Biology students return from gathering samples in Eagle Lake. Photo: Pam Figge

Living in the Lab

Students and faculty work across disciplines at Eagle Lake Field Station

It is Sept. 7, summer is nearing it cyclical disappearance, and the morning air is just starting to feel crisp. The swallows have taken wing. Students and faculty in sweatshirts and shorts arrive in the dining hall, lured by the smell of coffee and bacon. With notebooks, digital cameras, and a relaxed eagerness, they will soon be capturing the beauty and details of the Eagle Lake Field Station.

On the lake, western grebes are diving for a morning meal while an osprey flies in a circular rhythm. The scene is ancient and present, quiet and lively. Separate research groups carry survey equipment into the surrounding Jeffery pine and western juniper forest, climb into boats to join the grebes and explore the field station’s buildings, which have sprouted organically over the many years of use. Preparation of the Eagle Lake Field Station Master Plan is underway.

The field station began as a concept and dream of biologist Dr. Vesta Holt more than 60 years ago. Dr. Holt believed that learning should be experienced in an environment where the researcher lived with the organisms under study.

The field station is located in a remote area of Lassen County where the Cascade mountain forests, Great Basin desert, and Modoc lava plateau converge. Many professors and their students have conducted research at the field station over the years. Originally, fieldwork was conducted using a hunting resort owned by the Webbs, a pioneer family of the area.
Through the years, cabins were constructed or moved onto the site and improved by volunteers. With the exception of a new conference building, most of the structures were constructed with limited funds by students and faculty. The buildings have a distinct quaintness.
In 2005, Gordon Wolfe and Michael Marchetti, Biological Sciences, applied for and received funding from the National Science Foundation to develop a strategic management plan, or “Master Plan,” to sustain the 90-plus -acre field station and plan for future development. The plan includes promotion and development of academic use of the station, assessment of the existing physical condition of facilities and buildings, and development of an administrative and business plan to fund future development and operations.

Working with the departments of civil engineering, construction management, and geography and planning, the team began collecting data for the existing conditions study in September. As a land use consultant and instructor in the Department of Geography and Planning, I directed the data collection. Geography and planning department students, with Jacque Chase overseeing their work, will be using the information and data collected from students in civil engineering and construction management to formulate the Master Plan.

From left to right:  Geography and Planning Students:  Dan Allmon, Scott Gregory, Jared Hancock. Consultant Pam Figge and Jesse Smith.

Jim Scolaro, Civil Engineering, brought four students to the station for a weekend of surveying property boundaries, buildings, and infrastructure improvements. Meanwhile, lecturers Mark Maybee and Dale Lee, Construction Management, inspected buildings for structural integrity and code compliance.

Geography and planning students captured the station on digital camera; evaluated the current uses and functions of the station; reviewed user questionnaires provided by longtime station manager Raymond “Jay” Bogiatto, Biological Sciences; interviewed station caretaking staff; inventoried the facilities, and began formulating the components of the Master Plan.

Information provided by the civil engineering students will be plotted using a computer-aided design (CAD) and converted into a geographical information system (GIS) by the geography and planning students. The building condition study will aid me and my students in determining future building renovation and construction.

During the same weekend, Wolfe escorted students from his Microbial Ecology class to the lake, where they sampled the water for bacteria and algae, and filtered water for eventual DNA extraction. The field station was a weekend activity center filled with the low hum of data collection and the confluence of academic disciplines.

In the evening, the western pipistrelle bats took to the night air to feast on flying insects as students and faculty gathered in the dining hall to swap stories and chow down on the caretaker’s hearty meal. As the sun sunk into the alkaline waters of Eagle Lake, it was just as Dr. Vesta Holt had dreamed.

—Pam Figge, Department of Geography and Planning