Through Our Interns’ Eyes: Reflecting on an Inaugural Field Season at the Center for Conservation

“We were very lucky catching it opening its wings,” intern Emma says, referring to moths’ and butterflies’ tendencies to hold their wings differently at rest.

“At the beginning of this internship, Erin sat us down and asked, ‘What are some of your goals for this summer? What do you want to learn?'”

Emma’s answer was measured. “To identify one plant and one bug. And now I know I can at least identify monarchs. But after the hours upon hours of veg sampling, I can definitely say that I have learned how to do plant ID, also.”

“What is this the plant in this picture?”, challenges one staff member.

Likely thinking back on every last encounter with its spiny stems and leaves, she doesn’t hesitate. “That’s teasel.”

“Definitely one of my favorite parts of the summer was getting to spend time with the cows—in particular, naming a cow, which was totally by accident,” says Emma.

Dr. Treanore prompts, “Do you want to share the name you chose?”

Emma, laughing, says, “It was very much on the spot. I said Tim for some reason.”

A rising senior, intern Edalix first came to Duke Farms, “thinking through an independent project for [her] student thesis.”

“I’m just very grateful for how open and helpful Erin’s been with developing the project.

“Getting to learn about all kinds of butterflies and moths that live in this part of New Jersey, getting samples like this through sweep netting, learning about what it takes to develop a short project—I think I’ll remember a lot from that experience.

“It’s just very cool.”

“Even veg transects,” Edalix allows.

“They were… tedious, but it was really cool to see how the plots that were grazed [showed] differences in their vegetation.

“Getting to see what effect the cows were having on different areas of Duke Farms was very interesting.”

“We were navigating to a very remote plot on this particular day,” begins intern Celeste, describing one instance of forest plot setup.

“It took us a very long time. We were going down this winding path, and it took us much, much longer to get up that hill than it should have. The moment we got to the top of the hill and we were beginning to start the quad[rat]s, we realized that the Trimble had died. And we made no progress.

“I guess one thing I learned from this particular experience is that, even through times that seem pointless, you still get to bond and learn things.

“I also would say the thing that I learned through a lot of experiences this summer, especially when doing coarse woody debris and forest plots, was that the thorn adaptation is much more common [than I thought]”

“This is our second day, and this is when we were first using the Trimble for every single point,” says intern Charlotte, recounting the learning curve the interns experienced with the GPS unit they used to locate plots.

“But we stopped doing that because it was not time-efficient. Learning how to deal with adversity and how to adapt to the situation, like ‘well, the plot’s over here, but the fence is going through the plot, so we need to figure out what to do with that,'” she says, reenacting what must be a familiar experience for everyone, interns and veteran staff alike, nodding along.

“It was very impactful to me, being able to make decisions in weird situations that I didn’t expect.”

Danielle follows up on this thought, saying, “We all learned to deal with the challenges and adapt to what field work is, because it’s so unpredictable.”

Dr. Hila Shamon, Deputy Executive Director of Science and Conservation, adds, “That is a very important lesson. How to adapt field work and still get the data that you need to answer your question.”

“This is the first time we saw Charles unpack all his stuff, tag the turtle with the epoxy, and all the details. And I just have the biggest smile on my face, because I’m just so excited about seeing what exactly goes on. Until then, it was just recaptures and some health sampling, which was also very cool,” says Alannah. But it didn’t compare to seeing “the process from start to finish.”

“It was just something so cool to witness. Danielle and I are gloving up; Charles is unpacking all this stuff. It kind of looked like a mobile field lab, because the ground has so many things on it.

“But then, sure enough, at the end of it, it all goes back in his pack, and he rolls it up, and you just keep moving.”

“Alannah and I were on the turtle team,” intern Danielle starts, “so a lot of our days are spent hiking [through] meadows. When I first started this internship, I definitely thought the turtles would be a lot more abundant than they were.

“But every time we found a turtle, it was very rewarding. We spent a lot of time tracking down turtles that had already been caught, but this,” she says, referencing the turtle in her photo, “was one of the first new ones that Alannah found. We thought it was a turtle we were looking for…”

Charles elaborates, “It took us a moment to notice it wasn’t the tagged turtle we had been looking for, but an untagged one that happened to be almost at our feet as we pushed through a carpet of poison ivy.”

“We learned a lot about how to tag them, the physical process of attaching the GPS and VHF tags, and the perseverance and grit” it takes to do the work.

“It was just the four of us out there, looking around, kicking around, and then finding this turtle,” Alannah trails off, before finishing. “I just felt very accomplished”

“My favorite part of this photo is, if you look in the bottom right, you can see a piece of my glove. hanging off. This turtle in particular was a fighter,” she says with emphasis.

“Working with animals, seeing their behaviors, and interacting with them in that way is just such a beautiful thing and something I was very excited for in this internship. This photo, apart from it being so pretty, I think it showcases some of the reality of it. But the fact is that you know it’s all beautiful nonetheless.”

“This is our first bird count survey. I learned a lot of abbreviation for birding names,” says Alannah, before asserting that she still has plenty to learn about identifying birds in the field. ”But we learned a lot about how to monitor them, and when you should include them on the point.

“It was just really interesting, watching the whole process, and it was fun to wake up at 3:30.”
Above the knowing laughter that issues from the group, she insists, “That’s not sarcastic! At 1 pm I was like, wow, I’ve been up for so long.”

“This is also a 3 A.M bird count day… Or 5am, but you know, woke up at 3am to do it,” says intern Charlotte, picking up the thread from Alannah.

“Those were probably some of my favorite days. It was so cool to be out when the world was so quiet, except for the birds. That was such an amazing experience.

“I think I can identify at least a few bird calls now, which is definitely not something I could do before.”

“Danielle and I [are] watching Mitch and Virginia find the plot and coordinate it,” says Alannah, wrapping up the farewell lunch with one last photo. “The Trimble was working. It was in capable hands, so that’s probably why.

“This was one of the first days we were doing the forest plots, one of the days Virginia, Mitch, and Charles were out with the four of us. It kind of feels like a little family when we all go out together.

“We had a lot of conversations out in the field. I loved it—I love to chat,” she admits, recalling endless “conversations about some really random things.

“It’s like movies, books, shows… I knew coming into this internship that I was going to learn a lot about nature and ecology, but what I did not expect was to find people that I could talk with about hobbies and interests.

“I know I can’t expect that from every internship, but the fact that I was able to get it from this one was just something that I really, really value.”