Before hopping on the plane to eventually arrive in Wyoming, I knew little to nothing about the West, except that it was rather desolate. That assumption was right in some aspects, but wrong in others. In preparation for the Spring Creek field study, I looked up images of the state that has a higher population of cattle than humans, and to me it made sense as it seemed as if there was nothing but grass. After spending almost a week in Wyoming, specifically the Spring Creek property, I was quick to learn that there was a wide variety of nature in the region’s semi-arid climate. The weather had been pretty inconsistent, ranging from anything in between extremely cool to hot, slight breezes to 30+ mph winds, no clouds in sight to a lightning storm, and many more deviations.

The picture attached to this blog post contains an image westward of the shipping containers where we set up camp. Perched on top of this sparse rocky hill, I could see mountains on the horizon, some still with snow at their peaks. Lower down the mountain were windmills with a northward town and more vegetation near its base. Looking closer to me, the landscape was rather barren, filled with sagebrush, grasses, and lots of prairie dog mounds. The valley in front of me contained more greenery than the limestone ridge dividing the trenches. Right in front of my eyes, I could spot some of the grasses, forbs, lichen, and woody plants we had already been taught to identify this week, as they would be common during our upcoming weeks on the preserve.

Beyond my sense of sight, I could hear birds calling and prairie dogs chattering, as well as smell a hint of the nearby sage. Sitting on the rust-colored rocks, I could feel the rocks and plants poking into my legs, while the flies and mosquitos flew around me, desperate for a life form to land on. The wind’s slight breezes were cooling and offered white noise to accompany the distant animal noises and planes flying overhead. Few cloud coverage, paired with the sun’s mid-day rays, made sitting in this shadeless location feel especially hot. Although, taking this time to reflect on this desert-like biome helped me be even more thankful for this experience and put into perspective the vastness our Earth has to offer, especially when I compare it to the forest biome I’m used to on the East Coast.