Wilderness Volunteers - Give Something Back

Wilderness Volunteers will be giving something back to Mount Rainier National Park over Sept. 8-14, 2013 as they pitch in to help with revegetation of a popular area near Sunrise. Volunteers will be tent- and car-camping at White River during the project. If you're interested in becoming involved in this frontcountry effort, you're invited to learn more at the Wilderness Volunteers website. Come and enjoy the views while helping with this much-needed restoration!

Recruiting for MeadoWatch

Love hiking and viewing Washington's alpine wildflowers? Interested in gaining an understanding of how scientists study the potential impacts of climate change on native plants? If so, MeadoWatch would love your help this summer!

The University of Washington Biology Department is currently recruiting approximately 50 volunteers to join MeadoWatch, a citizen science program which will monitor the phenology of wildflowers this upcoming summer. Your participation will help researchers understand how climate influences the flowers in mountain meadows at Mt. Rainier National Park.

As a volunteer, you will be asked to attend one orientation session and conduct at least one wildflower survey in Mt. Rainier National Park this summer. Wildflower surveys will occur between late June and late September (depending on the snow season), and will start and end at Reflection Lakes. Volunteers will stop at nine pre-determined stations along the trail to record the phenophases (e.g. budding, flowering, etc.) for ten different wildflower species. In return, you will get free entrance to Mt. Rainier National Park, and if you so desire, you may camp for 1-2 nights without charge at the Volunteer Campground at Longmire.

For more information, please visit the MeadoWatch website at
https://sites.google.com/a/uw.edu/meadowatch/

or contact Anna Wilson, MeadoWatch Coordinator at mwatch@uw.edu.

Volunteer Newsletter - May 2013

Sumer is icumen in!

The snow is melting back and the wildflowers are just beginning to emerge in the lower forest zone. It's time to start thinking about our summer Volunteer activities in the Park! If you're a new volunteer or a seasoned veteran looking to expand your service to the Park, be sure you check out the opportunities listed on volunteer.gov. We are actively recruiting for a number of different positions including Backcountry Maintenance (painting) and Frontcountry Patrol - Paradise. Get your applications in soon!

Upcoming Events

The annual Volunteer Brunch returns to the Tacoma Mountaineers' Program Center this year. Join us on Saturday, May 11 from 9-11 AM. Attendees are asked to bring their favorite potluck dishes to share with the group. Beverages and place settings will be furnished by the hosts. The address is 2302 North 30th St. Tacoma WA 98403. Hope to see you there!

Break out the gloves and hardhats! The MRNPA will be working on several trails projects this year. Mark May 18, June 15 and August 10 on your calendars if you'd like to join the crew. The MRNPA will also be removing exotic plants on July 13 and will hold a revegetation project at Sunrise on September 7. If you are interested in participating in any or all of the above activities, please contact volunteer@mount-rainier.org or visit MRNPA's website at mrnpa.org.

Meadow Rovers, we have two training sessions coming up for you as well. The first is for incoming Rovers and will be held on Saturday, June 22. The training for experienced Rovers is on Sunday, June 23. Further details will be posted here and also in an upcoming Volunteer newsletter.

We will be partnering with Washington Trails Association again this year! This fine group will be leading projects every weekend starting in June. You can sign up for on their website at wta.org.

Our Citizen Science programs will be resuming again in July. Watch for details on the Volunteer blog and in upcoming newsletters. We're still taking applicants for amphibian surveys. Butterfly surveys will also return this year, and we hope to be announcing a third citizen science project shortly as well.

What's Been Going On

ArrowCorps502: In recognition of their conservation project ArrowCorps502, the T'Kope Kwiskwis Lodge received the 2012 OA National Service Award, making the lodge the first in its section to receive the Award, and only the second lodge in Washington State. ArrowCorps volunteers built trails and restored campsites during August 2011. Congratulations to all who made ArrowCorps502 a success!

Nordic Patrol wrapped up a great season with 47 volunteers logging over 1,081 hours for the winter of 2012-2013.  Nordic Patrol is made up of volunteers supplied by the Washington Ski Touring Club (WSTC). Volunteers patrol the backcountry trails of the Park on weekends and holidays, and sometimes participate in Search and Rescue. If you are interested in volunteering for Nordic Patrol, visit wstc.org.

Adopt-a-Highway: In a partnership with the Washington State Department of Transportation, teams of Park volunteers conducted two litter patrols along a two-mile stretch of SR 706. This "beat" encompasses the Tahoma Woods frontage as well as that of Columbia Crest School. Future patrols will be scheduled in late June and September. Keep your eye on the Volunteer blog for more information.

Jeanne Friend: On a more sombre note, we are sad to report the loss of longtime volunteer Jeanne Friend. Jeanne's contribution to the Park spanned 27 years of volunteer service. For most of her volunteer career, Jeanne's passion was with the revegetation program. She was actively involved with a Boy Scout troup in Everett, starting with restoration of the old Paradise Campground in 1983. Many of the still-healing patches in the meadows you see during the summer are restorative work done by her and her teams. She also served as a "Paradise Ranger Assistant" under Ranger John Madden, patrolling trails and helping in the ranger station full time from 1997 to 2000 and part-time in 2001 during the summer. In later years, she helped with the park library and curatorial collection. Jeanne received the prestigious Superintendent's Lifetime Achievement Award for Outstanding Volunteer Service

Statistics, statistics!

Number of volunteers have increased from 1,728 to 1,804.
Total volunteer hours increased from 74,504 hours to 74,615 (worth $1.65 million!).
The new value of volunteer time by the hour is $22.14, a 35-cent increase from last year.

EDRR Invasive Weed Recognition Training Sessions

Are you interested in learning more about invasive plants in the area? The PNW Invasive Plant Council is holding two training sessions in early May. Many of our Volunteers have attended these sessions in past years.

Training Locations and Dates for 2013:

• Sunday, May 5th; 1pm - 3:30pm at NorthwestTrek Wildlife Park in Eatonville, WA

11610 Trek Drive East, Eatonville, WA; Specific location of training will be sent to participants who sign up for the trainings. General location information about Northwest Trek can be found at http://www.nwtrek.org/

• Monday, May 6th, 2013; 1pm – 3:30pm at LOTT Clean Water Alliance Center in Olympia, WA

500 Adams Street NE, Olympia, WA; Specific location of training will be sent to participants who sign up for the trainings. General location information can be found at http://www.lottcleanwater.org/directions.htm

***Capacity is limited so if you would like to attend one of the trainings, please RSVP to Julie Combs at pnw.ipc.org@gmail.com (or call 615-812-5295) to reserve your place.

Teaming Up

When Carol and Jim Miltimore were hiking at South Beach (Olympic National Park), they discovered a tangle of ropes and net which had washed in on the tide. Assisting Olympic Volunteers Walt, Conrad and unnamed others over the weekend, they removed a substantial quantity of beach debris to a spot for later pickup. Volunteers lend a hand even when they're not in their "home" Park!

Volunteer Brunch and Meadow Rovers Training Sessions

Ah, yes! Many of you will have attended our annual Volunteer Brunch in the past and know that it's a great occasion to meet friends both old and new. Bring your favorite potluck dish and join us at the Tacoma Mountaineers' Program Center, 2302 North 30th St. Tacoma WA 98403. The time and date are from 9-11 AM on Saturday, May 11. Unlike last year's Brunch, this one will include a discussion of plans for the suMMer season (as opposed to the "suPPer" season typo inadvertently posted last year) and a briefing regarding general news in the Park. Come as early as 8 AM if you'd like to help with setup! Coffee, tea, juice and tableware will be provided by the hosts. For directions, contact Amy Mann agmann@comcast.net or Michael Waiss mwaiss@net-venture.com.

Meadow Rovers, we have two training sessions coming up for you as well. The first is for incoming Rovers and will be held on Saturday, June 22. The training for experienced Rovers is on Sunday, June 23. Further details will be posted here and also in an upcoming Volunteer newsletter.

A Homepage for Citizen Science!

Caitlin Kenney, citizen science coordinator at Mount Rainier, is featured in this image on the new NPS Citizen Science homepage. You can see it on-line at www.nps.gov through April 30. This feature links to the web page titled "Get Involved with Citizen Science."

T'Kope Kwiskwis Lodge Receives National Recognition

In recognition of their conservation project ArrowCorps502, the T'Kope Kwiskwis Lodge received the 2012 OA National Service Award, making the lodge the first in its section to receive the Award, and only the second lodge in Washington State. The National Service Award was established in 1999 to recognize lodges in each region which have performed outstanding service to their council. ArrowCorps volunteers built trails and restored campsites during August 2011. Congratulations to all who made ArrowCorps502 a success!

NPS Litter Team, Earth Day 2013

Photo credit: NPS, Crow Vecchio

In anticipation of Earth Day (Monday, April 22), Mount Rainier National Park sent out a team comprised of volunteers, paid employees and their family members to complete a litter patrol covering two miles of SR 706, the main access to the Park. In three hours, the group of twelve collected eleven bags of trash as part of their contract with the Washington State Department of Transportation's "Adopt-a-Highway" program. I had the honor of supervising this great crew, and couldn't have asked for a cheerier and efficient lot. Thank you so much, gang, for helping keep the Road to Paradise clean and tidy!

Volunteers needed for backcountry painting this summer

Volunteer John Kemple takes a break at the Mowich Cabin

Some volunteer jobs are really tough. Imagine spending all day painting or staining a backcountry cabin or fire lookout in the mountains of Mount Rainier National Park, then hanging out at the cabin in the evening with no television or Internet, a rough bed to sleep on and a camp stove to cook on, with nothing but gorgeous scenery to relieve the tedium. It's a rough assignment... but someone has to do it!

That's why we're looking for volunteers, two or three in a group, to spend a couple of days at a time at locations throughout the park performing basic maintenance and painting on backcountry structures. Some locations (the Mowich Cabin, for example) would involve little or no hiking to get to, but others (Golden Lakes Cabin, for instance) might take an additional full day of strenuous hiking to get in or out of.

Due to snowpack, the work would not begin until at least July, but after that the dates are flexible and would be coordinated between your schedule and ours. You'd hike in with a member of the park's backcountry maintenance staff, who would get you set up and work with you part of a day before leaving you to finish the job on your own. Once you're up to speed, more complex and independent projects may become an option later on.

For more details, or to express interest in participating, contact Mitch Anderson, Backcountry Carpenter, at 360-569-6726 or Mitch_Anderson@nps.gov.