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Archive for the 'Wildlife and the natural world' Category

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Do birds help curb global warming?

April 8th, 2010, 9:55 am by

The early bird catches the worm — and, one UC Irvine scientist says, might also help reduce the effects of global warming.

Eastern bluebird with leaf-eating caterpillar. Photo by Mike Onyon.

In a new study published in a scientific journal this week, ecologist and lead author Kailen Mooney shows that birds, bats and lizards consume enough insects to reduce the damage they cause to plants and promote plant growth — by 14 percent on average.

“The goal was to understand how natural communities work, and the role of top predators in shaping and affecting communities of insects,” Mooney said.

The study itself, a “meta-analysis” of 63 previous studies involving 113 experiments, looked only at how plant growth is affected by removing birds and other animals that prey on insects. But the implications for climate change are clear, Mooney said.

“Anytime a plant is growing, it’s taking carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and turning it into tissues,” he said.

Humanity’s release of carbon dioxide, along with other greenhouse gases, is believed by climate scientists to be Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in: Animal archive • Climate change • Wildlife and the natural world • • • • | 6 Comments »

O.C.’s parks: Crazy names, riot of colors

April 7th, 2010, 12:15 pm by

Johnny jump up. Stork bill filaree. Yellow pincushion. Pineapple weed.

Reel off the common names of wildflowers in Orange County’s and you can start to sound a little crazy. But the names might, in fact, help preserve a bit of sanity: how else to confront the explosion of colors suddenly spattered across the hills?

Rain-fed blooms are reaching toward their peak, and the rangers at OC Parks are eager to show them off.

During a short visit this week to Limestone Canyon & Whiting Ranch Wilderness Park, supervising ranger Ron Slimm spoke of the attachment people develop for plants — even non-natives such as eucalyptus trees. Try cutting them down in and, in some places, you could spark a neighborhood protest.

“It’s an emotional factor that binds people to all these things,” he said.

So a low-growing, knobby-looking plant might be overlooked — until someone remembers its zany name (“Hey! That’s pineapple weed!”).

Squash one of the knobs between your fingers and, sure enough, it smells exactly like pineapple.

In a canyon that was little more than a smoking scar after the 2007 Santiago Fire, the hills are now thick with green growth and bursting flowers.

The flowers aren’t as concentrated as they were immediately after the fire, said David Raetz, deputy director of the Irvine Ranch Conservancy.

“The displays this year are a little more spread out,” he said. Still, he said, “It’s a stunning landscape. Most people wouldn’t believe it existed in Orange County.”

Such displays are, in fact, rare, Raetz said. The county is part of one of the planet’s few regions known for seasonal wildflower explosions.

And a decent rainy season after several dry ones is giving Orange County its biggest pop in years.

OC Parks is offering several wildflower tours to the public:

Saturday, April 10:

Wildflower Hike

Laguna Coast Wilderness Park, Willow Staging Area, 20101 Laguna Canyon Rd.

8:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.

Call 949-923-2235 to make reservations. Parking $3, plus $2 donation.

Saturday, April 17:

Junior Ranger Day at Santiago Oaks

Santiago Oaks Regional Park

10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Free event, ages 5-12. Parking $5. Call 714-973-6622.

Saturday, May 8:

Wildflower Hike

Laguna Coast Wilderness Park, Willow Staging Area

8:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.

Reservations required (see phone number above; parking and donation fees same as above.)

Saturday, June 12:

Wildflower Hike

Laguna Coast Wilderness Park, Willow Staging Area

8:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.

Reservations required. Fees same as above.

Don’t forget to enter the Orange County Register’s wildflower photo contest. The winner gets $250:

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Edge of Nature: a scientist finds his flower

April 6th, 2010, 7:47 am by

Breaking news from the world of wildflowers: Bob Allen has, once again, found his daisy.

And it really is his – at least when it comes to scientific names.

Allen, an Orange County botanist and professor, spends wildflower season prowling the back country, photographing rarities.

In 2003, he came across what looked like an odd specimen in Limestone Canyon. He’d seen it once before, in 1983 in Dana Point; while it struck him at the time as “different,” he took no further action.

Another biologist had much the same reaction in 1908, when he found the flower at the El Toro train station, long-vanished. He collected a specimen but went no further.

In 2003, however, Allen FedExed a few specimens to an expert, David Keil at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.

In 2006, Keil published a paper declaring the flower a new subspecies, with an added bonus for Allen: his name is now attached to his flower for all time.

It’s known as Allen’s daisy, and last week, Allen found it in Laguna Coast Wilderness Park.The weekend before, it turned up at Audubon Starr Ranch Sanctuary.

Allen’s daisy has so far been found only in Orange County. It’s rare, Allen says, and looks a lot like another flower, tidy tips, which has much broader leaves.

But Allen knows his flower when he sees it.

Scientific name: Pentachaeta aurea, ssp. allenii

Source: Biology professor Bob Allen, Irvine Valley College and Santa Ana College.

Next week: Coastal whiptail

Photo: Keala Cummings, Audubon Starr Ranch Sanctuary.

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Native seed farm blooms, but ranch needs help

April 1st, 2010, 9:17 am by

Seed farm site before planting. Photo courtesy Wida Karim, Irvine Ranch Conservancy.

A native seed farm planted by the Irvine Ranch Conservancy is flourishing, with rain-fueled blooms of lupines, poppies and other flowers and shrubs.

But the rain was fuel for weeds as well, and the conservancy says it needs the public’s help to rip them out.

The idea behind the farm is to produce native species, many of them difficult to cultivate, to act as seed stock for the conservancy’s ambitious habitat restoration efforts. Growing their own natives should save money and avoid depletion of wild plants from too much collecting.

The conservancy has planted about 22,000 shrubs over six

Seed farm site after planting, showing lupines. Photo courtesy Wida Karim, Irvine Ranch Conservancy.

acres in a former avocado orchard near Irvine; the orchard burned in the 2007 Santiago fire.

Not only are arroyo lupines and California poppies showing their colors, but chia, cliff aster and dwarf plaintain are blooming as well, soon to produce the seeds that the conservancy will harvest.

Tough-to-grow natives including purple owl’s clover, cobweb thistle, hedge nettle and narrow-leafed milkweed are also in the mix on a trial basis.

Volunteers are needed to attack weeds on the seed farm on the second Saturday of every month. So far, turnout has been low, said spokeswoman Wida Karim. Volunteers can register on the Irvine Ranch Natural Landmarks Web site.

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Posted in: agriculture • Green events • Wildlife and the natural world • • • | 4 Comments »

Scientist captures elusive abalone off O.C.

March 30th, 2010, 12:47 pm by
A green abalone caught off Laguna Beach. Photo courtesy Nancy Caruso.

Green abalone captured off Laguna Beach. Photo courtesy Nancy Caruso.

An Orange County scientist who spent years growing kelp forests offshore is firing up volunteers for her newest project: breeding green abalone in local schools, then releasing them into the wild.

Nancy Caruso, a marine biologist and head of the “Get Inspired!” non-profit organization, caught three good-sized abalone off Laguna Beach Saturday with help from her dive team. She kept the abalone in tanks overnight to get fecal samples, and returned them to their offshore hideout the next day.

It’s the first step in an ambitious effort that would be the only one of  its kind in the state.

“We’re finding some abalone, and that’s good news,” Caruso said. “Nobody really knew if they were still around.”

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Posted in: Animal archive • Wildlife and the natural world • • • | Comments Off

Edge of Nature: Meet the snipe, creature of legend

March 30th, 2010, 10:16 am by

Youngsters on their first camping trips still fall victim to a famous practical joke: being taken on a “snipe hunt.”

According to legend, the snipe doesn’t really exist, much to the chagrin of the inexperienced camper.

But in some places, the joke might be on the joker. Snipes do exist, and the Wilson’s snipe can be seen in Orange County this time of year, though it will soon head north for the summer.

Seeing a snipe can be a difficult proposition, perhaps contributing to its legendary non-existence.

Inhabitants of marshes, wet meadows and river banks, they are strikingly patterned birds, but the patterns serve to break up their shapes. The result: the birds can hide in plain sight, blending in so well with, say, a rocky or pebbly habitat that they’re virtually invisible until flushed by an approaching intruder.

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Posted in: Animal archive • Edge of Nature • Wildlife and the natural world • • | 1 Comment »

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