It’s about time for me to make a summer update, and a lot has changed since the last time I made a blog post!
First, I have a job! I’ve been working as a seasonal naturalist at Northwest Trek, an AZA accredited wildlife park featuring wildlife native to the Pacific Northwest. I’m primarily leading tours of our Free Roaming Area, where we see bison, caribou, elk, mountain goats, deer, and occasionally the bighorn sheep or moose. It’s definitely re-sparked my interest in environmental education, communication, and interpretation.

The Key Peninsula Gulch was once a diverse, healthy ecosystem that today is overrun with blackberries and ivy. Despite these invasive species, the gulch is still frequented by both black bears and bobcats in addition to many native birds, deer, and small mammals. We aim to use a seasonal process to remove blackberries and ivy, while also planting native trees, shrubs, and eventually wildflowers to return the area to its previous state.

My passion for plants and ecology started when I was a kid, climbing through the gulch in my grandmother’s backyard with my sister and cousin and marking the biggest trees on our hand-drawn map so we could find our way through the blackberries. We also searched the beach for treasures and creatures; our greatest find was a small octopus, washed up in the afternoon. By high school, I was volunteering with a neighborhood park’s restoration group, this time climbing through different gulches and recording wildlife at different beaches.