May 21, 2020 Covington, La.
The Louisiana Iris Conservation Initiative (LICI) is very please to announce that Destiny Simon, a senior at Northwestern University of Louisiana, has joined us as an intern for the summer. Destiny's major is biology with a natural science concentration. She is a resident of Abita Springs, La when she's not at the university in Natchitoches, LA.
Destiny is assisting us in forming our non-profit corporation and helping to setup our website, as well as the usual duties of participating in the field with iris rescue and plantings projects.
As the photos show, Destiny received her first taste of the hard work that is required with our projects on May 29, 2020. But she also felt the satisfaction of moving irises from a location where they will be destroyed at some point in the future to a safe environment at the Bayou Sauvage National Wildlife Refuge's boardwalk.
We are looking forward to Destiny working with us this summer. Welcome aboard Destiny!
On May 29th the irises were rescued from a commercial piece of property located just outside of New Orleans where the parking lot was recently extended right up to the edge of a stand of wild I. giganticaerulea species Louisiana irises.
The owner of the property has been very supportive of our removing the irises to a safer and more permanent location.
The plan was for the two person team to remove as many irises as possible and then bring them directly to the Bayou Sauvage refuge for planting.
About three hundred irises were dug up.
After five hours of hot and hard work the irises were in their new home at the Bayou Sauvage refuge.
Photo: LICI intern Destiny Simon is shown on the left and Gary Salathe, founder of LICI, is on the right at the Bayou Sauvage refuge as they finish work. The irises were planted in an area about 75' behind where they are standing. The irises in front of them were planted by volunteers in 2019.
Information on the Bayou Sauvage refuge can be found here: https://www.fws.gov/refuge/Bayou_Sauvage/