch. In our time on the refuge we shadowed several positions within the conservation field.

The preservation of earth’s natural state includes a few positions that naturally come to mind. Wildlife biologist, conservationist, and environmental scientist are some common careers in conservation.

While these positions are essential, and we observed many of them at the refuge, there are some less well known jobs that are of equal importance to restoring our environment.

For a majority of our time at Patuxent Research Refuge, we worked with the facilities department. I learned that the work they do has a direct impact on the refuge. Our firsthand experience showed us the direct benefits of this job and its importance to conservation.

Facilities staff do a variety of jobs, many of which require physical labor. In the short time we spent working with them, we removed illegally dumped tires, fallen tree limbs, and massive piles of scrap aluminum, wood, and fiberglass roofing.

Interns working (Taken by Molly Finch)

I feel as though shining a light on what the Patuxent facilities staff do is of massive importance because it had the most immediate impact of any position that I observed at Patuxent. If you didn’t know what was there a week before we cleaned the dump sites, you never had any clue.

Working for facilities isn’t entirely physical either; we viewed tons of organisms in our time outside. A short list includes foxes, wild turkeys, turtles (both box turtles and red eared sliders), frogs, toads, mice, groundhogs, dragonflies, fish, and several others.

Baby black rat snake found while removing fallen tree limbs (Taken by Sarah Carpe)

The wildlife we saw while spending time with this department was so amazing because none of it was planned. Unlike a wildlife biologist where you have a predetermined animal that is is the focus of your survey (perhaps a box turtle), we saw the habitat as a whole, with all of its organisms in our focus. Facilities work gave me an eye for what Patuxent really looks like in terms of wildlife as well as its mission as part of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Being in the presence of so much wildlife really connected me to the surrounding habitat as well as the other conservation positions that aren’t the typical careers. While every environmental career has an influence, facilities staff play an invaluable role in conservation that has an impact you can see instantaneously.

Urban Surveys: Get involved with Nature

From left to right we have Logan Kline, Sarah Carpe, Sheldon Mason and Adler (AJ) Pruitt

Today’s post comes from Sheldon Mason, one of our Masonville Cove Baltimore Urban Conservation & Education Interns, in conjunction with the National Aquarium in Baltimore, MD.

I have always loved turtles, they are by far my favorite reptile. Recently, I have had the opportunity to help monitor the population of one of our native turtle species: the eastern box turtle. The eastern box turtle is listed as a vulnerable species according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, and as a result population surveys are being conducted at Patuxent Research Refuge.

One of the many box turtles kept in the veterinary house at Patuxent

Where should we look for box turtles? Sandy Spencer, a wildlife biologist on the refuge, says that they can literally be anywhere. Out in the forest at Patuxent Research Refuge, we were searching for box turtles as part of a survey, led by wildlife biologists. As we explored the forest in search of box turtles, we looked next to rocks and logs, places we thought were suitable habitat. When we finally found a box turtle, which was located in a forest full of ferns, we had to write a description of the turtle, details of its surrounding environment, as well as other data.

In order to mark the turtle, we had to drill holes on the edge of the shell and we notched the side. There was a key we used to notch them in a certain way so the turtles can be assigned a number. I asked Sandy why she was doing this survey and she explained that this survey was conducted years ago and they wanted to compare the present and past populations. This was the first time I have ever met a biologist and I was very surprised that they were in a field more than a lab or an office.

A baby box turtle that has not been notched yet

The work out in the field reminded me of the Bioblitz that we had at Masonville Cove. A BioBlitz is an annual event at Masonville where participants record all the wildlife they find that day and upload it to iNaturalist. Working at the reptile station at the Bioblitz, I realized that the survey that we were conducting on iNaturalist was similar to the one at Patuxent. iNaturalist is a citizen science app, a program used to share wildlife observations with the scientific community. The Bioblitz was promoting citizen science and I was starting to see how something as user friendly as iNaturalist can help scientists learn more about wildlife populations. The whole idea behind citizen science is to encourage all people to be a part of real scientific studies in their own environment and iNaturalist is a great application to get people involved.

I am very fortunate to have had experiences within a career path that interests me. While we have had other experiences during this internship program, this one may have personally made the greatest impact in my career choices as well as how I interact with wildlife.