Range Plants Trip

November has been a very busy month. November 11-14th I went on a field trip with my range plants class to Southern Utah in replace of the final. We camped at Lytle Ranch owned by BYU. We were suppose to leave at 6 am but didn't end up pulling out until 6:30 am and arrived at the ranch at 8 pm to set up camp in the dark, that was interesting... part of arriving so late was we went the back way so we can stop and look at plants. That is one thing that I didn't like about the trip was that I was on plant OVERLOAD!
The second day of the trip was a LONG day. Got up early, had our plant test of the plants that we had learned the day before and then went on a hike around the ranch looking at plants. Plus to add onto it the first night I didn't get any sleep at all because it was so freaking cold and just getting used to sleeping in a new area. We didn't know what the place looked like until morning because we arrived when it was dark. We hiked around, went back to camp for lunch and then hiked some more. I was SO tired! We then sat around the campfire after dinner. Here are some pictures around the ranch where we were hiking. The weather was actually very nice and sweatshirt weather, just cold at night, but what do you expect, it is a desert.

Sunday we got up early to drive an hour and a half to church in Pine Valley. Their were closer churches, but they didn't have the vegetation area we were looking for. When we arrived we were sure if we were going to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints because it is nothing like what the buildings look like today. It was just a small branch and this is actually the oldest operating building of the Church and we were able to have a tour afterwards before going and looking at more plants and taking our plants test of plants we learned the day before. The people there were so nice and even invited all 15 of us for lunch at their house and beds to take a nap.
Heading back to the ranch from Pine Valley. We stopped in this area to collect red sand and of course look at plants. Lets just say we stopped a LOT to look at plants. That is what got really annoying, hop in the van drive for 5 minutes, jump out collect a plant sample and the name of the plant, hop in the van, drive another 5 minutes and repeat. But I learned a lot and it was a lot of fun other than being burned out with plants.

Monday we then packed up camp and headed out to leave, but before doing that we took another plants test. We had a slow start in leaving because the dirt road to the main road should only take 20 minutes, but it ended up taking 40 because we kept stopping to look at plants. Our professors can point out this little itty bitty cactus that you can't even see in the distance while driving pretty fast. I guess they just have an eye for plants. However I am getting to the point to where I can do that as well, just not small plants though. I just name them and say the scientific name and family name when I see a plant that I know.