what are you?

me and my brothers (August 1976)

Nature ID is my learning tool to help me find answers when I take pictures of little living things, here and there, plants, butterflies, what have you, and I ask, "What are you?" The funny thing is, I get asked this question all the time of me. Even when it's not Halloween. By complete strangers.  "What...  are...  you?" in a loud, slow, measured way, as if I can't hear (uh, yes, I have a hearing impairment, but that's beside the point).  I get asked as if I were somehow not human.  As if I were a chair, or a dog.  "What are you?"  I've been asked so often in my life that I count down, 3, 2, 1, for the follow-up questions that are sure to come in rapid-fire succession, "Chinese?  Japanese?  No?  What are you?"  It used to piss me off.  Okay.  It still pisses me off. I have yet to come up with a witty reply, because so often I'm stunned into silence by the sheer surprise of the question.  Any suggestions?

Andy has been lamenting that I haven't been posting to my blog very much recently.  He's been extremely supportive of this hobby I started over 5 years ago, which is now a huge part of my life.  After a couple crappy job interviews this past spring, I decided to use what I love about Nature ID and what I've learned and direct all my energies into something new, something yet undefined, something of my own creation.  And, it's scary.

I'm now asking myself that same funny, pissy question, "What are you?"  Haha.  I'm in one of those awkward developing and gangly growing stages, and more than ever, I'm afraid of looking like an idiot.  Am I merely one of those annoying people who asks far too many inappropriate questions?  Am I a naturalist?  Am I a lepidopterist?  Am I a botanist?  Am I a phenologist?  Am I a citizen scientist?  Am I an actual scientist?  What does that even mean?  Where will I be in another 5 years?

So, I don't know how to proceed with this blog.   I've learned a lot this year, and it's difficult to translate that as a continuing process in an online format that gets forever saved in time by RSS feeds and search engine spiders.  Hey, as I find errors on Nature ID, I've gone back and corrected them.  And, there are a lot of errors.  Eh-hem.

Time and time again, I've seen how misinformation gets spread around by people who act like they know everything.  I think we all fool ourselves at times, some more than others, even though I'd like to believe I'm self-aware and forthright when I don't know something.  It's been called to my attention that this gives off the impression that I don't know much of anything, especially among folks who apparently know even less and who actually advised me to shut up and blindly defer to the old guys.

This does not sit well with me.

There were a couple years or so while I was learning English, when I could understand what people were saying, but I could not speak it.  My mother told me that I was a chatterbox when I first arrived, but as soon as I figured out that no one around could understand me in my native language, she said I went quiet for a very long time.  Quite frankly, I was scared silent by the strange, slow monster speak coming from these fair-skinned giants with big, blue eyes.  Once I got the hang of English, she joked that she could never get me to shut up again.  Ha!

I've discovered I'm in a similar situation now, in that I understand a lot more than I have the vocabulary to express.  It's frustrating as hell.  However, just like when I was a kid playing with the big boys, I can stand up for myself, even if I can't speak the speak of all the -ists out there. Yet.  Watch out, guys!

ps - It's National Adoption Month, btw.

pss 01/15/15 - For those still hung up on the question "What are you?" that I purposely did not answer, please refer to this New York Times article on adoptees returning to their home country.  It's not an easy question to answer when you've lived it like I have.

pss 05/18/19 - The thoughts and words I typed out here were completely my own in 2014.  Imagine my surprise to find people's comments about Keanu Reeves and their own experiences regarding the ridiculously offensive question of "What are you?"

which reader?

With the upcoming demise of Google Reader, I need to find a new blog reader.  What site are you using for your feeds?  Please comment.  Thanks!

gone

sunrise from home

December 5, 2012

Gone.  This is the label I use in my Google Reader to mark blogs I follow which haven't had new posts in several months.  The list seems to be growing by the day.  I miss some of those bloggers as if they were real life friends who have moved away.  I wonder how they're doing and hope life is treating them well.  Every so often someone surprises me and comes back from being gone, like The Ohio Nature Blog and The Skeptical Moth.  Dang kids and new jobs seem to get in the way of regular blogging.  

I can't say I have those excuses.  I have been a bit lackluster in my blogging routine this year. The dry dreary weather and now windy rain have discouraged me from going out as much as I would like.  In large part to being otherwise preoccupied, I have also missed posting whole sections from my photo archives, like a camping trip to Morro Bay and a couple outings to Fort Ord.  I have already ID'd many things that are easy to photograph and narrow down to species; now all I have left are annoyingly perplexing unknowns and exceptionally crappy photos. However, I'm not giving up, yet.  My hiking should inform my blogging, rather than the other way around as it has been in the past year or so. I think this transformation of intent has really shown in a lack of curiosity in my blog posts.  I want to get back to truly enjoying hiking for all the things that drew me to this activity in the first place - being outside, clearing my head, getting a little bit of exercise, and simply enjoying nature. I'm not closing the door on Nature ID, even though my posts may become fewer and fewer for a while.  I'll see you when I have something fantastic to share. Blog on!

checkered white ~ 09/03/12 ~ Fort Ord

female checkered white (possibly western white)
female Pontia protodice (possibly Pontia occidentalis)
for more information click here and here

posted 09/18/12 - When I started Nature ID back in the spring of 2009, I simply wanted to learn more about local nature. I wasn't fully aware of the extent of challenges I would face creating a virtual collection. Sure, basing IDs solely on photographs, especially my typically crappy ones, has its limitations when experts often rely on actual collection of specimens, dissections, and scopes to distinguish species. But, I figured whatever I casually found during my hikes would be quite common and clearly represented online by people who know way more than I do. This has proven to not always be the case with some of my photographs being the first online of newly described species to the best represented of rare species to possible correction of collections from places like CalAcademy. For a new ID to me, I usually look at 3 to 20+ different sources from my own small collection of field guides, library books, and most often online, especially from reputable online ID resources I've discovered. While comparing several different sources side by side, outliers often become blatantly obvious. I hate to admit to it, but I've become something of an ID policewoman particularly on sites I know other people trust such as Wikipedia, CalPhotos, and BugGuide. In fact, I sent a correction in to a contributor to BugGuide while I was searching for this white butterfly ID.

In the embedded links in the ID under my photograph, I've linked to trusted sites Butterflies of America, Butterflies and Moths of North America (they've made vast improvements to their site in the past 3 years), and Art Shapiro's Butterfly Site. It looks to me like it's a western white based on the pattern and boldness of the markings. However for now, I'm going with a checkered white ID, because westerns have never been reported for Monterey County. As biologist and fellow blogger biobabbler has repeatedly cautioned me, I should not always rely on what other people have reported. I've sent e-mails to Paul Opler, Jim Brock, and Art Shapiro for their expert guidance. I've already heard back from Paul and Jim and will ask if I can quote them in this blog post. I have a feeling Art will have a more definitive answer for me. I'll update this post when I know more.

Btw, the Pontia I show is nectaring on telegraph weed (Heterotheca grandiflora), one of the few flowers I found blooming profusely at Fort Ord on this date.

ps 09/22/12 - Phew!  I've been in several e-mail correspondences regarding this post.  Mike Hoffman at BugGuide was surprisingly quick in getting the ID corrected, even though he's not an editor with access to move IDs.  The three experts I contacted each have authored books on butterflies (linked in their names below) and basically said the two Pontia spp. are difficult to tell apart.  Paul Opler, like me, thought it looks more like P. occidentalis.  Jim Brock suggested I contact Art who is more familiar with butterflies in this region.

Art Shapiro ended up being a gold mine with more detail and PDFs of his scientific papers than I could fully wrap my head around (still trying to figure out how to post PDFs on my blog).  His area of extraordinary familiarity from the greater Sacramento area to the Sierras spans an impressive 40 years.  With his permission, here's what Art said, "I'm sure it's protodice. It's a very fresh, crisply-marked one, but it's still a female protodice. I've gotten nearly identical ones here and in Riverside County--and on the East Coast! Back in the 70s it was sometimes incredibly common in the Salinas Valley and nearby, and it generally peaks regionally in September. Occidentalis has never been reported reliably in the Coast Range south of the Bay, except for the two Doudoroff early-spring specimens from the Santa Cruz Mts. in the 1940s cited on p.106 of my book. (I wanted to ask him if he remembered anything about them, but he had died just a few weeks before I came upon the specimens at Berkeley!)"  M. Doudoroff actually collected these specimens in 1930, which are now housed at University of California, Berkeley's Essig Museum of Entomology and have not been catalogued yet.  Art goes on to state, "Occidentalis has indeed been expanding its range--eastward across Canada and along the US-Canada border, nowhere near here. It does show up very rarely on the floor of the Sacramento Valley (see attachments) in September-October. We don't really understand this. Monterey would be rather an incredible stretch. Nothing is impossible, of course. A P. beckeri was once caught (really) in Colusa County. I suspect the pupa came in on a camper or other vehicle..."  After some questioning on my part and an admission that I was hoping I had found a new Monterey Co. record for P. occidentalis, Art replied, "These two cause lots of confusion, and it doesn't help that where they are sympatric 1-2% may be hybrids. (Here is another old paper about their genetics. It goes back to the Miocene, before the polymerase chain reaction triggered the sequencing revolution. We probably should look at these two genomically as part of our overall hybridization research program. We're doing sulphurs right now.) The 'winter' phenotypes of both are VERY much darker beneath than the 'summer' ones and yes, it is easy to get confused with only singletons or a few specimens, rather than good series. In the 'recurrent enigma' paper, the occis are at the upper left in each group. No, that first record was not a hoax, but I had been cautioned by colleagues to refer to the possibility if only to discount it.  I have raised literally 1000s of these things in the course of research. I don't claim infallibility--only that I'm pretty good with them. Never take 'expert' stuff on faith. I've often been wrong, usually on Speyeria but hardly ever on Pontia or on skippers. But 'hardly ever' does not equal 'never.'"  Art finishes, "Butterfly people can be annoying in the same way as birders. If you can tell your Empidonax flycatchers you are up in the stratosphere with the anabolic-steroid users. Hang in there! Don't be intimidated by 'expertise.' As we age, it metamorphoses into senility."  Gotta love Art!  If anyone would like PDFs of his papers, feel free to contact me and I can forward them to you.

dwarf brodiaea ~ 05/11/12 ~ Fort Ord

dwarf brodiaea
Brodiaea terrestris ssp. terrestris
2011 online Jepson description
Themidaceae (aka Asparagaceae and formerly Liliaceae)

This was my favorite flower from the entire excursion (even though I keep spelling it incorrectly). It was everywhere in the Butterfly Valley vernal pool. I've seen it before, but never knew what it was. The pic with my finger is to show how tiny and close to the ground these beautiful flowers grow. And of course, I had to include one of the several white versions I found, which I pointed out to several students. One fellow who is into plant genetics said that the white versions of flowers are due to a gene being knocked out (don't really know how that happens, and I didn't hear the rest of his explanation).

For the ssp., I'm using the printed list that David Styer passed around. I'm also now including the new 2011 Jepson online descriptions in my IDs, even though it's linked from my usual embedded links to Calflora.org in the scientific plant names. Plus, as I go through plants, I'll be changing all the family names to the 2011 Jepson version, versus the APG versions that are often used on Wikipedia. Jepson seems to be the bible of CA plants for CNPS.

ps 05/21/12 - As Graeme of Imperfect and tense asked in the comments, the even tinier, white Primula-looking sp. growing with the dwarf brodiaea is Hickman's popcorn flower (Plagiobothrys chorisianus var. hickmanii) in Boraginaceae. Click here to see my other popcorn flower posts.

what do other blogspot bloggers do?

Fremont's star-lily / death camas
Toxicoscordion fremontii (formerly Zigadenus fremontii)
Melanthiaceae (formerly Liliaceae)

While I was examining a couple shoots, a lady stopped to chat with me. She had a well-behaved dog who sat there panting patiently while we talked. Shocking, right? The dog didn't jump all over me or knock me over into the dirt, it didn't bark and growl at me, it didn't stick its slobbery nose up where it didn't belong, and it didn't rub me all over with poison oak. OK, I've previously maligned dog owners on trails, so, to be fair, I need to point out that I also meet many dogs and their owners who are quite respectable.

This lady is a local who regularly walks the trails at Jacks Peak. She remarked how all the star-lily blooms were very early this year because of the mild winter we've had. Yes, it has been an unusually mild winter here in CA, but I disagreed with her observation of early blooms (this is not to say early blooms haven't happened elsewhere). I told her I believed it was, in fact, the right time for star-lilies to be blooming. She was highly skeptical. Too bad I didn't have access to my blog, because I have photographic records of these plants blooming 3 weeks earlier in the season on February 11, 2011 here at Jacks Peak. I also have records of them blooming at Wilder Ranch on March 7, 2010 and Fort Ord on March 14, 2009. To me it's not surprising to see them blooming right now. Of course, they could continue to bloom for a while.

Part of why I started Nature ID and am so persnickety about backdating picture IDs to the date of my photos is to record when things occur. I already knew my memory is fickle. Had I not been keeping track of bloom dates like the Fremont's star-lily, I would have come to the same conclusion as the lady with her dog. However, I've slowed down in posting repeat IDs unless the date or some other observation is unusual. The reason for this is I've reached 66% of my blogspot storage capacity, and I'm starting to wonder what I'll do once I reach max capacity. I'd like to continue my blog for a while, because I know I have many more new IDs yet to make. One can purchase additional storage, but I'm not sure I want to go down that road.

What do other blogspot bloggers do when they reach maximum free photo space?

In addition, google made major changes throughout February 2012 with the way people can comment on blogspot. In response, I've been testing out the different comment features, which will be ongoing. I removed the CAPTCHA, because the word verification test to make sure you're not a robot became extraordinarily difficult to decipher. I'll admit that I sometimes skip commenting on someone else's blogspot if the CAPTCHA is too murky. For a couple weeks I was inundated with anonymous spam once I turned off word verification, but now for some reason those kinds of comments have ceased. Then, I also switched from my favorite of pop-up window to embedded comments. Embedded comments are now the only way they can be subscribed, but only if you have a gmail account (see lower right below the comment box). I haven't taken advantage of the new reply to comment feature available in the embedded comments options, since I don't want to inundate those who subscribe with extra emails. In my search for fixes to google's changes, I found a quote I liked, "You're not a customer of google; you're their product."

What do other blogspot bloggers do to fix their comment features?

ps 03/19/12 - Looks like google blogspot bloggers are not the only ones having issues; WordPress has also apparently changed its comment settings. Very odd.

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/

Pacific silverweed ~ 10/02/11 ~ Shoreline Park

Pacific silverweed
Potentilla anserina ssp. pacifica (aka Argentina egedii ssp. egedii)
Rosaceae

This plant reminded me much of a yellow-flowered woodland strawberry and with the fruit somewhat similar to that of a blackberry (click the second picture to better see the berries).

You'll notice above I have an aka, also known as. I check multiple sources before I decide if it should be aka or formerly. (Haha! Prince's "Purple Rain" just popped into my head. Should he've been the artist fka Prince? Sounds bad.) I've refrained from using the botany standard syn. for synonym, because often sources simply don't agree. Indeed, Jepson even suggests Potentilla egedii var. grandis as a synonym. Aka feels more appropriate if anyone wants to do an internet search under any of the names I provide.

habitat ~ 10/01/11 ~ Garland Ranch Regional Park

Garland Ranch Regional Park
October 1, 2011

posted 10/08/11 - Like I said before, I was not out this day. Andy took all these pictures. He likes setting the timer on the camera and shooting himself running down a trail. It seems quirky to me, but I've seen many trail runners do this kind of thing. Park staff and/or volunteers set up several seasonal footbridges across Carmel River and Las Garzas Creek. The one shown is over the Carmel River by Carmel Valley Village, 12 miles inland from Hwy 1. There's not much water and it's not primarily due to the time of year. There's a huge ruckus between Cal-Am (local water co.) and steelhead conservationists. The mountain ranges in the fourth picture above are the Sierra de Salinas range on the left and the better known Santa Lucia Range on the right. The last picture is of Veeder Pond, which despite its name is actually a vernal pool.

As I was writing this post, I realized I haven't labeled many water features, except for vernal pools and waterfalls. I've added some more this morning:
bays (not Monterey)
creeks/rivers
dams/reservoirs
estuaries/sloughs
lakes
Monterey Bay
Pacific Ocean
ponds
snow
Mostly these are scenery shots.

I did a little research to figure out the differences between lakes, ponds, and reservoirs. I also tried to find exactly where the Monterey Bay extends (see District 17). Erga. I didn't like what I found, so I've made up my own definitions. Hey, it's my blog. I don't know the official difference between creeks and rivers and suspect many are misnomers, so I'm combining them for simplicity. Dams and reservoirs are obviously man-made. Lakes and ponds are (or were) natural for my own definition. For the demarcation of Monterey Bay, I've chosen Point Pinos Lighthouse near Crespi Pond as the southern boundary. Since I live here, it's really easy to see the difference in the way the water acts around that point. For the northern boundary of the Monterey Bay, I arbitrarily decided Lighthouse Field State Beach in Santa Cruz, which makes nearby Wilder Ranch State Park part of my Pacific Ocean designation. I really want to get a map up and running for this blog, but I'm still working on revamping my labels. Beside, if anyone were really interested, they could easily google map or mapquest any of the locations featured on Nature ID.

ps - Click to read Andy's blog post from his run. I like how our perspectives are different.

am I doing the right thing with this blog?

best guess unknown goosefoot
best guess Chenopodium sp.
Amaranthaceae (formerly Chenopodiaceae)

posted 10/02/11 - I featured this plant 06/30/11 when it was just beginning to flower. While doing a search not too long ago for another plant, I found a similar looking plant to this one, and it was not an amaranth. Unfortunately, I failed to make a note of it and can't find it again. Can you ID?

I hope I'm reasonably clear when I am uncertain about an ID. I've added a new label * best guesses for those items which I'm really not sure of the ID. For some posts that I assume I already know, I don't do much research. For other posts, I spend way too much time searching and checking to make sure my ID is correct. It's a challenge to convey how much I do know and how much I'm making my best guess based on the information available to me. Now I always include embedded links to outside sources and better information in the IDs under the pictures.

Yes, my blog is titled Nature ID (and recently re-subtitled "from Monterey Bay and CA areas beyond" to better reflect the locations presented here). I've expressed concern the mere name may lead people to believe I know way more than I do. I seem to experience a constant IDentity crisis. I can't tell you how many e-mails I get from people wanting me to ID their pictures from places I have never been (please don't, btw). I do try to state clearly in my welcome! section in the sidebar that I am not an expert.

With that said, I believe I have a natural visual talent to distinguish shapes and details. I have refrained from talking too much about my education or work here, because I'm afraid readers will make assumptions and judgements about me and this hobby blog. However, for the record, I graduated summa cum laude from the Ohio State University with a Bachelor of Science in Entomology, only after also variously majoring and minoring in fine arts, dance, liberal arts, chemistry, and biology. Through fortune and misfortune, I was a professional entomologist and headed the Invertebrate Zoology Department (which included malacology) at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. I've had a handful of peer-reviewed research papers published, but I do not consider myself a scientist. I have also worked in the publishing industry as a science content editor at CTB/McGraw-Hill and as an intellectual property manager (rights, permissions, copyrights, and trademarks) for what became National Geographic School Publishing. What's that saying, "Jack of all trades, master of none, though often times better than master of one"? Once again I am wanting to do something different and meaningful in my life. Thanks to doing Nature ID, I'm considering going to graduate school to study salamanders. Still, I am not sure I would make a suitable graduate student or a respectable "real" scientist.

I prefer approaching nature without any preconceived notions and with a "what can I learn?" attitude. Since I don't attempt to ID until I get home and look at my pictures, I try to observe all that I can while out hiking. There are benefits and drawbacks to this practice. It's been fascinating to watch my own learning process. What may stump me one year is perfectly obvious the next year after I have looked up hundreds of other IDs. I do like details, and I try to be as accurate as possible. However, in nature and what we know about it, accuracy is often a relative term.

For over two years I've searched extensively online for local IDs of everything from plants to herps, and I feel I'm slightly more knowledgeable and thorough than some other blogs/sites which sometimes post completely inaccurate information. Considering it irks me how much misinformation is online, I sometimes try to gently correct them (e.g., John Game claims he will change his incorrect Wikipedia photo for Pipera yadonii, which has been reviewed on CalPhotos as likely P. elegans; and the most dangerous site is Plants of California, where they talk about how you can eat soap plant and then picture death camas as their example! Yet, I would not stake my life on the fidelity of the 850+ IDs I have made on Nature ID.

Sigh... the reason why I'm even bringing this topic up is due to the numerous correspondence I received this past week about my blog. Some were lovely e-mails that made me smile and grateful that I am an active blogger (you know who you are, and thank you!). I enjoy blogging and am proud of what I have created here on Nature ID.

I also received a permissions request from a journalist at Pour la Science to use photos of my CA horn snails (I've added a postscript to that post with more information). I was very excited. I've received permissions requests before but never from such a big publication. She found my pictures through an online image search and liked mine. However, when I made clear to her that I am not a professional malacologist, she seemed under deadline stress and declined use of my pictures since she didn't have the time to have my ID checked. Big bummer. I took it to heart.

This virtual experience makes me wonder once again if my blog is adding to the same online misinformation that I so detest, because I do make mistakes! Since I include both common names and scientific names in all my ID posts, my blog is often found through internet searches. For those not familiar with my blog format or translating from another language, it can be difficult to know what information can be trusted. I guess that's true with any site found online. I have considered stopping this blog and not having it available for public consumption. Nature ID really is my personal learning tool, and, at times, I don't think I'm adding much quality to the blogosphere. After all, I don't particularly like taking photos, and I struggle with writing. And, there are much better nature blogs out there, although very few local ones. For the time being, I will continue as I have... learning something new every day.

Here are relevant links:
The Skeptical Moth has a series of media mistakes titled "Genius of the Press".
Deep-Sea News has a field guide to distinguish between scientists and journalists.
Deep-Sea News has a recent blog post about the gap between scientists and journalists.
The Biology Refugia has an excellent discussion about mass media and science.
Culturing Science talks about young or inexperienced science bloggers (with great links).
Nature of a Man does a much better job explaining his IDs and providing references.

ps - As with any post that naval-gazes this much, I will likely continue to edit it for a few days.

pss 10/04/11 - I edited this post a couple times now and made an ID correction. I originally posted this as best guess Amaranthus sp. Thanks to Cindy's comment of the flower buds looking like an Atriplex sp. but with different leaves, I went on a wild goose chase... er, goosefoot hunt. The leaves look like spinach, and after this picture was taken the seeds are starting to look exactly like quinoa. I've corrected my best guess above to a possible Chenopodium sp. Also, I'd like to tell everyone that the journalist I mentioned above sent me a very nice e-mail about how she truly enjoys my blog and nature, and she was simply making a journalistic choice to not publish one of my pictures due to lack of time to check them. I appreciated hearing back from her again.

habitat ~ 07/18/11 ~ Fort Ord - BLM InterGarrison

Fort Ord Public Lands - InterGarrison entrance

July 18, 2011

posted 09/10/11 - Yep, I'm still backposting from this summer, filling in blank spots I skipped in order to write about more current encounters, like red abalone, before I forget the details.

My habitat posts seem to be the least popular and rarely get comments. Basically, they're a step back and look around at the place where I'm hiking. Photos seem to do more justice about the type and seasonal changes than I can possibly describe in words. I often don't have much to write about habitats, because I've yet to really look into the basics of habitats. I'm still focusing on IDs of specific plants, animals, and other.

Everyone seems to have different names for particular habitats and frequently a location has legitimate numerous descriptions. The University of California, Santa Cruz's Fort Ord Natural Reserve, a place I have not hiked and is adjacent to my Fort Ord locations, describes Fort Ord as "maritime chaparral." The U.S. Department of the Interior Bureau of Land Management (BLM) describes Fort Ord variously as "riparian forest, perennial grasslands and vernal pools."

From the very beginning of Nature ID, I felt it was important to include the wider picture, so to speak. Because I'm limited as to what blogspot can do and my own ability to code, I rely heavily on labels and archives (masquerading as hiking/observation dates). A nifty trick is to go to the sidebar, look at the current blog entry you're looking at and click on the specific date under hiking/observation dates. Then you'll be able to see all the posts for that particular hiking excursion. For this date, I only have a Spiranthes orchid. For dates like June 10, 2011 at Pinnacles, there's much to be seen.

Blogging is merely a hobby I have enjoyed. I know if I set up my own domain or switch to WordPress I may have more flexibility in how I present information. I'm not ready to go down that path quite yet.

fairy lantern ~ 07/14/11 ~ Garland Ranch

fairy lantern / white globe lily
Calochortus albus
Liliaceae

I remember hiking past fairy lantern seed pods in the past and not knowing what they were at all. Now that I'm beginning to recognize a decent set of local flowers, I'm gradually discovering the beauty and identity of the structures that surround seeds, such as pods and fruits. It's a natural progression of my learning curve.

I've recently reorganized my labels for plants and have edited and added new labels, such as *fruits/seeds. My eventual goal is that someone visiting my blog can click on a name in the labels (at the bottom of every post) and see how a plant looks throughout the year and note some locations it can be found. I've mostly done this for poison-oak already since it is ubiquitous. Plus, you may start seeing labels with a number added to the end, like poison-oak 2. I'm designating the numbered labels for when the plant is pictured but is not the focus of the post. I'm hoping this will help give a sense of the habitat and what other plants can be found with it.

As a final blogging brief note, I often choose a less attractive photo for posting to Nature ID if it shows the features I want to highlight, such as the three part seed pod of the fairy lantern. This sometimes makes for a less visually appealing blog, but that's not my primary purpose.

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.

large flowered star-tulip ~ 03/20/11 ~ Fort Ord

large flowered star-tulip
Calochortus uniflorus
CNPS 8th Edition Inventory
Liliaceae

I've posted this large flowered star-tulip before from May 8, 2010, but I want to note the March timing of this bloom, which was found in almost the exact same spot as last year. These are not very common and are restricted in where they grow, near wet meadows and vernal pools. I wish I could have gotten some other photo angles, but the surrounding grass was taller than the bloom. The flower is surprisingly large (almost 2 1/2" across) compared to its diminutive height (maybe 6" tall at the most). They're difficult to spot unless they're fairly close to a trail, and I generally stick to trails out of respect for the sensitive public lands I hike.

After the vandalism the past two years of "closed trail" signs, there's a new sign at the InterGarrison entrance that now states all trails are closed unless specifically marked as open. Considering the Army is still in the process of removing old ordinances, this isn't only for the safety of plants but also for people (no joke, we sometimes hear explosions when they do their annual burns). I love Fort Ord and I hope all those folks who wish to continue using it for recreation such as hiking, biking, horse riding, and nature loving will appreciate the hard work of the land managers who want to save this unique habitat for everyone and everything. OK, I'll get off my soapbox.

ps - I'm in the process of back-posting the rest of my Fort Ord finds with hopes to refresh my memory for my favorite wildflower months of April and May. I always date my CA nature posts to the date of the photographs. Depending on how you access my blog, say through a reader, this might not make sense; it may look like this pic was taken the day I post (03/29/11) or look like I haven't posted in a couple weeks due to the date of the photograph (03/20/11). If you go straight to Nature ID, all pics and posts are dated and in the order that I intend for later archival reference. Apologies, I still haven't figured out a way to explain this properly since everyone has different ways of reading and following blogs, and the way I post is not typical of the blogosphere.

bush poppy
Dendromecon rigida
Papaveraceae

Here's one shrub that if it weren't blooming, I'd have no idea what it is based on the leaves. I think I've mentioned before that I generally ignore bushes. Maybe I've gotten used to seeing shrubs pruned to an inch of their life and not looking very natural in gardens and public spaces. They generally don't excite me. However, it is fun to see the bright yellow of this bush poppy on hillsides.

ps - For those who follow my blog through readers, you may have noticed an odd testing post yesterday. I'm trying to figure out a better way to manage my numerous labels. It used to be fairly easy when I only had 4 label groups: flowers, insects, birds, and location labels. I want to easily find past posts of specific groups, like poppies, without having to scroll down from here to eternity in the widgets on the right side of this blog, or having to continually, manually maintain the lists. I've found google's search widget to not be very effective for my own blog or other blogs. Right now I have 4 groups of lists for plants: ferns, flowers (garden flowers, native wildflowers, and non-native wildflowers), plant families, and trees & shrubs. I don't particularly like the idea of adding additional pages to the top of my blog, because personally I rarely click on those unless it's an "about." Does anyone have any ideas?

pss 07/21/11 - I've changed labels around for plants. To see lists of all plant labels see plant families and plants.

woodland strawberry ~ 02/11/11 ~ Jacks Peak

woodland strawberry
Fragaria vesca
Rosaceae

I never noticed the proliferation of strawberries at Jacks Peak before. It helps that these bright white flowers caught my eyes. I certainly have never seen the fruit there. I don't know if they get eaten by animals, collected by humans considering it's a popular public park, or rarely produce fruit since it's so shady.

As I was looking for more information, just to learn something new since I've never bothered to look up strawberries before, I was surprised to find there's a second Calflora site out there. The one I use most often, highly recommend, and link to in most of my plant scientific names is Calflora.org. The second one is Calflora.net, which is the personal site of Michael L. Charter and is based out of Southern California. Other than being a little irritated at the similarity of names, (don't know which came first as they both started in 2005), I'm highly impressed by Michael's elaborate website. Can you imagine the time it took him to create that sucker?!?

So, this got me wondering this morning (posted 02/17/11)... what the heck am I doing with this blog? And, why? It started out innocent enough as a casual "I want to learn about the things I see on my hikes." Now, first thing almost every morning (well, after a bathroom visit and a huge cup of tea), while my husband gets his beauty rest, I quietly work on Nature ID. Plus, with any free pockets of time, I'll update or add more posts, many of them backdated far enough that most followers won't even see them. I'll admit to being a bit obsessive. I'm already at 413 labels and 583 posts and I have yet to reach my 2 year blog anniversary (in May). The label lists along the right side of this blog are becoming unwieldy and extraordinarily lengthy (all that scrolling is probably why my wireless mouse eats through so many batteries). At a certain point, I imagine Google's Blogger will complain with site crashes or start charging for hosting. I don't know where this is going or how I want my blog to be in another year. I watch as several other bloggers stop adding new posts or close their accounts entirely and I suspect they simply got burned out - I still really miss Steve Wilson's Blue Jay Barrens blog. However, I do know what I do not want. I do not want to sell anything and am very proud that this is an ad-free blog. And, I do not want to "network" or show off my abysmal nature knowledge - in other words, there's something really freeing in not being the expert and being totally comfortable in saying, "I don't know." I'm relatively anti-social, hence why I like hiking to get away from people and into nature. I'm not on facebook anymore and generally refuse to join nature groups, clubs, and societies. Although, I have met some very nice people online with similar interests. My questions about the future of Nature ID remain unanswered for now.

With that said, I'd love to hear from fellow bloggers on why you blog.

Oh my!

I'm hesitant to state this, but... I simply cannot reply to every comment posted to Nature ID. Thank you, everyone, for following my blog and taking the time to offer your thoughts. I do read what you say and will reply when appropriate. I've had to remind myself that my goal for this blog is to note what (as best as I can), when, and where.

ps 02/09/11 - Watch out, I will be in a back-posting frenzy this week in order to catch up to date.

a meeting of two blogs

Phew! I finally finished adding my other blog's posts to Nature ID. I lost a couple pics and comments along the way (despite blogger/blogspot's assurances that all would remain intact), but I'm fine with that. I'm still working on fixing my labels and embedded links. Here are a few of my recently moved old posts and labels:

sentimental about seasons
sunrises
sunsets
artsy photos
crappy photos
travel version of Nature ID
yakety yak

This little hobby of mine has turned into a piece of work. My self-imposed rules for Nature ID were becoming limiting, hence the reason why I decided to combine my blogs. Compared to some of the bloggers out there, I'm relatively new to the scene with only 16 months of blogging under my belt. I'm still learning the etiquette of the blog-o-sphere.

Quite honestly, I never thought anyone would read my blather, let alone comment, but, someone, namely Biobabbler, felt I was worth mentioning and awarded me a blog badge, which I now proudly display in my sidebar. Again, thank you, bb! While I'm not up for taking the time to adhere to the award's guidelines (I feel it's a new generation of the old-fashioned chain letter without the bad joojoo), I will make the following comments:

a) I don't particularly like writing or taking photographs. Nature blogging seems contrary to this dislike, but I also like learning new things and I love the community of nature aficionados that blogging has exposed me to.

b) I regularly link to bloggers and posts that I find "good," without fancy-schmancy awards. However, maybe I should let them know more often as I'm fairly shy about commenting on other people's blogs.

c) Here's a short list (considering I regularly check in on over 350 blogs, this is short!) of my favorite bloggers, nature-related or not, and in no particular order:

Blue Jay Barrens
Posie Gets Cozy
Wanderin' Weeta
The Zen of Motherhood
Meanwhile in a valley in the Coast Ranges...
Indian flowers and herbs
A Yankee-in-Belgrade
John Wall's Natural California
The Max Files
The Skeptical Moth
Xenogere
Bread on the Water
The Speckled Wood Calendar
Phyte Club
From Russia with Blog

To interrupt my regularly scheduled blog...

I'm in the process of combining my two public blogs. My concept for Kt's Nature ID companion didn't pan out. While I like sharing some personal information, I'm uneasy about sharing too much for internet consumption. Do you know what I mean? Now I'm going to relegate my companion blog for testing and playing around with blogger and coding features. Plus, I'm finding it's too time consuming to keep up with multiple blogs, Twitter, and flickr. Until I get organized, here's a little tidbit to show a new label, shout out to awesome blogs and sites:

I had the opportunity to watch Karate Kid recently since the mid-80's. Ah, I miss the simpler times and seemingly innocent life experiences. Thanks to the power of the internet, I found this on YouTube: Funny or Die's Wax On, F*ck Off with Ralph Macchio.

LMAO! This is my generation in a nutshell. Again, what was I saying about too much information? Seems every celebrity in the news these days has behaved in some heinous fashion, and why it makes "news" is beyond me. All I can do is shake my head and appreciate those who use their fame for good, like Angelina Jolie's work with UNHCR. I still remember when her tattoos and marriage blood vials with Billy Bob shocked the public.

"Haha. You're so sweet, baby. Why don't you come back when you turn 18, okay?"

So, I've been deliberating over actually mentioning the following nature bloggers. They like curse words, but in some ways it helps me laugh and not take things too seriously:

Fuck You, Penguin
Bourbon, Bastards and Birds
The Drunkbirder... Birding From The Hip Flask.
The Drinking Bird (Nate doesn't regularly curse, but his blog name fits the theme)

And, one last shout out to an ol' friend Friday Jones who inked parts of Angelina.

Where am I going with this?

Los Padres Dam, CA
May 28, 2009

Click here to follow the trail sign to the original "about embedded links" post of which this is a postscript.

I was recently blocked from accessing CalFlora and was required to register after a whole year of using the site, without any logins, for free, and being granted written permission to link to it. I suspect this move was due to a recent late night, unable to sleep with my usual insomnia, when I began a flower family organizing extravaganza that may have alerted the servers at CalFlora of unusual activity. Or it could have been that I simply accessed the site in a way I never had previously. Hahaha.

I questioned John M. about the registration requirement and he replied with a bit of grumpy attitude that I should not mistake registering with paying. These are two separate things. Apparently, having registered users helps with grants and such. Hmm? What, my unending gratitude is not enough to survive?

I'll admit, I haven't been following my philosophy I proclaimed above. I've taken CalFlora for granted. CalFlora is indeed a better plant ID resource than any book I've ever purchased. I've discussed with my husband about donating to this valuable site because I do use it a lot, I trust it, and I'd love to see it continue being offered to the public. For those who are "professionals" you may want to request from your institution to pay the small sum asked by CalFlora. At the very least, go ahead and register so CalFlora can show there's interest in keeping the site alive.

Regardless of free, donations, or for a fee, I generally don't like sites that require you to register and provide e-mails and passwords and type in what you see in the funky-text box. So, apologies in advance to blog visitors if you suddenly find a link that requires registration. ALL embedded links I include on Nature ID should be free to use. If you ever find one that asks you to pay, please let me know!

If you can't tell already, I love the internet! I like being able to type in a few keywords and find information on just about anything from around the world. Often, I take these things for granted. Don't you? I forget that someone or many somebodies spent many hours to create these amazing websites. And, there are challenges in the offering that aren't always apparent from the outside.

Heavy sigh... additionally this week, I deleted a couple more blogs I follow when it became obvious to me they were inserting product placements within content, like cell phone providers. (Let me be clear, I do not mind if people use their blogs to promote their own businesses.) I've heard stories of these kinds of sly marketing tricks and don't believe they work very well. Seeing this in nature blogs feels somehow dishonest compared to obvious commercial sites. I suspect most savvy online folks can sense this deception whether they can express it or not. This underhandedness pisses me off to no end when I discover it.

So, with CalFlora requiring registration and these product-placing bloggers on two sides of the same coin, I wonder why I feel so differently about them. They're in essence both wanting money, right? Ha! Don't we all?

Continuing on this train of thought... a couple of friends have suggested I should try to make money from Nature ID. As if I could anyways. I shake my head and think that would somehow taint my pure joy of learning and sharing... and creating something of pride exactly the way I want and when I care to do it. It's a kind of freedom that probably exists only by my perception of it. I won't place any adverts here, because I don't like seeing them on other people's blogs. Really, who clicks on that ugly line-drawing of the shrinking woman? And, I'd guess that when you sign up for the "service" you don't get a choice of which ads get placed on your blog. Occasionally, I'll rave about a particular website (CalFlora), blog (John Wall), or book (BtB West) simply because I'm very impressed, not because I have any hidden agenda.

On a somewhat related note, all Nature ID and Kt's Nature ID companion photos are mine or my husband's. I try to be respectful and base my commentary on my own experiences, rather than quasi-quoting/summarizing other previously published information. Usually there's something better with more information, so I'll link to it instead of stealing it.

I see many bloggers out there who insert watermarks in the middle of their photos with strongly worded copyright notices. In the general spirit of a shared online community and my own beliefs, I prefer and would like to trust people. US copyright laws are in essence based on trust anyways, unless you have loads of cashola to pay lawyers to defend your claim. I've reluctantly included what I hope is a friendlier version of copyright claim, permissions, linking, and a way to contact me at the bottom of this blog.

As a result of my online exchanges this past week, I realized just how jaded I've become about participating online and creating my blogs. At what point when one tries to safeguard personal information and property does it become safeguarding against connecting and supporting people?

Just wondering and thinking out loud... my brain is hampered with an awful cold, so I'm more into navel gazing (to quote Bug Girl's Blog) than looking up owl's clover IDs this evening... And I'm still not sure where I was going with this post. Want to come along with me... quo vadimus?