Field News Update- Spring Young Adult Recap
Young Adult Conservation Camping Crews
This spring, all of Northwest Youth Corps’ Young Adult camping crews launched out of Oregon before traveling across Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Northern California for a wide range of conservation projects. Over the course of the session, crews restored habitat, maintained trails, prepared campgrounds for the summer season, removed invasive species, supported wildfire resilience work, planted native trees and shrubs, and strengthened public lands and communities across the region.
This season also marked the return of NYC’s Leadership Development Program. LDP members began their year with six weeks of fieldwork before continuing into additional training and preparing to lead youth crews over the summer. Together, the spring Young Adult Conservation Camping crews and LDP crew completed an impressive season of hands-on conservation service.
Funding for our Urban and Community Forestry projects is provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service.
Blue Crew (YA 1)
Blue Crew began their season at City of Rocks National Monument, where they worked through snowstorms to mend fences and maintain trails. From there, the crew traveled to Crane Falls Lake in Idaho to remove tumbleweeds before heading to the Rogue River National Forest to prepare campsites for the upcoming season.
Later in the session, Blue Crew worked with The Nature Conservancy in the Coburg Hills, where they removed Italian thistle through all forms of Oregon spring weather. They then partnered with Pierce Conservation District removing blackberry and preparing pollinator beds before wrapping up their season with Tacoma Water, where they removed Himalayan blackberry and planted trees.
Over the course of the session, Blue Crew improved 22 campsites, restored 26.77 acres of habitat, maintained 4.02 acres of bioswales, maintained 2 miles of trail, installed 43 drainage structures, installed 9 fire pits, and cleared 1.39 miles of road.
Yellow Crew (YA 2)
Yellow Crew started their spring session with the City of Eugene, where they dug up grass and spread compost. They then worked with West Multnomah Soil & Water Conservation District to plant trees and remove invasive vinca and scrub laurel.
The crew spent the next two weeks in the Siuslaw National Forest removing Scotch broom, repairing fences, and brushing trails. They also supported a wide variety of nursery tasks at Dorena Genetic Resource Center, helped prepare Willamette National Forest campsites for the summer season, and returned to Dorena for more nursery work, including moving trees, replanting young plants, and de-mossing saplings.
Yellow Crew finished their session with Boise District BLM, where they surveyed for endangered slickspot peppergrass, repaired fences, and encountered plenty of wildlife along the way.
By the end of the spring, Yellow Crew removed 5.84 acres of invasive species, maintained 7.94 miles of trail, installed 46 fire pits and 9 picnic tables, planted 364 saplings and 673 shrubs, removed 535 pounds of trash, cleared 2.02 miles of road, and de-mossed and fertilized 6,735 saplings.
Orange Crew (YA 3)
Orange Crew kicked off their season in the Steens Mountains, where they planted sagebrush, checked fencelines, and maintained trails. They then traveled to Dorena Genetic Resource Center for greenhouse work before spending two weeks partnering with the Army Corps of Engineers preparing Schwartz Campground for opening.
The crew continued their season with the Rogue River National Forest, where they completed trail maintenance, riddling, and other project work. They then spent two weeks with Idaho Power removing fencing before ending their session with The Nature Conservancy in the Coburg Hills, where they removed Italian thistle.
Over the spring session, Orange Crew removed 0.59 acres of invasive species, maintained 2.04 miles of trail, removed 0.95 miles of fencing, naturalized 60 feet of trail, bucked 10 logs, maintained 2 switchbacks, built 6 trail structures, planted 1,000 shrubs, collected 2,000 seeds, removed 115 cubic yards of woody debris, de-mossed and fertilized 5,000 saplings, maintained 400 trees, and planted an additional 20 shrubs.
Red Crew (YA 4)
Red Crew spent their first four weeks at Fern Ridge, where they partnered with the Army Corps of Engineers on meadow restoration work. Their projects helped open up habitat for a native butterfly species that has lost much of its habitat.
The crew then spent four weeks near La Pine with Western Rivers Conservancy. Their work focused on riparian meadow restoration, including thinning lodgepole pine that had been planted on former agricultural lands to help open the landscape back up around the ponds.
Later in the session, Red Crew spiked out by boat across the Little Deschutes River to work at a river camp, where they removed blackberry for a week. They finished the season with Eugene Springfield Fire, chipping woody debris collected at community drop-off locations.
In total, Red Crew removed 1.51 acres of invasive species, removed 5,000 trees from the landscape, created 69 burn piles, thinned and limbed 10.44 acres for hazardous fuels reduction, chipped 1,140 cubic yards of woody debris, and planted 28 Willamette daisies.
Blue Crew (YA 5)
Blue Crew spent their first four weeks with the Army Corps of Engineers at the John Day Dam project near Umatilla, where they removed invasive tree of heaven, Russian olive, and black locust.
From there, the crew traveled across Oregon for a wide range of projects. They partnered with The Nature Conservancy at Tom McCall Preserve in the Columbia River Gorge, where they maintained trails, moved gravel, and installed geocells. They also completed urban and community forestry work at Dorris Ranch, including invasive species removal and hazardous fuels reduction.
Blue Crew then headed to the coast for another Nature Conservancy project at Cascade Head, where they maintained trails and thinned encroaching conifers from the lower meadow. They continued trail maintenance work with the Siuslaw National Forest, first on the Rainforest Trail at Cascade Head and then farther south near Florence on the Berry Creek Trail at Cape Mountain. The crew wrapped up the session on Mount Hood, clearing logs from an OHV trail system.
Across the session, Blue Crew constructed 12 burn piles, removed 7.43 acres of invasive species, spent 34 hours chipping, removed 20 pounds of trash from one campsite, maintained 10.9 miles of trail, bucked 58 logs out of trails, installed 29 trail structures, and cleared or maintained 212 trail drains.
Yellow Crew (YA 6)
Yellow Crew began their session with Northwest Oregon BLM near Molalla, where they removed invasive plants and replanted native species. They then spent a week at Dorris Ranch doing more urban and community forestry work, including invasive species removal and replanting.
The crew traveled to the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area to refresh Lagoon Campground and help get it ready to open for the summer season. They then traveled to Hinsdale Garden, where they completed trail maintenance, garden maintenance, weed removal, and erosion control work by filling and installing sandbags along the river.
Yellow Crew also traveled to Six Rivers National Forest in California, where they worked at Papa’s Flat removing French broom and thinning encroaching conifers from meadow habitat. From there, they spent two weeks in Washington’s Gifford Pinchot National Forest at Big Creek Campground, building picnic tables, installing fire rings, removing old infrastructure, and helping prepare the campground for summer visitors. They finished their session near Bandon with BLM at New River Nature Center, where they removed invasive species and helped dig a trench for a weather monitor.
All in all, Yellow Crew planted 2,575 trees and shrubs, removed 8.88 acres of invasive species, bucked 10 logs out of trails, installed 2 kiosks, filled 28 contractor bags with root material, maintained two-thirds of a mile of trail, constructed 10 burn piles, built 32 picnic tables, demolished 26 old picnic tables, installed 44 fire rings, removed 33 old fire rings, refurbished 89 campsites, chipped 120 cubic yards of woody debris, and filled and installed 90 sandbags.
Leadership Development Program (LDP 1)
The Leadership Development Program crew spent their first six weeks in the field this spring, which marked the beginning of a much longer year with NYC. After some time off, LDP members will return for first aid training and additional leader training before leading youth crews over the summer.
The LDP crew started their season with The Nature Conservancy in Eugene, where they removed Scotch broom and English ivy. They then spent a week on the North Umpqua Trail with Roseburg District BLM, completing crosscut training and clearing trail.
The crew finished this first field phase with three weeks of project work with Rogue River BLM. Their work focused primarily on developed recreation, including preparing campgrounds for the season, completing trail work, and supporting a variety of public lands projects.
In just six weeks, the LDP crew built 30 trail structures, removed 620 feet of fence, bucked 91 logs off trails, cleared 10.7 miles of trail, and treated 28.7 acres for invasive species or hazardous fuels.