Written by Ian Snyder
Photos by Ian Snyder
Tribal Stewards week at Malheur Refuge kicked off with the Lomakatsi Inter-Tribal crew arrived on Monday June 15th. The crew was led by Carl Jackson and Seneca Hescock along with K’Shalee Thomas, Jordan First-Raised, Alexis First-Raised, Del Marsh, and Teddy Edwards. All of this year’s participants are back again for their second or third season!
This year the 6 weeklong program kicked off with their first week at Malheur Refuge. The crew is working 4 – 10hr days a week so that they can make the most of their travel time to field locations and enjoy three day weekends. Their time at Malheur was coordinated by Friends Director, Janelle Wicks and looked like this:
Monday: Thule ducks & Bat Surveys
Tuesday: Fish Traps and Grebe Rescue
Wednesday: Vegetation Monitoring and Sandhill Crane birding
Thursday: Snowy Plover Surveys
Burns Paiute Tribal Leaders, Rhonda Holtby and Elise Adams, led the crew in how to properly harvest tule, or hard stem bullrush. The crew drove out to a wet meadow near Malheur Lake and harvested tule for the construction of traditional duck decoys. After harvesting Tule reeds, the elders instructed the crew on how to build them. Rhonda learned how to make Tule ducks from Elise, and now they are both passing their culture and knowledge to the younger generation. Rhonda said, “Tule ducks are connection to the past and were used for survival.”
After constructing Tule ducks, the crew waited for sunset to help out with bat emergence surveys. FOMR tech Ian Snyder, wildlife biologist Alexa Martinez, and FOMR volunteer Linda Craig helped lead the surveys that night. The Lomakatsi crew members were assigned stations at a building around sunset and counted bats as they emerged from their roosts. They were over 1000 bats counted that night and up to 10 species. The report will be coming soon.
The next day it was all hands on deck as aquatic biologist Dominic Bachman and FOMR biologist technician Luke Duvall led the group though the process of removing carp from the Sodhouse Dam fish trap. This was a very involved and exciting day, as there have been hundreds of carp trying to make their way up the Blitzen River. Having the crew witness the impact of the invasive fish was very evident, as there was not a single living native fish to pass through the Sodhouse fish trap that day.
After Sodhouse, the crew followed Luke Duvall to the carp barrier at the Narrows. This barrier has become infamous for trapping Western and Clark’s Grebes when high waters make it difficult for the birds to pass by. Staff must show up on a daily basis to survey the site and rescue any endangered birds via nets. After many minutes of patience and determination Seneca was able to rescue a grebe and return it safely to the lake.
The next day the crew arrived in the morning to follow supervisory ecologist Travis Miller and HDP technician Kate Barry out to conduct vegetation surveys at Sod House Ranch. The crew was taught basic plant identification by Miller, who is always eager to share his deep knowledge of plants. With the help of Survey123 and some field tools, Kate Barry enthusiastically assisted Miller in educating the crew on how they conduct their exhaustive plant surveys within the ample habitats of the refuge. These specific survey transects are associated with Malheur Wet Meadow Study.
The afternoon was spent with Oregon Bird Alliance biologist Dr. Terasa Wicks, who took them on an afternoon tour of the refuge. The crew arrived at Buena Vista Overlook to use as a scouting location to search for Sandhill Cranes. The crew was given binoculars, and it looked like they were all already very avid birders and wildlife watchers. Upon finding the Sandhill Cranes pair, they were all lucky to see not just one colt, but two!
Thursday was Snowy Plover surveys, and the crew followed both Teresa Wicks of Bird Alliance of Oregon and Travis Miller out to the Harney Lake playa. After an early morning meetup, the crew was split up to search different parts of the area and begin counting these tiny but exceedingly cute shorebirds. After driving down remote sections of the Double O Road, the trucks were parked to gain access to the playas, upon which the crews began to conduct the surveys by foot. After walking several miles on the playa and trying to avoid the bugs and heat, the surveyors returned to their vehicles and wrapped up this very busy week.
We are extremely grateful for the help of the Tribal Stewards from Lomakatsi and are looking forward to future collaboration.
The Friends of Malheur support this program with a $10,000 grant from the Oregon Cultural Heritage Commission.
