Hello! My name is Braque Pike and I am Lake SWCD’s new NOWCorps member for the next year. I am from Salem, Oregon but recently graduated from Oberlin College in May 2024 and have remained in the Cleveland area for the foreseeable future. I started my service for Lake SWCD October 8th, and have finally started to find my bearings. I have already helped work on projects, such as the Coastal Resilience Project, implementation of woody materials into stream beds to increase natural habitat, creating ArcGIS field maps to make data collection easier out in the field, construction site compliance visits, easement monitoring, and Mentor Marsh water quality monitoring.
With such a wide range of projects, I have been busy and learned almost too much to remember. My favorite part of my service so far has been the days I get to go out into the field. Whether it was Mentor Marsh water quality testing with Dan, looking for good test sites for the woody materials project with Maurine, or driving around doing construction compliance checks with Chad and Wes. Being outside lets me learn the area. While still being relatively new to the northeast Ohio landscape, being outside lets me learn the county, develop my plant identification abilities, and see how the local community and watershed interact. My first month of service has gone by quickly, and I’m looking forward to the remaining 11 months.
