People of the Big River 2026 - Judy Bergevin

 We woke up at the same time 6am, we ate breakfast and put everything away. We went to the Tamastslikt Cultural Institute which is the museum next to Wildhorse Casino, we walked around and had time to really sit and listen to the stories that are told at different parts of different exhibits. Some of the stories were a little surprising, I never really heard stories about the boarding school Chemawa even though my aunt went there not as a original boarding school but later on as the non threatening boarding school. The things they all had to go through is unimaginable, then there was the different coyote stories and boards that told different versions of stories I've heard before but they had visuals that were hieroglyphs used for coyotes, birds, bears, cougars, and the variety of animals that have stories told about them. It was a whole new experience to listen to these people tell stories of their grandparents and family members that were apart of the boarding schools. Those who ...

 Today we woke up at almost the same time, we all got ready and ate breakfast and made lunches. At first we were all kind of just sitting and waiting until 8:15am, but then time rolled around and we headed out to the CTUIR Hatchery to tour with Emily Emeske and while we walked around we got to see the it wasn't to similar to other hatchery's especially because they house three employees right next to the site and they have the control panel inside their homes to keep an eye on them while they are at home relaxing. This site was recently updated and they just got done with it in 2021, they're working to restore the natural habitat for these Umatilla and Walla Walla Chinook salmon. We learned that they release about 30,000 fish into the river next to the hatchery and a good portion next to Walla Walla, they hold 50,000 fish in these runway tanks and they actually get so big compared to half of the fish I catch in the Columbia sometimes. We went to where they do the spawning a...

 Today we left Spokane, it was a really long process because we still had to do some things for our soil samples which felt like it took forever and when we would think we were done we weren't and somehow had like one more thing to do. We woke up and had breakfast and made lunches then we all had our tents packed at about the same time, me and Lovey had to struggle deflating our bed pads but we got it done and had breakfast. It felt like everything before the soil sample stuff took longer than the soil sampling did. After putting everything away and getting ready to finish our soil tests, we got everything we needed ad did our canopy cover to jot down for our papers we had for the soil sampling. We got the canopy cover things done with the densitometer then we came back to start some of our spreadsheets with our data we got from doing the soil kits to test for nitrates and nitrites, phosphates, potassium, and pH. Meanwhile, Monet was in the RV and this prairie dog got into it and s...

 Today we woke up at 6am, as per usual, we had cereal and made lunches then packed up and kind of just waited around until 8:30 for Casey, Brian, and Jordan to get there to take us out to measure this stream and see how much sediment build up there was. Sometimes the stream floods and takes down the breaks that they put up to help bring up the water levels. There were 32 breaks all the way down about a mile, and they have these metal plates with a reference point in case one or a few breaks flood and move. We used this tool to measure the different points at the breaks, it is called a transit and you place it in one spot and use that one spot to measure the long yard stick. We rotated and some of us put on waders but the others used the transit and one person would be a scribe, we wrote down the measurements as they said them from the transit but there had to be more than one so we could compare measurements to make sure we all heard them right. Meanwhile Brian would tell us a stor...

 Today we went to the fish hatchery here in Wellpinit, Spokane. I usually don't like to be involved in things that have to do with teaching children, but more often than not I find myself in those situations and I tend to have a lot of fun. I also do really well teaching children and finding ways to help them understand or just help them have fun, I think that's something I get from both my parents. We started the day at 6am, which I indeed woke up early for because I knew Professor Black was on a tight schedule with us, and I think I can say that things went smoothly. I wake up everyday and thank Creator for a new opportunity to learn something and to maybe even teach someone else something, which is usually my friends but this time it was children (sort of the same thing to me). Being someone who fishes a lot on the Columbia River or N'chywana I already knew the salmon life cycle but it's not something I often find myself talking about, but with the children today I g...

 6/14/26 Today is technically our first day, I am very excited about the trip but nervous because these aren't the people I normally go on road trips with. I think it's always good to put yourself out of your comfort zone, it opens so many new experiences. I spent maybe a week telling whoever would listen that I am going on a trip with my college to learn about things I wouldn't have thought of to learn myself. It's not everyday you hear about a college student being excited about a trip that isn't technically thrilling but for someone who has personally been on this trip it's safe to say I want to learn when possible. With everything going on in the government these programs and trips and opportunity won't come by to often until something is done.