Little House on the Prairie

So here I am, in good ol’ Missouri living on a prairie in the middle of nowhere with not one Water 4 person in sight. It’s strange being away from my Water 4 team, but it’s been great getting to know my new team, Water 6, for shuffle round. We’re working with the Missouri Department of Conservation where we’ll be performing prescribed burns and invasive species removal. The tallgrass prairie currently occupies less than 1% of its former range in Missouri and North America, so our work is important to help preserve and restore what’s left.

This past week we started working on blowing fire lines to prepare the land we need to burn this upcoming week. It’s hard work; we have to carry these 15 lb. leaf blowers on our backs blowing these lines out through the woods, up some very steep slopes. And yes, I was the first one on the team to take a spill going up a small, yet very steep slope. =) It’s a lot of physical work, but it feels good to be outside working. We had our fire training on Friday so our entire team is level one fire trained and we’re prepared to start burning, hopefully this next week.

This weekend we went to Columbia, where the University of Missouri campus is, and did some shopping and walking around. Unfortunately, the first day of spring brought us a gross rain and snow mix, so it was rather miserable walking around. I decided to hang out with Molly and Zoey in a little frozen yogurt and tea shop and read my book.

Our housing is small, about the same size as the house in Lafayette, but it’s very cool. I like to call it the Little House on the Prairie, since we are living on the prairie. It’s cozy and I enjoy having my own little top bunk to relax in.

I’m excited to see what the next few weeks have to bring us. We’ll hopefully be able to start burning this upcoming week, but because of the weather this weekend, we’re unsure if we’ll be able to burn because the ground needs to dry up.

~Jenna