kestrel ~ 02/18/12 ~ Fort Ord

male American kestrel
Falco sparverius

Yup, I've reached a new low (or is that high?) for crappy photos, especially of birds. Never mind the massive early-blooming silver bush lupine, the coyote brush, the coast live oak, or the dried bit of telegraph weed, there is a kestrel in this pic. Can you find it? Perched on the coyote brush?

When we went to Palo Corona back on January 2, 2012, I spotted several kestrels and was unable to capture any pictures of them. I love how brightly colored the males are with their light-colored breast, slate grey wings, and brown backs. The mere fact that I can actually recognize them is because I've flipped through every single page of the handful of bird books I now have in my possession (some are on permanent loan from a dear friend). It's a sharp learning curve for me to ID birds, but it's been fun.

purple owl's-clover ~ 05/14/11 ~ Fort Ord

purple owl's-clover / banded owl's-clover

Castilleja exserta var. latifolia

Orobanchaceae (formerly Scrophulariaceae)

It is with many thanks to Mark Eggar on Flickr with his impressive knowledge and photo collection of Castilleja that I was able to obtain expert ID for the purple owl's clover variety/subspecies. My policy for Nature ID is to never use other people's photos and only quote if I have written permission. Seeing as how I don't have permission from Mark, yet, click on this link to my Flickr post for his comment about why these Castilleja are unusual to ID. As a note, the ongoing 2006 CNPS vascular plant list for Fort Ord (alphabetical) does not include this subspecies.

I could not decide which photo was better, the clearer first one with the non-native foxtail chess (Bromus madritensis ssp. rubens) in Poaceae or the second pic with chamise (Adenostoma fasciculatum) in Rosaceae, so I posted both. The third pic centers on older C. exserta var./ssp. latifolia with what I believe is white-flowering wedge-leaved horkelia (Horkelia cuneata) in Rosaceae to the top right. The last photo above shows this Castilleja growing among sky lupine (Lupinus nanus) in Fabaceae and non-native sheep sorrel (Rumex acetosella) in Polygonaceae, as well as many other plants. These were found in areas that were burned in 2003, 2008, or 2009.

ps 06/02/11 - I've added additional ID's in the text based on Cindy's comment below.

coastal tidytips ~ 05/14/11 ~ Fort Ord

coastal tidytips
Layia platyglossa
Asteraceae

This is such a sunny flower. I have a picture of another tidytip from Carmel Valley, but I couldn't properly identify it before. Maybe I'll go back and try to ID that photo and backpost under tidytips. I cheated on this ID and looked at the CNPS plant list for Fort Ord to get the species. According to Calflora there are 16 species/subspecies of Layia found throughout the state, with several looking very similar. The last picture above shows the coastal tidytips profusely growing among sky lupine (Lupinus nanus) in Fabaceae. These were found in areas that were burned in 2008, 2009, or not recently at all.

I should note this is a new location for Nature ID. In the next week or so, I'll be posting additional pictures from a special hike on Army Lands at the old Fort Ord. This area is normally closed to the public as they burn and clear munitions in preparation to turn over the lands to the BLM for recreational use by the year 2020. At the end of this series of posts from this hike, I'll do my usual habitat entry and explain more of how I had access to dangerous, closed lands. I have also corrected the location labels for past Fort Ord fire posts from 10/08/10 and 10/06/09 to Fort Ord - Army Lands.