Soggy noodle camping trip

By: Kelsey Brock—June 20, 2018

Our crew is finishing our first camping trip in Redwood Falls. During this trip we worked for the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Fisheries Department on Aquatic Management Areas (AMAs). We got to break out the backpack sprayers and spray thistles that were invading some reclaimed prairie lands.

The method to take out this invasive species was to line up with our backpack sprayers and do grid patterns through the prairie, pivoting at the end of each transect, and repeating back down to the other end. This could get repetitive after awhile, but we made sure to have music playing so we could dance and spray at the same time to keep ourselves entertained. We also had a few good scares from snakes and pheasants jumping out at us! To keep things interesting, we even got to meet a baby fawn that was taking a nap nearby—which made my day.

On the days it was too rainy to spray chemical, we removed parsnip instead, and found out that the Corps boots can also double as swimming pools for your feet.

These rainy days made our first camping trip a very soggy one to begin with but by midweek, it stopped raining long enough for us to hammock, cook s’mores, and start to feel a little bit less like soggy noodles and a little bit more like happy campers.