RENSSELAERVILLE — After spending the summer as an Odum intern at the Huyck Preserve in the Helderbergs, Jamaine Hunt is heading home to West Virginia this week feeling raw.

"How delicate and strong something can be at the same time," said Dawn O'Neal, speaking of the birds she studies, but perhaps inadvertently referencing herself. She recently became the Huyck Preserve's newest executive director.