FIELD RANGERS

During the week, we split into two groups. One group spent the day traveling to various sites on the Deschutes National Forest with the field rangers. The pictures tell the story of what we experienced.

	Once again we traveled to Todd Lake to hear how it was managed, and what exactly the field ranger’s job was regarding this place. We learned that field rangers, for the most part, have a broad range of duties. They are also given the opportunity to create their own project. Janet, the field ranger in charge of Todd Lake, created a packet for visitors identifying some of the flowers they might see around Todd Lake. She also told us that she had to remove one of the flowers from her packet because it is an endangered species. She explained how she worked with the Fort Rock Ranger District’s biologist to provide accurate information about each specimen in her packet. While walking around Todd Lake, we had to pass through the meadow on the backside. The meadow was segmented by small streams running from the hillsides through the meadow down to the lake. Janet described these small streams as essential habitat to young frogs living in the meadow. We saw quite a few of these small frogs hopping in the middle of the trail or swimming in the streams during our tour. We were also told about how an uncommon species of dragonfly was found on the hillsides surrounding Todd Lake.

	Janet and Chris explained how bulletin boards were used to inform visitors of seasonal regulations, changes in rules, and provide maps and information about the area. This bulletin board had signs reminding visitors about the No Fires Allowed policy and the new Dogs Must Be Leashed policy. Janet confessed the leash policy was the most commonly disobeyed and misunderstood policy at Todd Lake. Because the policy had only been implemented within the past few years there were still lots of visitors who didn’t leash their dogs while visiting Todd Lake.

We felt privileged to be accompanied by Les Moscoso, the Deschutes National Forest Recreation Planner. Les provide information about recreation activities on the forest and problems that commonly arose along with how he managed the recreation activities and dealt with specific problems.
	We stopped at an informational site along the highway that was management project to help inform the public about prescribed burning. The dominant species was ponderosa pine with the understory consisting of manzanita and other shrubs. There were signs explaining the management procedure as well as the benefits resulting from prescribed burning.
We stopped for lunch along the Deschutes River and while we ate Les described one specific problem he had recently been working on. The problem was associated with camping along the Deschutes River and the hazards this caused because of the inadequate road access to the areas in case of a fire. Les explained how they decided to revamp some campsites and put in others that were located in more accessible areas and close campsites that were hard to get to.

	This recreation area is one of the higher scale problem areas for Les and his staff. The place is littered with shot casings and garbage. OHV trails zig zag all around the area. Chris explained that once maybe twice a year some group comes out and tries to clean up the garbage that accumulates. However, if the garbage isn’t removed almost immediately it becomes the newest target. This unfortunate car was riddled with shot and appears to have been fire bombed.