My six-month stint as the Wells Reserves Maine Conservation Corps/AmeriCorps volunteer is now half over, and what a busy three months these have been!

I have spent the majority of my time preparing for and conducting stream habitat assessments in the Merriland River/Branch Brook/Little River (MBLR) watershed.? Thanks to an excellent crew of interns and volunteers, those were finished late August and we have moved on to the Shoreys Brook watershed.

I was interested in being stationed at the Wells NERR because of the opportunities for ecological field work.? The monitoring projects at the Reserve this year are quite extensive and I have had the opportunity to participate in everything from electrofishing and fyke netting to bird watching and marsh salinity monitoring.? These projects have provided an excellent glimpse into possible fields of environmental research and monitoring, something I had hoped to gain from this experience.? As the summer draws to a close, I am looking forward to finishing up our current projects and taking a closer look at the information we collected this summer to see what it can tell us about our local watersheds.