wordless Wednesday

Gowen cypress ~ 03/04/12 ~ SFB Morse Botanical Reserve

yellow male pollen cones with brown female seed cones

female seed cones

Gowen cypress
Hesperocyparis goveniana (formerly Cupressus goveniana ssp. goveniana)
CNPS 8th Edition Inventory
Cupressaceae

When I first took pictures of these short-statured trees I thought, "Oh good, I can finally get close-up shots of a Monterey cypress (Hesperocyparis macrocarpa) for my blog, since they're usually too tall or perched on a cliff to take decent detailed pictures." Wrong? Maybe, maybe not? Gowen cypress is my best guess based on the CNPS plant list for SFB Morse Botanical Reserve, which does not include Monterey cypress. However, the female seed cones seemed bigger than described in Jepson compared to the larger Monterey cypress seed cones, but I'm aware visual perception can often be deceptive. I really should carry a ruler with me when I go hiking, since memory and photographs are proving to not be enough to distinguish species. I checked our neighbors' cypress trees, and there's quite a bit of variation outside of the reported dimensions. I guess theirs could be garden hybrids though. Erg. Come to find out the Gowen cypress is a federally threatened species. For more information about cypresses, check out Wayne's Word and Point Lobos Association.

trentepohlia ~ 10/10/11 ~ Point Lobos

carrot algae (a type of green algae) on Monterey cypress
Trentepohlia aurea var. polycarpa on Hesperocyparis macrocarpa (formerly Callitropsis or Cupressus)
CNPS 8th Edition Inventory
Cupressaceae

Good golly! I would have never guessed the orange stuff on cypress trees and rocks is a type of green algae. When I first saw it years ago in this limited area of Point Lobos, I figured it was a mold of some sort. Thanks to the handy-dandy checklist the ranger gave us (I mentioned this in my osprey post from this hike), I now have a name to the genus. When I first searched online, I misspelled Trentepohlia as "Trentepholia" with the 'o' and 'h' switched. I got lots of beautiful pictures, but very little actual information about this living thing. Sigh, gone are the days when my only labels were insects, flowers, and places. I still feel like I should take another general biology class to figure out what all those non-plant/non-animals things are.

ps 06/09/12 - I edited the name and links above to reflect better book and online information about the specific Trentepohlia found at Point Lobos.

Monterey cypress ~ 10/23/05 ~ Point Lobos

Monterey cypress
Hesperocyparis macrocarpa (formerly Callitropsis or Cupressus)
CNPS 8th Edition Inventory
Cupressaceae

If there is one tree that distinguishes this area from any others, the Monterey cypress is it. Click on the links above to learn more about this lonely looking tree hanging on a cliff.

ps 03/18/11 - For other pictures of how our local cliffs affect life, see bigsurkate.

pss 10/22/11 - I noticed the name change as I looked up a new post of green algae that grows on Monterey cypress.