5 questions with a Conservation Corps crew member-turned regional leader
Snakes, work sites and successful conservation approaches
Dustin Looman didn’t major in timber rattlesnakes.
The Paynesville native signed up for a Conservation Corps Minnesota & Iowa stint after interning at Frontenac State Park and earning a recreation and tourism management degree from Winona State University. He didn’t plan to stick around.
But he liked the work. He liked the people. Eventually, he became the South Region assistant district manager for the Conservation Corps. During a drive from his Rochester office to an AmeriCorps work site overseen by the Root River Soil & Water Conservation District in Houston County, Looman talked about who signs up, who sticks with it — and how timber rattlesnakes fit into the picture. Edited excerpts from that conversation follow.
What have you gained from working with the Corps?
I gained a whole new respect for nature in itself, and I’ve seen myself grow tenfold as a leader, as a manager, as a dad. I feel like I’ve finally started to come into my own and what I was truly meant to do. It’s not just the fieldwork that I thought I would be doing, but it’s the mentorship and giving guidance for folks that are 18 to 25 and trying to figure out what they want to do next. Maybe even discussing with them that this may not be the job they thought it was going to be, and helping them find a different direction in life.
What’s the common thread for those who stick with it?
They have this passion. The ones that maybe realize that it’s not for them, by no means do I think that this isn’t the right avenue. But maybe (they should pursue) more of a research type of position within natural resources. They come to realize that fairly quickly.
What about those snakes?
I didn’t go to school for working with timber rattlesnakes. In certain areas where crews are at work doing restoration, they’re here and there. I didn’t go to school for that. I personally don’t care for snakes. But over the years, I’ve had to learn that if I want to keep up with how things are changing, I have to adapt. I can’t turn my back to them like I wanted to. (Conservation Corps crews) are doing some surveying in the spring and fall. They’re trying to find out where certain populations are.
We tell them that there may be a possibility (of seeing snakes). But the flexibility of having 20 or 30 people in a location is if certain crew members don’t want to deal with snakes, they can switch out to a different crew.
What do you wish crew members knew before they started?
Come in with an open mind. Just know that your views or perceptions on certain resource-related things may change when you see different practices or actually learn what the true issue is vs. what you’re told by a grandparent or hear at a coffee shop. A majority of people have an idea of how to do something, and that’s maybe not the correct way. The people that we’re actually working for are doing everything in their power to do what’s right.
What are some misconceptions?
People have this idea that fire is bad and that you’re killing everything. You’re (actually) setting back the plants or woody vegetation that doesn’t belong there. By doing more prescribed fire, you’re actually decreasing the opportunity for wildfire. You’re seeing that on a much larger scale in the Western states where areas haven’t been burned for 30 years and now they’re having these over-the-top, huge fires with loss of homes and fatalities.
(Generally speaking, some landowners) want the work done overnight and they want things to look like it did pre-settlement. Some of these projects take five to seven years to see the end result. Things just don’t occur overnight.
The Minnesota Board of Water and Soil Resources’ mission is to improve and protect Minnesota’s water and soil resources by working in partnership with local organizations and private landowners. www.bwsr.state.mn.us.
