Volunteers are needed to assist the Bureau of Land Management with rangeland health monitoring on northeast California and northwest Nevada public lands that provide habitat for wild horses and burros.
The project will run two to three months this summer in the Twin Peaks Herd Management Area northeast of Susanville and the Nut Mountain and High Rock Herd Management Areas east of Cedarville.
Interested volunteers can apply by filling out the online volunteer application at www.volunteer.gov and emailing a resume with two references to [email protected]. The complete job description can be found by using the keywords Twin Peaks on the volunteer.gov website.
Volunteers will develop landscape descriptions; take photographs, record geographic information system data, measure grazing use of various plants and record information on condition of streamside areas, also known as riparian areas.
Some techniques will require skill and proficiency in scientific methods, while other tasks will require lesser degrees of skill. All volunteers should have experience working in rugged and remote backcountry conditions, and could have to hike several miles to reach some monitoring areas. Map reading skills are important.
“This monitoring work is important because riparian areas are critically important to wild horses and burros and to other range users,” said BLM Northern California District Manager Nancy Haug. “We need to collect information about conditions and trends in these areas, which are the most productive, diverse and sensitive on public lands. The volunteer work will assist the BLM in expanding the number of monitoring sites in our herd management areas, thus increasing our knowledge about conditions.”
Volunteers will need to provide their own high-clearance four-wheel-drive vehicles and must be capable of driving in rough terrain and adverse weather. There is no salary offered, but the BLM can reimburse for expenses including personal vehicle mileage.
More information is available by contacting Derek Wilson at the BLM Eagle Lake Field Office, 252-5306.
