About me

Waving hello from Whiskeytown National Recreation Area! My name is Natalia, and I recently graduated from UC Santa Cruz with a B.S. in Ecology and Evolution. A little bit about me is that I love to travel, especially internationally, and spent about half of last year out of the country. I visited 9 countries new to me, all the way from Southeast Asia to Western Europe. When I’m not traveling, I enjoy walking dogs, surfing, and learning new languages. I also like to spend my time volunteering at animal rehabilitation centers, like the one pictured below where I got to learn falconry! In the coming years, I hope to attend graduate school for biology in the coming years after having more experiences like this.

My time here

As an Environment for the Americas intern in the Fish and Feathers program, I am grateful to spend a summer in a lake town of Northern California learning all kinds of skills. I grew up by the beach in southern California and was raised an ocean girl- so I am excited to see how I’ll take to the lake life. As for my work here, I am hoping to get lots of experience with the site’s wildlife biologist, help with local environmental issues, and increase my skills in educating the public. I am especially eager to get more experience fishing, as Whiskeytown Lake, due to its size and location, houses some of the biggest largemouth Bass in all of California! The birds here are impressive too, more notably the many ospreys I’ve already watched diving for fish. I have so enjoyed the serenity and vastness of this place, and feel lucky that I get to play a part in its preservation.