A Day In The Life (of the Byers Intern)

To whoever is reading this blog post: H.F.F. members, conservationists, future Byers Interns, Anglers, and anyone else who may have stumbled upon this… You may be wondering, “What does the Byers Intern even entail?”. My name is Stephen Gentile, and as the 2025 Byers Intern, I’m here to tell you! 

Before we begin, I want to talk a little bit about myself. I was born and raised in Rexburg, Idaho. I discovered the Henry’s Fork Foundation in high school while taking a class called Environmental Solutions. H.F.F. gave a presentation on the equipment they use to collect data at Warm River. Fast forward a couple of years, and now I’m going into my junior year at Boise State University. My major is biology with an emphasis in ecology and evolution, and I’m glad to be able to gain some fieldwork experience in my “backyard” this summer.

First off, I’m primarily in-charge of maintaining riparian fencing along the Henry’s Fork to keep the river in prime condition. Riparian fencing is important because it prevents erosion along the streambanks and excess nutrients (cow manure) from entering the river. We have two stretches of fence that Henry’s Fork Foundation looks after. One is across the river from Pine Haven, and another is across from Last Chance.

This summer, I have been working a lot on the Last Chance fence. I’ve been putting on these new fence clips that hold the barbed wire in place. This new system is a lot better than the old one. The fence used to have these old, brittle wood posts with the barbed wire nailed into them. These wood posts were then lifted and looped around metal posts in the ground. Now, we can attach the barbed wire straight to the metal posts with no worry of the wood posts breaking. I’ve enjoyed my time out at Last Chance as I get to listen to my music and look at all of the amazing flowers and wildlife in the area. It’s a very tranquil setting.

 Some of my other duties have been helping maintain the Chester Dam Fish Ladder. It consists of moving a lot of the gravel that has been swept down to the bottom section of the ladder to the upper section. With some adjustments to the ladder, the gravel should hold better in place as well. On my first visit, we found a large Brown Trout using the Fish Ladder, which was pretty exciting! I’ve also been helping the Water Quality and Ecology Intern, Dela, collect temperature data along the Henry’s Fork. The best part about this is that I get to kayak to some of these locations.

As of late, I’ve been fortunate enough to help Friends of the Teton River electrofish some of the tributaries in the Tetons to get an idea of how many Yellowstone Cutthroat trout are living in these creeks. This was super exciting for me since I had never electrofished before. It was interesting to see where fish hide in the tributaries of the Teton River. To get to these creeks, we have to hike through gorgeous mountain scenery, and it really made the experience feel surreal. So far, it has been an amazing summer, and I love the work that I have been doing.