Interns Jessica Jerin and Nathan Fuller, Jr. and biologist Autumn Sabo

A sea of green gobbled up the diminutive figure seconds after she received her marching orders from her Department of Conservation and Natural Resources taskmaster.

Spicebush limbs slapped her; green briar snagged her; spider webs enshrouded her; and the mosquitoes and horse flies never stopped following.

There was no easy way through the understory jungle climbing steeply from the shore of Pinchot Lake. The only way was to follow the deer trails snaking through the brush, under fallen trees, and over slick rocks and logs.

When she finally stepped on to a cleared trail after helping canvass a 70 acre-tact in Gifford Pinchot State Park, her clothes were soaked with perspiration and remnants of an overnight rain. She had burrs and spider webs in her hair, vegetation stains on her clothing, and a smile on her face spreading ear to ear.

Jessica Jerin of Carlisle was happy doing exactly what she had signed up to do. No classrooms, no assignments, no mandatory reading, just a daily diet of learning as she volunteered her knowledge, enthusiasm and stamina as a student intern assigned to the Ecological Services section with DCNR’s Bureau of Forestry.

Every day is different for the 21-year-old biology major at Shippensburg University, yet the end-result is the same—when she returns late this month to her senior year, she will have a summer of invaluable field work under her belt, and a better understanding of where she wants to go—and what she wants to do—with her science degree.

“I feel very fortunate that I’ve had this chance to learn at a summer job that teaches you something just about every day,” said Jerin. “I’ve learned how to use GIS (Geographic Information Systems), and I’m learning how to recognize plants, and just what the state is doing to protect those that are threatened.”

A lesson in the latter part of that learning experience came early this summer as Jerin teamed up with another Shippensburg student, Nathan Fuller of Lewisberry, and their mentor, boss, and friend, Autumn Sabo, an employee of the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy who works with the Pennsylvania Native Plant Program.

Their assignment that day was to survey some 70 very rugged acres, looking for plant species of special concern that might lie in the path of a proposed disc golf course at Gifford Pinchot State Park in York County. Before and after the trek through the underbrush, Sabo peppered her students with questions following a basic theme: what is this and why?

A morning sampling: is this purple loosestrife growing lakeside? A rare but possible Schumard oak, or the more common red, white or pin? Take a sample back to the office for later identification. Or try now, using Sabo’s fieldwork Bible, “Plants of Pennsylvania, ” or other essential tools of her trade: hand lens, maps, ruler, knife and small shovel.

All help Sabo and her crew conserve Pennsylvania's native wild plants with the Pennsylvania Native plant program.. Their inventory results and data are contributed to The Pennsylvania Natural Heritage Program (PNHP). PNHP maintains an integrated data management system of the location and status of special concern ecological resources, including rare plants like those surveyed at Gifford Pinchot. The goal is to build, maintain, and provide accurate and accessible ecological information needed for conservation, development planning, and natural resource management.

Fuller, 19, who is set on teaching biological sciences at the college level, said he is delighted to have the chance to help in this inventory effort: “Already this summer I’ve learned there are many endangered species in Pennsylvania, and my work here has shown me the startling rate at which their habitat sometimes is being developed.”

Fuller and Jerin were among 78 interns working this summer with DCNR at its Harrisburg headquarters as well as in state parks and forests across the state. Like other successful students who landed positions, they applied early and took the time to learn about where they wanted to work.

Details on DCNR intern programs, both paid and unpaid, can be obtained by telephoning 717-705-1082.

(Find this and other articles in DCNR’s August 16 Resource.)

8/26/2005