naming nature

Art sent me a book under the guise of my non-birthday last year.  It's Naming Nature: The Clash Between Instinct and Science by Carol Kaesuk Yoon.  I'm not a big reader, so it sat on my shelf for 9 months until Andy and I went to a cabin for holiday this spring (read: no internet, no tv, no phone).  Naming Nature made sense to me at the time and provided a good historical summary, most of which I've long forgotten the details.  I also took along my perennial favorite Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver, which I read through twice (it's total book candy) while it rained.

Given my recent discovery of my own religious-based beliefs still lurking about in the grey matter, I think it's time to give Carol's Naming Nature another read through.  Let's see what will stick this time around under a refocused lens of understanding.

I'm guessing my written lines from my last blog post's edit, "As humans, I think we have an instinctive need to identify things, although our ability to do so is not always intuitive.  What are you?  It's in our nature." came directly from having read Carol's book.  It's funny how the mind works.

Art and Jim also sent me several scientific papers, a book chapter, and a dissertation all covering related topics on speciation, subspeciation, the molecular phylogentics of Eriogonum, and the issues that arise when taxonomy meets law.  I'll admit to being a bit intimidated by the technical details that read like Greek to me, and that's one of the points of Carol's book of how science, as it's practiced today, is largely out of reach to the average Joe.

One of the goals that I set out for Nature ID was to invite folks to "learn along with me."  Despite the foolishness I've displayed as of late, that invitation still stands.  Take a look at the book if you want (I recommend it), and feel free to comment.

ps - Has anyone else noticed their reading comprehension is easier from a printed physical page compared to an electronic pdf?  I'm loathed to print out so much paper, but...  I wonder if this holds true for kids growing up in the digital age who are learning to read primarily from computer screens?

of buckwheats and butterflies

seacliff buckwheat / dune buckwheat

Eriogonum parvifolium (var. parvifolium)

Polygonaceae

edited 11/25/14 -  I've made a public fool of myself.  And, I'm okay with that.  Sharing my journey may help someone else learn something new about themselves, or about the world around them.  Sincere apologies to those who have read through my numerous emotional incarnations of pure drivel as I worked all of this out in a very public space.  I do thank you for your time.

The embarrassing kicker is that my experience could be the perfect demonstration, p-e-r-f-e-c-t, of the perils of ID based on observable traits.  Art Shapiro kindly pointed out to me, "Your essay is no surprise to me. Laypeople often think taxonomy is just naming and identifying distinct entities in Nature (for the religious, add "as created by God"). Well, it ain't. DNA sequencing has underscored that! I've been teaching students since 1972 that "if species weren't messy, we'd have no reason to believe in evolution." Subspecies are even worse. In the heyday of the Neo-Darwinian Synthesis, taxonomic subspecies were viewed as species in statu nascendi. Some folks understood way back then that being recognizable to a taxonomist had no necessary implications regarding genomic differentiation. Now we KNOW that. Do you want me to go on?!"

I read this last night, and it made absolutely no sense to me.  Then, it hit me how I've been understanding all along that Art's got some bugs in his 40+ year transects that look nearly identical, but are not the same.  I know this.  He also sent me one of Jim Reveal's old papers about the amazing sequential evolution between butterflies and their host plants...  Oh, my God!  How could I have been so blind?  It's fascinating to look at my own deep-seated beliefs compared to what I think I know intellectually.  They don't match!  It's crazy making.  I was at a point of complete frustration, and I'm glad Art spoke up in such a direct way.  Maybe other people have been telling me all along, and I just haven't been listening?

I can't believe I never saw this before, because I'm fairly self-reflective.  I've always considered myself firmly in the evolution camp ever since my junior year of high school (1987-1988), and a handful of us asked our Mormon AP biology teacher for his opinions of evolution vs. creationism (now disguised as intelligent design), which had been the topic of a recent US Supreme Court ruling (Edwards v. Aguillard).  To be honest, I hadn't given this much thought since then, even though my college degree is in the sciences.  You'd think I'd know better.  However, I was raised in a conservative Christian family (the 700 Club, laying of hands, speaking in tongues, no drinking alcohol, no secular music in the house, no reading LOTR, etc.).  I'm definitely not that way today, but it's funny how the cultural beliefs of the people I've been around have seeped into my subconscious.  It's ironic for a blog titled Nature ID, as in identification, not intelligent design.  Have I been subtextually promoting intelligent design?  This was never my intention.  I need to reevaluate.

Art sent me a follow-up e-mail that explains things pretty well for me.  I've edited it for brevity. He says, "...we have learned in the era of "barcoding" (if you're unfamiliar with it, search the term) that the number of apparent genetic species is often larger than the number of taxonomic species, because cryptic or "sibling" species are often concealed by one phenotype. That is, the phenotype has been constant while the genome overall has changed a LOT. Surprise! Here's a bird example--a bird!  ...The whole thing started with butterflies, but it has now expanded to everything (my naming usage follows the genetics for herps). On the other hand, taxonomic subspecies may be dramatically different in phenotype, but virtually identical genomically, because those conspicuous differences are caused by just a few genes under strong selection, superimposed on a constant genetic background..."  Wow.  Just wow.  My mind is blown as to how I knew about this, yet haven't actually applied it to my hobby cum citizen science project turned hopeful serious science project that can be peer-reviewed and funded.

So, does anyone know who is currently doing the DNA on buckwheats in CA?  Is this buckwheat genetically different than the one Smith's needs, even though its superficial physical characteristics match what's found right along the coast?  I'm still curious to see if the buckwheat(s) that Smith's actually uses (or can use in situ, with potential drawbacks) is the one that's being planted for mitigation as it's currently practiced.  I owe the two CNPS authors an apology for making such a fuss (but not for pointing out their error - I wish I could be more diplomatic).  I'll have to ask around if anyone has already tested this idea, because I'm not sure the authors know themselves.  Otherwise, wouldn't they have just pointed that out, instead of hanging their hat on the amount of hairiness?  Does anyone know?

With this kind of potential discrepancy, how can we use physical features and observations in the field and for what purpose?  How do we separate what we see with what we know is continually changing and evolving?  How do we assign names to each defined entity for the sole purpose of clear communication?  Have we lost the original definitions and intent of common names vs. scientific names in the age of digital photographs, online sharing, and public outreach in the form of organized counts and BioBlitzs?  Are field guides (and all their online incarnations) really just a 1950's era hobby that have little to no basis in science as we understand it today?  Do they keep the layperson lay?  Eh, maybe some of these questions are too much of an exaggeration, but is there truth in there as well?

As humans, I think we have an instinctive need to identify things, although our ability to do so is not always intuitive.  What are you?  It's in our nature.  Maybe I want to stay lay, because I've been having so much fun tacking on names to everything?  It's like a game.  Heavy, heavy sigh. I'm going to leave my post below as I had last edited it (including the incidental original religious references and the late ps) as a true testament to the perils of ID from a layperson who got led astray by her own righteous beliefs as she tried to find her way back to science on her own.  Ha!

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Seacliff buckwheat was my very first buckwheat ID on Nature ID.  I've come a long way since then in learning about the local nature.  As you know, I rely on photographs rather than keys for most of my IDs.  I believe my process and methodologies have served me well in the 5 1/2 years I've been doing this blog, specifically designed to be my personal learning tool.  I've been able to quickly recognize seacliff buckwheat ever since this spring with my numerous casual trips down the coast, looking to learn the local buckwheats and butterflies.  It's a common native plant around here.  And, it has caused me more headache than you can possibly imagine. 

To me, this shrub's leaves have a distinctive cobwebbiness to the topside (adaxial - with a 'd', as in dorsal) that can sometimes look like it's been partially rubbed off to a shoeshine, and underneath (abaxial - with a 'b', as in belly) there's a thick cottony felting that can sometimes be so thick it extends down the woody stem.  It just has a look that is much easier to recognize than it is to describe in words.  Granted, there are at least two forms I recognize around here, this one shown here with the narrow-arrow leaves (Mortuary Beach) and another one with really fat/wide round leaves mainly from online photos and a vague recollection of having seen it adjacent to the ocean (Point Lobos, Asilomar, gardens?).  If I were to assign a common name to each form, this narrow-arrow one I would call seacliff buckwheat (I find it really does grow on steep hillsides that have any hint of marine influence, i.e. right up from the water to extending inland at least 12 miles or more), and the round one I would call dune buckwheat.  Neither shrub form should be confused with the similarly-and-confusingly-named perennial herb coast buckwheat, aka seaside buckwheat (E. latifolium), a common mistake that I've noticed online. This is all fine and good that I can recognize these by sight.  However...

Through a series of communications for my research permit application as required as part of my agreement with my Monterey Co. butterfly site (not Garland Ranch), it's come to my attention that the local CNPS folks believe this is CA buckwheat (Eriogonum fasciculatum) and more specifically, var. foliolosum.  Nope.  I went back and checked their local field guide, their CNPS-endorsed website, and a draft that was sent to me of the Monterey Co. wildflower bible revision that one of them is updating.  They are correct in recognizing the rounder form as dune, which is fine.  But, I can clearly see they have the mistaken impression this narrow-arrow form of seacliff buckwheat (E. parvifolium) is CA buckwheat (E. fasiculatum), two different species.

In my experience, that multi-toned pink, tight pom-pom shape they show in their "CA buckwheat" photos is distinctive of the mature summer season's seacliff buckwheat, and I have never seen that flower head on CA buckwheat, which tends to be looser in shape (ex. of comparable summer season CA buckwheat).  I asked around and have been informed by people who have grown buckwheats for decades that these two species do not hybridize.  I specifically went to Terrace Trail at Garland Ranch's Garzas Creek access on 11/17/14 just to take these diagnostic photos (see also at the bottom of this post), because this is the location I was told by one of the CNPS authors where he's found CA buckwheat.   I was fully prepared to find CA buckwheat (and actually hoping!), but I didn't.  I found this narrow-arrow seacliff buckwheat, instead.

The Garland Ranch wildflower field guide has been very useful to me as I learn the local plants.  I make no qualms that it's well-designed and one of the best ones available for our area.  I would recommend it to anyone interested in local wildflowers.  With that said, I do think the authors' mistake makes it impossible for anyone to ID the local buckwheats by using their guides.  What I've seen of the wildflower bible revision draft, which is a CNPS publication, is misleading and could be improved.  I hope they get that fixed, but not likely.  I tried my best to explain and provide evidence as to why I think their ID isn't right, but they maintain they're correct in calling it "CA buckwheat".

Here's the thing, I have been staring at real CA buckwheat at Pinnacles every single week going on 8 months now and looking at thousands of my own pictures and others' online of CA buckwheat from all over the place.  While I still may not always be able to distinguish Pinnacles' var. foliolosum (the local CNPS ID, btw) against var. polifolium, I know CA buckwheat (Eriogonum fasciculatum) to species, in person and in photographs, through the seasons.

I've also consulted with photo-documentarians for the Eriogonum Society, the National Park Service, and CalPhotos.  Even if they're unfamiliar with seacliff, they have confirmed it is not likely CA buckwheat, which is more common and familiar in SoCal.  I've been utterly amazed at how many people don't actually know how to distinguish buckwheats (or are not willing to say on record). Hey, I don't know all of them either, but a handful of the larger local buckwheats are really obvious to me now that I made it my mission to learn the local buckwheats this year.

Given the continuing disagreement over this ID, I had to seriously consider the possibility that the local CNPS authors could be correct in their determination, especially considering one is revising the local wildflower bible and many people defer to their opinions, including the folks at my Monterey Co. butterfly site.  Their insistence made me question my own observations, because I know I make mistakes, too.  For my own peace of mind, I needed to double-check what I felt I already intuitively knew, so I took the time to research the keys and figure out the dizzying array of taxonomic terms.

Basically, it boils down to leaf shape.  Simple as that.  When keying to species (not variety) between the two, forget what you hear about amount of fasciculation or hairiness/tomentoseness (remember, hard to describe in words).  The Jepson eFlora keys out E. fasciculatum at 60/60' with "Leaf blades narrowly linear to oblanceolate".  Additionally, eFloras of North America keys out similarly at 20/+ with an additional statement under the species description for E. parvifolium, "blade lanceolate to round".  Linear and round are pretty obvious, and the above is neither.  Now, google images or take a look at this exaggerated graphic between lanceolate and oblanceolate.  The leaf shown above is clearly lanceolate (aka narrow-arrow), therefore E. parvifolium.

I also reached out to Jim Reveal, the author of Eriogonum.  For additional reference, here are his original descriptions, from which I believe most every key depends for Eriogonum:  E. fasciculatum and E. parvifolium.  E. parvifolium has not been keyed out into varieties, and Jim told me he doesn't officially recognize them.  With that said, there were certain forms or phases he did recognize in the past, until he was shown examples that completely graded with each other.  For my own edification, here's how I understand it: var. parvifolium ("thickened leaf blades" and "compact clusters of involucres containing white to rose flowers", this is the narrow-arrow form I find common around here in the wild), var. crassifolium ("compact and dense mat-forming", is this a round one found in the sand? I don't know), var. lucidum ("yellow flowers" with round leaves, also found here with a white phase, too, according to Jim), and var. paynei ("white-flowered inflorescences", and "more graceful habit", found down in Ventura Co. and is supposed to be large).  I'm guessing this elegant white phase shown here on Terrace Trail at Garland Ranch may just be how "var. parvifolium" grows in protected, shadier places, because it has the same leaf shape as the shrubbier pinker one I find on exposed sunny hillsides that Jim confirmed the ID for me via my photos.  Again, seacliff buckwheat varieties are not formally recognized.

So, why is this plant such a big, huge, deal for me to go to all this trouble?  

Six words: the federally endangered Smith's blue butterfly.  The seacliff buckwheat (Eriogonum parvifolium) is its host plant.  There is only one person in the entire country who has ever been granted a permit to study this butterfly and in essence even be around seacliff buckwheat for research purposes (I may be exaggerating slightly, but you get the picture).  While I'm sure he's done a lot of good, he's also made quite a tidy business over his legally-mandated monopoly.

The fact of the matter is, there are very few people who could see a blue butterfly and know it is or is not Smith's.  I believe I could eventually tell, only if I could be allowed to get close enough and take enough photographs as absolute substitutes for physical specimens.  It's worked for me with buckwheats, why can't it work for me for butterflies?  Gotta start somewhere for baseline info.  Let someone else do a specific collection to work out the genitalia and genetics if anything unusual is seen.  I've heard that merely taking photographs of this endangered butterfly can be considered as "take" by the USFWS, a strict no-no.  Sigh.  It sure seems silly that the very laws created to protect an animal keep us from learning more about it.  Something is seriously broken in the system.

Hey, I'm not even particularly interested in Smith's, but I discovered seacliff buckwheat is the dominant native nectar source for butterflies at my Monterey Co. site (again, not Garland Ranch).  I can't study the other butterflies without getting near Smith's listed host plant, and if they are there, either in flight or potentially trampling over delicate pupae around the buckwheat bushes.  I wonder if we might even have one of the square-spotted blues (Euphilotes battoides) in the area, which isn't reported for anywhere near here, but that may be because no one admits to looking close enough over fear of Smith's restrictions.  They do look a lot alike.  The selfish solution for me is to see Smith's delisted, but it's all entangled with political and financial motives. 

The federal permitting process for Smith's is essentially non-existent and shrouded with stories of how impossible it is to jump through the hoops to meet their requirements.  They require experience to get the permit, but no one can get the experience without the permit or threat of jail and financial ruin.  Catch 22.  From several people, I've heard hushed horror stories about closet lepidopterists who live in fear and flatly refuse to cooperate with other researchers over concerns of being raided by federal agents.  I have no way of knowing if any of these stories are actually true.

These stories not only hamper research to learn more about this rare butterfly, they may also hamper the information made available about its host plant.  I figure there must be some antiquated law about not being able to update listings based on new findings.  Gordon Pratt believes the listed species (Euphilotes enoptes smithi) is not the one that's actually rare, but he told me he was talked out of delisting by the USFWS.  Smith's close relative (Euphilotes enoptes arenacola), which he helped describe, that feeds on coast buckwheat (E. latifolium) in a small sandy area in Marina is the one that he believes is truly endangered, and Smith's law protects it, too.  Likewise, I wonder if there was pressure on Jim Reveal to not reveal (pun!) his buckwheat variety designations, because it would further complicate the listed identity of several endangered butterfly host plants.  I asked him directly, but his answer shed little light on the question.  The reason why I came to this conclusion is because Jim goes into such mind-boggling detail for the various buckwheats and their varieties (case in point, sulphur buckwheat/E. umbellatum has 45 keyed varieties as of 2002), and yet for the seaclifff (E. parvifolium) and coast (E. latifolium), nothing, nada.  They are as they are, no variety designations, even though there's obviously different forms.  You'll notice that both of these buckwheats are host plants for endangered butterflies (real or listed).  Or, maybe even he can't get a research permit to study the plants that the endangered butterflies need?  I don't know, but there's gotta be more to the story.  I believe this lack of variety designations for seacliff, when there are so many for other buckwheats, confuses a lot of good plant people who may only be familiar with the round dune version. 

So, maybe Smith's blue is a common butterfly around here, who's to truly say?  Without hardly trying, I have twice found the earliest seasonal record for Smith's blue, once in 2003 and again this year 2014, the only two years I've gone down the coast with the specific purpose to look for various butterflies (hey, I've been busy pursuing other interests in the intervening 10 years).  I personally suspect Smith's is way more common than anyone realizes considering the locally recognized "CA buckwheat" is actually seacliff buckwheat.  Maybe people haven't been looking in the right places for the butterfly?  In any case, I imagine there might be some wealthy landowners out there who were relieved to find out they had "CA buckwheat" and not seacliff buckwheat on their property when it came time to do their EIRs before they developed.  Eh-hem.

On the flip side, I have a hunch CA buckwheat (E. fasciculatum) in Monterey Co. is not as common as is reported by the local CNPS chapter, unless it's found along the highway where it's been planted by Caltrans and maybe further south towards SLO.  eFloras also cautions that var. foliolosum is, "a potentially aggressive weedy shrub, efforts should be made to curtail its introduction into areas outside its native range."  I worry that good-intentioned native gardeners, seeing it listed as occurring here, will plant the not-native to this area weedy CA buckwheat, where it could easily escape and compete with the locally native seacliff buckwheat.

Most importantly, the narrow-arrow form that is mistaken in our local books for "CA buckwheat" is, in fact, the seacliff buckwheat form that I have personally seen Smith's blue on and is in all the photographs I can find online where the butterfly is actually on the plant.  Yet, when E. parvifolium is shown without the butterfly for illustrative purposes of the reported host plant, the round shape is chosen to be used.  Peculiar and possibly misleading.  I'm thinking that's because the round dune form is the one people first think of for E. parvifolium, very likely due to the famous El Segundo blue's round dune use down south, which had a spectacular CA buckwheat fail.  I worry folks are planting the round dune up here as part of mitigation based on the El Segundo experience, when really the narrow-arrow is what Smith's uses.  And, that's not to imply all narrow-arrows are used by Smith's. So, if anyone needed to do restoration or mitigation work as required by law, they'd be pulling out the narrow-arrow seacliff buckwheat fully believing it's the weedy "CA buckwheat" and planting the round dune form, which could possibly be the wrong seacliff buckwheat form for Smith's.  I'll admit, I don't actually know if this happens here with Smith's, but who does?  

It would have worked in my favor if this really had been CA buckwheat.  Despite my desire to be correct, I was actually hoping I was wrong, because then I'd have no need to apply for a federal permit for my butterfly site.  Problem solved.  But, I'm not okay continuing to call it "CA buckwheat" just because other people say so.  That's just bad research.  If I had only kept quiet, I might have been able to make nice-nice with the local CNPS folks.  Although, at this point, with the way they dismissed all my research and documentation, I don't feel they have earned, nor deserved, my trust.  I'll admit, I made a bit of a fuss as I was attempting to get them to see reason.  I can be very pushy in getting things correct, and it does not do me any favors in winning over people.  I've pretty much burned that bridge.  Erm... torched?  

Such as it is, imagine for a minute, the ripple effect this simple ID error has... 

Their expert plant advice (books, online, in person) is probably followed by many environmental consultants who do EIRs and restoration-type work (if you believe they know better, I have a burnt bridge to sell you), who then also mistake this buckwheat ID, which ends up determining the fate of the land all based on a plant name, potentially costing millions of dollars (or making others billions of dollars), and all to the detriment of the very butterfly we're trying to save from extinction.   

This is important!  Does any of this make any sense to anyone besides me?

I sincerely thought I was helping by pointing out a simple correction, like I do all the time when I look up stuff for Nature ID (most people are appreciative).  However, it does beg the question why these old guys, who are no more botanists than I am (they're two fellows with a lot of money who moved here from far away places for retirement), are so adamant that I'm wrong with barely an explanation.  This is not a fight I'm up for.  I wish I could continue with my butterfly studies at my Monterey Co. butterfly site, even if I avoided the seacliff buckwheat like the plague and went searching the brambles for Nymphalids (don't think I haven't thought of this), unfortunately, by doing so, I would not be able to honor the spirit and intent of my private land access agreement. 

As it is, I may have to completely abandon my grand plan to have a companion Monterey Co. butterfly research site in conjunction with my Pinnacles one in San Benito Co., two sites on roughly the same latitude and with similar elevation changes, with similar historical and current cattle land usage, with two native butterfly-pleasing shrubby buckwheats, one cool coastal and one hot, hot, hot, to monitor as the climate changes for the next 20+ years, the rest of my life. Wouldn't that be an incredible data set!?!  

Unfortunately, I'm facing the reality that I will not likely be granted a federal permit anytime soon.  Even if I did manage to get one by some miracle, I would still have to fight the local transplants.  Quite frankly, I feel utterly defeated over this issue and how complicated it got rather quickly.  This has significant personal implications for me, far beyond a simple plant ID or a couple rare butterflies. Have I been overly dramatic?  Sure.  Sob.  At the very least, this hullabaloo has made me rethink my plans and scale down, way down.

Terrace Trail - Garland Ranch - Garzas Creek

Again, I specifically went to Terrace Trail, because this is the location I was told by one of the CNPS authors where he's found CA buckwheat for his field guide.  This is the only type of buckwheat I found on the hillside.  Eh, there might have been an herbaceous buckwheat tucked in there, but remember, I went looking for shrubs.

The photographs below were taken as part of my ongoing effort to better document plants without the need to clip a specimen, bag it, press it, store it for perpetuity who knows where. And, at the point we're taking photographs of dried, dead specimens, wouldn't photos of the living work just as well, or even better?  I feel the same about butterflies, too, and had hoped my method could have been a possible avenue to get federal permit approval.  With the quality of macro-photography these days, I think we need to evolve past collecting things to be hidden away in closets (or for those wary of dermestids and moth balls, in freezers).  Plus, photos are so much easier to share and get feedback.

it's November, so the flower selection is sparse

Does anyone know the name of the stringy brown nest-looking stuff found at the base of the bundled perianths on older buckwheat flower heads (last photo here)?

variety of leaf shapes, from roundish to narrow-arrow to superficially linear 

(must look at individual leaf to really make that determination)

contrary to what the local bible says, I believe seacliff is often fasciculate

one last look at overall form and appearance
(note V-shaped cyme with flower clusters half-way up)

ps - For the evolutionary biologists out there who have a valid criticism that I'm focusing too much on names (man-made construct), when speciation (natural) is in constant flux, I'll concede this post does read like that.  Funnily enough, the names are in flux, too.  Like I've said before, I don't really have the writing skill or vocabulary to describe what I'm seeing, hence, why my photos have served me well. For once on Nature ID, the point of this post is decidedly not about the names in of themselves. Rather, it's precisely because of the confusion over those names that the issue described here becomes real in practical application.

To put it another way, it may be best to substitute species names and varieties (and all the baggage that entails) and simply label each entity as a snapshot in time.  BugX feeds on PlantA.  BugX does not feed on PlantB, nor on PlantC.  Human1 groups PlantA and PlantB together and calls it Plant AB.  Human2 sees PlantB, and calls it PlantAB.  Human2 also sees plant A, does not know Human1 includes it in PlantAB, and then calls it PlantC, for lack of a better alternative.  Human3 wants to save BugX.  Human3 reads that BugX feeds on PlantAB and to remove competing PlantC.  Human3 uses Human2's labels.  Human3 plants more H2's PlantAB (PlantB) and removes H2's plantC (PlantA).  PlantB and PlantC thrive.  BugX no longer has PlantA to feed on.  BugX is not saved.

Does this help explain?  As a repeat reference that helped get me thinking along these lines:
"On the Perils of Ecological Restoration: Lessons from the El Segundo Blue Butterfly".

about exceptions to Nature ID posting rules

nutria / river rat

Myocastor coypus
picture taken at Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden in Portland, OR
June 23, 2012

It surprised me to receive 223 blog visits since summer road trip published 2 days ago. Nature ID is usually not that popular. So it occurred to me that I should explain three of my posting rules that may not be obvious to the average blog visitor.

First, I always backdate posts of featured CA nature to the photo date in order to accurately document when (e.g., I published colonial orb weaver on 08/14/11 even though the entry shows the actual date of the picture from a year before of 08/04/10). Since this practice is rare for blogs, I do not get many visits on newly published backdated posts, and it confuses some folks who use RSS readers, which often only pick up entries backdated to about 3 months before. To add to the confusion, I do have exceptions to my backdate rule, such as photos taken from outside of CA, a handful of miscellaneous posts, and wordless Wednesday. The reasoning for these exceptions is as follows: when I'm traveling, I focus on the moment and blogging rarely enters my mind -> I occasionally like to share my travel or non-nature pictures -> and by posting currently dated entries, I want to let readers know I haven't abandoned Nature ID.

Second, I'm quite thorough and consistent about including labels for identification (e.g., plants) and location with all of my nature photos taken within the boundaries of CA. For all photos taken outside of CA, I do not include identification labels. Even though introduced nutrias are also found in CA, the above photo wasn't taken here; therefore, I am not including any labels with this post for mammals, and I do not have a specific location label like I do for CA locations. The purpose for this practice is so people can click on identification label links, see what I have personally found in CA, and not be mislead by things I have pictured from elsewhere in the world.

Third, I have my settings open to all comments, because I maintain it should not be necessary for anyone to have gmail or an OpenID-type blog simply to make a comment on Nature ID. Of course this opens me up to all sorts of spam, anonymous or otherwise, especially those trying to sell pharmaceuticals from other countries or promoting websites that have nothing to do with nature or relevant topics. In my zealousness to report spam, I sometimes delete legitimate comments. My apologies to those few anonymous commenters.

These rules and exceptions may seem trivial and arbitrary, but they are important to me for the integrity of Nature ID.

about navigating within Nature ID

view from home of the Monterey Bay
October 23, 2011

I just finished revamping my labels and categorizing them... again. This will likely become an annual blog maintenance duty. As I post new IDs, I invariably end up with new categories.

At the bottom of every post, there's a series of highlighted labels near the share buttons and comment section. These link you to only Nature ID blog posts (unlike WordPress blogs) with the same label.

I've again added the grouped label lists in the sidebar. I have 4 basic groups:
~ shortcut
~ what
~ when (includes seasons, current weather, and hiking/observations dates)
~ where.

A nifty trick of hiking/observation dates (aka archives), is you can click on a year, a month, or a specific date to see all the posts for that time period. I publish entries in a specific order, with individual IDs first and then usually a step-back, look-around habitat post. I've found clicking on specific dates to be very helpful, e.g., Pinnacles on June 10, 2011, where the habitat is shown at the top of the page and specific IDs follow. Scroll down to see all the posts.

I prefer having grouped lists, because I often find it difficult to locate past posts for my own nature journal needs. I've included search widgets at the very top left of the blog and towards the bottom of the sidebar. They don't always effectively locate items. Until I figure out the coding to automatically update the grouped indices, they will often not be complete or have nonworking links. If you want to see the most updated list, check out my complete index to Nature ID page.

As I've said before repeatedly, Nature ID does not follow the usual blog format like a daily diary. I generally post to the date of the pictures, regardless of when I happen to be online to work on this blog. I'm still behind on backdating posts and haven't even completed July of this year. Until I get caught up (haha, nature keeps going even though I have other plans), there will be an occasional feature at the top of my blog titled "newest blog entry" that will link you to new posts that are backdated.

Also, I'm testing to see how LinkWithin works with thumbnail pictures shown towards the bottom of every post. I haven't decided yet whether it's a good thing for my blog or extraneous visual stuff.

Check it out. Thanks for following my blog.

ps - The coast Douglas-fir tree that I'm featuring in The Tree Year project can be seen with its brown cones in the lower left of the photo above. Dreamfalcon has kindly included me in her latest post.

http://thetreeyear.wordpress.com/tree-year-posts/around-the-tree/weather/

about the organization of Nature ID

sunrise from home
June 6, 2011

Nature ID is my online nature journal. It serves as a learning tool and helps me keep track of what, when, and where. As such, I post and organize this blog in a peculiar way so that I can quickly reference a past post. However, this doesn't make it easy for people to "follow" my blog.

To cover the when, I frequently backdate. This means the date header on an entry is the date I took the pictures, not necessarily the date of when I posted to the blog. My blog archives serve as actual hiking/observation dates. I'm currently posting from a hike on May 14, 2011 at restricted Fort Ord - Army Lands.

For the what and the where, I liberally use labels. At the bottom of every post and grouped to the right in the sidebar are highlighted labels that link back to specific Nature ID posts (this is different from WordPress blogs, where a "label" will take you to a listing of multiple blogs with that particular tag - I don't personally like that, so I don't do it).

When I first began this blog on May 6, 2009, I only had 3 labels: flowers, animals, and Fort Ord. I now have 472 labels in multiple groups as shown in the sidebar to the right. Scrolling down from here to eternity is inconvenient. I'd like to remove the lengthy label lists. So, I'm creating an index page (shown as a tab along the top) to help followers navigate within Nature ID.

ps 06/11/11 - Thanks to Janet's comments, I've started adding titles to my ID posts (what, when, and where) to help those who use blog dashboards, readers, and aggregators to easily click directly to specific entries.

pss 07/17/11 - A skeletal index page is up and running. I finally removed the lengthy lists to the right and am in the process of creating grouped index posts which show labels in general categories.

about embedded links

Within a month after I started Nature ID, I discovered I could embed links into my text. Cool! Whenever I can, I try to include links to external websites in the common names (usually photos or generic info) and scientific names (more reliable information sources). If I reference my own previous observations, I'll also try to link back to my previous posts. You can tell where the links are by looking for blue highlighted words.

Considering I link so frequently, I've asked permission to link to various sites and blogs which I rely on heavily to look up IDs, such as Cornell's All About Birds and Calflora. They have kindly granted me permission, not that I'm sure it's legally necessary. However, asking for permissions is a nice way to say "Thanks!" and offer my unending gratitude for all the work that was done to create such incredibly, informative resources.

I'm starting to get more selective regarding the links I encode in my posts. Say for example, if I link to a favorite book, I try to find the original publisher and not lazily link to Amazon.com. Silly really, but it's consistent with my philosophy of giving credit (and $) to where credit is due. I'm also getting a better handle on which sites are reputable and reliable. See in the tab above for recommended online ID resources.

For those that know of my insect inclinations, you may wonder why I never reference BugGuide.net. I initially found their information not reliably accurate and even though they've improved tenfold from a couple years ago, I still hold a teeny bit of distrust in the site. Perhaps, if I knew more about plants and other animals, many of my recommended ID links would not pass the same stringent test.

However, I am a huge supporter of Wikipedia, despite vehement protests from a scientist friend who's against "the free encyclopedia." I love the concept and fully support this kind of shared, collaborative, and continually changing informative website.

So, there you have it.

ps 05/15/10 - I started editing the above entry and feel another entry would be better. For a bit of naval gazing, click here. And, finally, if you've missed it, I've given in - I'm starting to link to BugGuide.net, because it has become one of the best insect sites out there.

about locations

Mt. Shasta
(from Weed airport)
April 17, 2010

While driving alone for 8 hours heading north on the I-5, I entertained myself by enjoying the stunning and varied, spring green of central and northern CA. If it were any other time of year, I would have yawned at the expansive stretches of yellow, dried grasses. I purposely left the camera at home, a decision I'm now regretting for not being able to capture the greenery, flowers, and birds along the way. My car, however, effectively sampled flying insects through 500 miles of travel - splat!

The photo above was taken with my phone. I've never seen Mt. Shasta with so much snow AND without clouds obscuring the view... which isn't saying much, considering I've only been through here a handful of times.

I try to limit my posts on Nature ID to the Central Coast of CA. However, I've already included a couple pics from our camping trips to the Sierras (Yosemite) and northward (Burney Falls, Humboldt & Richardson), which are not entirely coastal, nor central. Point Conception is commonly considered the southern boundary of CA's Central Coast, but it's been 20 years since I've visited coastal Santa Barbara County.

With all that said, I've decided to include more posts from northern CA. I've added labels to identify CA counties, now noted at the bottom of locations with a 'y'. Eventually, I'd like to link my locations with a map.

ps 05/02/10 - We love the Oregon State Parks (they do a much better job than CA, eh-hem...). I created a companion blog to Nature ID and, as I find time, I may post pics from our camping excursions up there.

pss 09/16/10 - Well, that didn't last very long. I moved most of my companion blog posts back here and added a new label: travel version of Nature ID.

about habitats label

Garland Ranch Regional Park
April 8, 2010

With these scenery shots, I hope to convey in pictures (more than I can state in words) what the local Central Coast of CA is like from location to location and seasonally from year to year - labeled as habitats. Maybe as I continue with this blog and learn specific IDs, I'll feel more comfortable writing about ecology, geology, hydrology, etc...

about IDs

acmon blue
Plebejus acmon

I see other people's beautiful butterfly pictures and a flood of envy fills me. Truth be told, I'm generally more interested in my hiking and getting to the next place than I am to take the time to capture a great photo (a social commentary can be made of this, but I'll skip it here). However, at a certain point if the photo is so out of focus, it may be of little use to stop at all to attempt an ID. This blog has helped me pause a little longer than I may have previously. Maybe next year, I'll have even better photos to post.

There are several different small, blue butterflies in the area, but I don't want to resort to netting just to satisfy my need to make an ID. I'll admit that in my eagerness, I'm not the most gentle of netters. Plus, I'm generally opposed to collecting various things, be it animals, plants, trinkets, or gadgets... well, ok, I do have an e-photo collection that's overloading my computer right now. My college insect collections are stuck in the garage with little fanfare and are probably destroyed by dermestids by now. I make for a poor entomologist.

There's a movement amongst lepidopterists to use e-photography in place of standard collecting and spreading techniques, similarly to the post-Peterson guide era for birds. Can you believe people used to shoot, kill, and stuff birds simply to identify them? Unfortunately, dissection of genitalia is often needed to make a positive ID of many insects. I hope someday this will change.

For most plants and animals, I assume I have found something very common locally. I will rarely, if ever, claim I somehow had the luck to capture an incredibly unusual species. There's so much still unknown or uncertain or debated, that I'm not going to attempt to tackle it here. Remember, I don't claim to be an expert!

ps 06/06/11 - Since I wrote this blog post, I have learned a little about the rarer species found locally, and I have sought out the opinions of people I consider experts. You can find those posts under * expert ID.

about my photos

California poppy
Eschscholzia californica
Papaveraceae

The state flower. Most poppies I see are a solid orange. I loved the red coloration of this one found along the rec trail. I confirmed it was indeed a California poppy because it had the identifying red ring just below the petals. According to Vern Yadon's Wildflowers of Monterey County other color variations beyond yellow to orange are liberated horticultural hybrids. It sounds as if Vern knows the person who released the poppy hybrids. Hmm...

On a related note - I often get asked if I Photoshop my pics, particularly my sunrise pics. As if! These questions are even more perplexing considering most of my photos are very poor quality. I barely have the patience to turn on the camera and shoot from the generic setting, let alone mess with anything more than the occasional zoom or crop to emphasize the item of interest. We have an old Konica Minolta DiMAGE X50 and 98% of these blog pics came from this camera; sometimes I may borrow a friend's camera. I'm still running Windows ME (I know, gasp! - please don't remind me how outdated I am) and until I finally decide between Windows 7 or a lovely, spendy Mac, our new camera purchase will have to wait.

ps 05/06/10 - Thanks to a fancy new iMac and iPhoto, I am starting to "enhance" some photos. I just hope I don't get carried away. And, truth be told, some photos I post were taken by my husband Andy.

Oh, what did I get myself into?

I've been debating about the organization of this blog...

Typical blogs date-stamp to when you post the item. I'm more interested in recording when I observed the thing or behavior to document seasonal fluctuations, not so much of when I posted online. It's too bad that many incredibly informative sites don't also mention when you can see the thing in question.

I want to be able to search based on hiking dates, locations, monthly variations, and type of animal, plant or otherwise. My hope is that if I'm doing this next year or in following years, I can easily look back and compare notes and observations with previous years. Maybe at some point blogger.com will allow 2 or 3-tier search options, but for now labels and archives will do.

Unfortunately, I simply don't capture many of the cool things I see. I have a particular fondness for butterflies, but animals move too quickly and my camera does not focus well for close-up shots. I'm generally not interested in most trees, mustards, grasses, or other drier things found in most of CA.

My Nature ID blog naturally selects for those showy, bright things that hold still long enough for me to take a halfway decent pic.

ps 03/10/10 - I try my best to maintain integrity in truthfulness and accuracy on Nature ID as I write about my observations of the natural world around me, even with my backdated and edited posts, which, admittedly, are not ideal. I make no claim that Nature ID is in any way a scientific blog. I post whatever happens to interest me out of hundreds of pictures and thousands of moment-to-moment observations that I may have taken during any given hike. Nature ID has been a useful tool to motivate me to seek more information about my natural surroundings from the Central Coast of California... the sharing of that information is simply a side bonus (and sometimes a headache).