Deer Poop in the Backcountry: Anecdotes and Advice from Amy

Oh yeah I'll collect anything to spend all day here!

Working in the field is the whole reason I (Amy) wanted to pursue paleontology. Fieldwork gets you up close and personal with the elements, which makes the science even more rewarding. That being said, field work can also suck a lot if you aren't prepared. Field work has many different demands, but whether  hunched over steaming rocks all day in full exposure to the sun or hiking through dense trees and scrubs with bears all around, you need to be able to handle the weird shit field work sometimes throws at you.

Smiles for poop!

This last spring I spent 6 weeks on Revillagagedo Island (Ketchikan, AK) and Gravina Island collecting deer poop for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADFG), Wildlife Conservation division. Now the reasonable question you might ask is why the hell anyone would get paid to count deer shit. Deer turds are an excellent indicator of animal population and health, which is important to the ADFG who have to determine how many of those delicious animals we can kill and eat for dinner each year. Additionally, how healthy and overflowing the deer population is impacts the need for predator control, cuz humans aren't the only ones in Alaska who love fresh venison. If there are too few deer and too many wolves in the area it is the state's responsibility to check the population of the predators by killing some of them. So essentially I was paid to collect shit to determine if wolves needed to be shot from helicopters. YAY SCIENCE!

Bears, Bugs, and Bogs, OH MY! (Aka, Fieldwork In Alaska)

The Vengeance Team are old pros at dealing with fieldwork in some pretty desolate places, including the bowels of Eastern Oregon and the red rock desert of Southeast Utah. We've always got our sweat glands operating at full capacity, and we typically guzzle gallons of water by the hour while hiding in the postage stamp-sized shade offered by emaciated juniper trees, fighting the temptation to jump into the swimming pool mirage we've just hallucinated. Not only are we used to the heat, we've also got the certifications to keep us safe out there, too. We are both wilderness first responders, which in theory means we can help keep you safe in a wilderness setting but in practice just means we get to drunkenly brag about the awesome ways we've set fake femur fractures.

So naturally Vengeance Team North Division had little fear as she headed up to the great state of Alaska to work in Denali National Park and Preserve. Amy had read the job description, convinced herself she could handle it, and them promptly stopped thinking about it. Now, after a few months of work, she is ready to share her experiences in the North, and help you, gentle readers, prepare for any fieldwork that you could (and should!) be doing in Alaska.