coast buckwheat ~ 05/18/14 ~ San Bruno Mt.

coast buckwheat / seaside wild buckwheat

Eriogonum latifolium

Polygonaceae
(fuzzy and not fuzzy)

 coast buckwheat leaves
(fuzzy and not fuzzy)

coast buckwheat in bloom
(fuzzy and not fuzzy)

coast buckwheat / seaside buckwheat

Eriogonum latifolium

Polygonaceae
(fuzzy and not fuzzy)

I'm on a mission to learn the regional buckwheats as they bloom this year, because it's much easier to locate them when they're in full blooming glory.  Calflora currently lists 256 spp./var. of Eriogonum.  That's a lot of buckwheat, and it's all quite confusing.  Fortunately, I'm focusing on the dozen or so found regionally from the central CA coastal area, inland to Pinnacles.  So when the opportunity came up to visit San Bruno Mountain with Santa Clara Valley CNPS guru Ken Himes, I was ready to get my buckwheat IDs sorted.  Turns out, the mountain in all its uniqueness has only one sp. of buckwheat, E. latifolium, locally known as coast buckwheat, and elsewhere described as seaside buckwheat.  I found plenty of variation, from pink to white blooms, perfectly round to flatted pom-poms, fuzzy to green leaves, short stalk stature to reaching for my knees.  I kept asking Ken, "Are you sure this is still coast buckwheat?"  He laughed at first, but then I think he tired of my repeated questions.  I still suspect there's some naked buckwheat (E. nudum) in the above with the flattened flower heads and greener, fuzzless top, larger leaves.  In any case, I'm now familiar with coast buckwheat, and I hope I can recognize it even when it's not blooming.  I found the low-growing, wavy-edged leaf shape with fuzzy underside to be recognizable, but not entirely distinguishable.  It's a perennial herb.  So, does that mean it dies after 2 years?  Yes, I'm seriously asking.

habitat ~ 03/10/14 ~ Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District Preserve

Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District Preserve

March 10, 2014

Once again, a casual comment on Saturday led to another nature bloggers' get-together... at least, from my perspective.  For Ken @ Nature of a Man and Cindy @ Dipper Ranch this visit was work-related.  One of Ken's CNPS friends Paul also joined us on this hike around a closed MROSD Preserve.  My first impression?  This is not what I expected of the Santa Cruz Mountains.  It was wide open and sunny.  And quiet.  Remember, I live by the ocean with an almost constant backdrop of crashing waves.  Well, it wasn't entirely quiet up in the mountains. There was the incredible sound of wind through trees, speckled with extraordinary songs of birds, and the non-stop, excited chattering of nature nuts.  I say this with complete admiration for my companions.  I was just happy to tag along for the ride.  It was a gorgeous day.  I now have more IDs than I can shake a stick at.  More to come...

coast garter snake ~ 03/10/14 ~ Midpen Preserve

coast garter snake
Thamnophis elegans terrestris
(ssp. of western terrestrial garter snake)

I don't know how to sex snakes, but I'm calling it a she.  She was quick and sought refuge in the pond, but a long-legged herp fellow was quicker on his feet.  We thought the two red dots on her head were a nice addition to a very pretty little snake.

edited 04/01/14 - Thanks to Cindy's comment, I revised the ID from Santa Cruz garter snake (Thamnophis atratus atratus) to best guess a ssp. of the western terrestrial garter snake, the coast.  All 3 ssp. of aquatic garter snakes (T. atratus) do not have any red on their sides like this one clearly shows.  Doh! 

The other possibility would be one of the common garter snakes (T. sirtalis).  While Cindy says CA red-sided (T. sirtalis infernalis), I lean towards valley (T. sirtalis fitchi).  Look at this picture and tell me it doesn't look the same with that large eye and black wedges?  Well, okay, the individual shown above has 8 labial palps (typ. of western terrestrial, elegans), rather than only 7 (typ. of common, sirtalis), but that's apparently not 100% diagnostic.  Plus, neither T. sirtalis ssp. is supposed to be found in this area of the Santa Cruz Mountains, and we're confident, somehow, that this is not the endangered San Francisco garter snake (T. sirtalis tetrataenia). Confused, yet?  Join the club!

For a handy-dandy key to CA garter snakes, check out CA Herps.  And, for a brief summary of the confusion around garter snakes (with links) check out my CA red-sided post from Fort Ord.

arboreal salamander ~ 03/10/14 ~ Midpen Preserve

arboreal salamander
Aneides lugubris
more information
Plethodontidae

I should note that we did not happen across this arboreal salamander resting on top of the log as pictured. I think Ken found it under some bark, but that makes it difficult to photograph. Normally, I don't go actively hunting for herps, but I'm also not documenting spp. for a preserve. This individual is not as spotty as the one-eyed arboreal salamander Andy found near home 4 years ago. I can't believe how gushy I was with my first find.  I think I appreciate the random encounters a little more, but this was definitely eye-opening as to how much is hidden just out of sight.

CA Alligator Lizard ~ 03/10/14 ~ Midpen Preserve

California alligator lizard
Elgaria multicarinata multicarinata

We saw several alligator lizards this day.  Most of them were smaller with various patterning, but this one was huge.  Note the long tail that looks like it's never broken off, which it apparently does at the drop of a hat.  I've never seen this personally, but I trust what I've been told.  The cool temperatures, especially in the shade under the trees, left most of the reptiles we found kind of dozy and easy to approach.  Usually, I find it near impossible to catch a picture of an alligator lizard.

I should note, I base all my herp IDs on Gary Nafis' California Herps website.  Ya, I know, I complained bitterly when I first found it 5 years ago, because of the impossible-to-decipher-by-looks-alone way herps are classified.  It's not Gary's fault.  Bar none, he's created the best herp site for CA out there.  It's up-to-date, extremely thorough, and easy to use.  There seems to be an unusual amount of funding to do PCR-crap (oh, did I say that?) on herps.  It's like all the university herp folks are in a race to see who can reclassify the most spp.  I'm sure there's historical biology precedent as to why this is, but I just find it perplexing.

CA newt ~ 03/10/14 ~ Midpen Preserve

California newt

Taricha torosa
Salamandridae

OK, what are they feeding the amphibians at this preserve?  Good golly, they're fat and huge, just like the Pacific chorus frog we found.   Seriously, no one is actively feeding these wild-found animals, but there must be plenty of food stuff available and plenty of comfortable habitat.  In one month's time, the CA newts have gone from skin and bones, like at nearby Stevens Creek on February 10, 2014, to fat, fat, fat.  Ya, the two locations have very different habitats, but still!  I'm unsure if the one in my hand is male or female.  Are those male nuptial pads on the toes?  Do you know?

a Rubenesque California newt

Pacific chorus frog ~ 03/10/14 ~ MidPen Preserve

Pacific chorus frog / Sierran treefrog
Pseudacris sierra (formerly P. regilla)

Oh.  My.  God.  Look at how fat and huge this adult is!  Fatty, fatty frog.  With its dark throat, I'm guessing it's a male.  Those toe pads are amazing.  Oh, that large hand is not my own. Compare the size of this sucker with this anemic-looking juvie I raised a couple years ago.  

Apparently, I prefer an outdated common name by calling it a Pacific chorus frog on Nature ID.  I don't get why "treefrog" is commonly used as one word, when in fact, it is a frog.  Remember, I used to be a science content editor.  Technically (there are indeed naming rules for common names), if the thing in question is truly the noun, then it is at least two words, descriptor 'space' noun.  If the thing in question is not the noun, then it is either one word (e.g., butterfly is not a fly) or hyphenated (e.g., poison-oak is not an oak).  Perhaps, like its/it's and their/they're, this is a frequent grammatical error that many people don't pay mind.  At what point does common usage change the rules?

wolf's milk and common grey disco ~ 03/10/14 ~ Midpen Preserve

wolf's milk slime mold

Lycogala epidendrum

It amazes me how so many natural sightings are time sensitive.  Just the week before, Ken mentioned a distinctive slime mold (which is not a fungus btw) called wolf's milk.  Then, Cindy also included some nice pictures in a recent blog post.  Fun name, no?  So, when I found these, I knew exactly what they were.  I've only ever seen the creeping plasmodium of other slime molds before, not the aethalia (aka sporangia stage) like these pink balls are.  I squeezed a couple, and sure enough, pink milk squirted out, reminding me of Pepto-Bismol.  Oft-repeated descriptions of the milk being a thicker consistency of toothpaste was not my experience. These aethalia were probably too young to be thick.  They're like pea-sized pink paintball pellets (apologies for the excessive alliteration). Apparently, our wolf's milk don't know they're only supposed to be out June-November, yet another oft-repeated statement that doesn't match my encounter.

wolf's milk slime mold among common grey disco fungus

Lycogala epidendrum among Mollisia sp. (maybe M. cinerea?)

It wasn't until I got home and looked at my pictures of the wolf's milk that I noticed the tiny grey disc clusters.  I probably should start carrying my reading glasses wherever I go (ugh, one more thing to haul around).  I thought I'd never get an ID on them, but a couple days later during my blog reading, I found Skev's B.L.O.G. had posted Mollisia cinerea from across the pond.  Oooh, a lead.  I'm not sure if what we have in CA is the same found in the UK, especially considering there are several grey-colored Mollisia spp. 

As a side note, there are other similarly looking cup and saucer fungi, but colored sunny yellow, called lemon disco (Bisporella citrina and its smaller sibling B. sulfurina).  It's the tiny world of cool.  Shall I dance?

black rat ~ 03/10/14 ~ Midpen Preserve

black rat / roof rat

Rattus rattus alexandrinus

posted 03/19/14 - Here's another dead animal to add to my virtual collection.  I'll take it.  I just noticed most of my dead animal finds have been mammals and snakes.  Hey, it's the only time I seem to get any pictures of them.  I'm not very good with their IDs and often have to ask for help.  I try to spread my queries around so as not to pester any one person too much, because everyone's busy and my blog is not that important.  In my zeal to double-check my facts as I always do, I ended up being a bit ratty myself.  Eventually, it was passed among a couple big-wig Mammalogists, so I am confident of this expert ID.  I'd quote the e-mails, but I didn't ask for permission, so I won't.  Sorry, all.

There were two other possible IDs:  the native dusky-footed woodrat (Neotoma fuscipes) and the introduced brown rat / Norway rat (Rattus norvegicus).  Without looking at teeth and skulls, they're not as easy to distinguish as I would have guessed.  My personal, completely uninformed, vote was woodrat, because of its obvious white belly, even though the tail wasn't as hairy as I would expect. Nope.  It's a black rat that isn't actually black.  Go figure.  I should note, the 2nd picture was my attempt to return the body back to its original stuffed-in-the-hole position, so that the black burying beetle I spied could get back to business.  I wouldn't even begin to guess how the rat died and got stuffed.

habitat ~ 03/03/14 ~ Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve

Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve

March 3, 2014

Fellow blogger Ken @ Nature of a Man and I met up at Purisima Creek to look for salamanders and whatever else we could find.  He's very familiar with the preserve and all its contents since it's closer to where he lives. Even though it's an easy 2 hour drive north along Hwy 1 for me, I had never been before.  We watched the weather pretty closely to maximize our sightings potential, but then we ended up deciding it didn't always have to be newt parades and ladybug parties, like last month.  The redwoods here are gorgeously dark and cool.  That lush flush of bright green soothes my parched soul.  I loved tromping all over, including in the creek.  As with rain, you try to stay dry, but once you slip and get wet, then it's a free for all.  I definitely want to return with Andy sometime.  Thank you, Ken, for sharing one of your favorite perennial creeks with me!  The specific IDs will be forthcoming. 

CA slender salamander ~ 03/03/14 ~ Purisima Creek

California slender salamander
Batrachoseps attenuatus
Plethodontidae 

Cutie.  This is a fairly small salamander, thinner than the width of a pencil.  It looks pretty much like the Santa Lucia Mountains slender salamander (B. luciae) that I found April 29, 2012 as I was digging around at home.  Well, okay, this one is not covered in dirt and has a longer tail.  Field markings are almost no help for several look-alikes, because they appear to have just as much variation within as between spp.  Thanks to the expert ID I received from Gary Nafis @ California Herps and John Sullivan @ Wild Herps for my B. luciae, I understand the currently acceptable way to distinguish slender salamanders is to pinpoint location found.  Here's a map of Batrachoseps spp. distribution.  It doesn't seem very intuitive, but whatever, I'll go with it.  I kinda wish I had retaken molecular genetics back when I transferred to a larger (read: better funded) university, because I might have appreciated what the PCR craze is all about.  As it is, the statistical models, like Tajima’s D and Fu’s Fs, sound like rap names to me.  Eh, I guess I'm getting old and staid.

rough-skinned newt ~ 03/03/14 ~ Purisima Creek

rough-skinned newt
Taricha granulosa

Salamandridae

Often, I have to see something in person to really "get it".  Ken @ Nature of a Man showed me these very clearly defined rough-skinned newts.  Their dark color is distinctive, especially with a sharp, solid color divide, under the eye area, extending around the upper lip.  I found the color in my newt pictures can be wholly misleading from what I remember, depending on lighting conditions, and/or if a camera flash is used, and/or what the predominant surrounding color is, like these redwood needles here.  They look much darker in real life than my pictures indicate.

Do these eyes NOT extend past the margin of the head?

OK.  Love, love the toes.  Four in front, five in back and all dipped in yellow around the purlicue.  I find myself silently squealing like an 80's Valley Girl, "Like, oh my god!  Awesome!"

Yeah, but... I still don't get the eye margin and lower eyelid diagnostics when compared to CA newts (T. torosa).  We've noted quite a bit of gradation of characteristics among individual newts, especially at Stevens Creek where we saw so many.  It seems like T. granulosa and T. torosa intergrade, but I'm not sure that's known for a fact.  I believe Ken is gathering observational evidence.

I dunno, everyone sees things a little differently.  A friend once claimed that different cultures see colors very differently, and I suspect he was right.  I didn't necessarily agree with his claim of cultural basis, although that could very well be true.  I figure different groups of people would have natural genetic differences in how their eyes physically process information.  It's like how I, an Asian, can squat very low, and my husband, a Scandanavian, can barely cross his legs.  Same difference.

regenerating newt tail

It's crazy cool how newts can regrow body parts.  Remember for a while there, I had considered going back to school to study salamanders?  After talking it over with numerous people, I have decided it's not the best idea for me.  First, I didn't have any pressing questions about them.  What would I research?  I already know I don't like working on someone else's passion project, particularly when they die on me and leave me with a mess of handwritten scraps.  I want to follow my own questions and paths.  Plus, if I were honest, I truly only wanted to raise newts and salamanders 'cause they're cute, but under the guise of "in the name of science" (hey, it happens).  To do this, I'd have to handle them a lot.  Guess what?  They're toxic, very much so, producing tetrodotoxin (TTX), "the most poisonous nonprotein substance known to scientists."  Yeah, sure, you can be careful washing hands and such, but can you be sure to be careful all the time?  Ever since my first collegiate research project involving the unusual mating ritual of an x-large, yet incredibly beautiful, tropical mosquito (Limatus durhamii), I knew fairly quickly from first-hand experience (i.e., many itchy, sleepless nights with arms swollen from a colony's worth of female mosquito bites) that I did not want to study anything that sucks blood, bites, stings, poisons, or kills.  Seriously.  Then, there's another conundrum surrounding all herps, the dratted pet trade.  I don't know if it is "dratted" and bad, but it's what I've heard.  So that leads to a lot of secrecy, loads, so secret the CIA... uh, nevermind.

dog lichen ~ 03/03/14 ~ Purisima Creek

dog lichen (more photos)

Peltigera sp.

Finding any lichen ID matches online is a challenge, even with a public-friendly common name such as dog lichen.  Apparently, there are some dog lichens that are considered pests on lawns.  Who knew?  I didn't find an exact match for this lettuce-leafy specimen with chalky white back and blistery reddish-orange nodules scattered across the top surface (yes, my own descriptive words).  I also have pictures (sorry, not posted) of this same-looking dog lichen from Stevens Creek on February 10, 2014, which makes me think it must be fairly common in the Santa Cruz Mountains.  I'm guessing many ID'd photos online may be incorrect to sp.  However, I did find a couple decent dog lichen photo series on Stephen Sharnoff's Lichens Index 9 and Andrew Khitsun's Lichens of Wisconsin (for both sites, do a find for "peltigera" to quickly get to spot on page).  I've added their home pages to my online ID resources under fungi, lichens, and slime molds. 

CA giant salamander ~ 03/03/14 ~ Purisima Creek

California giant salamander larvae

Dicamptodon ensatus larvae

Dicamptodontidae (formerly Ambystomatidae)

more information

 
If I had grown up in the Santa Cruz Mountains, you probably would not have been able to get me out of the creek.  As it was, my mother would express disgust at how muddy I got when playing in our irrigation ditch looking for crawdads and toads.  Hey, I'm thrilled to learn of the CA giant salamander.  For better pictures of this individual, check out randomtruth's flickr here and here.  This larvae is good sized and very comparable to the size of most adult newts that I've found.  They can be quite quick in the creek (say that fast 3 times).  Ken told me he had one bark at him.  Although, to me this recording from CA Herps sounds more like a fart than anything fearsome.  Read all about Ken's first-hand encounters with full-on beasties at Nature of a Man.  They're not named "giant" for nothing. Lastly, as a comparison, Blue Jay Barrens has a recent post of a fatty salamander in his Ohio backyard.

unidentified white slime mold ~ 03/03/14 ~ Purisima Creek

plasmodium of an unidentified white slime mold

Myxomycetes

Cool, eh?  Can you ID?  Much like Hermione in Goblet of Fire, I feel like the library, er, internet, has finally failed me.  Just as well, considering I never even knew moving (yes, moving!!!) amoeba-like slime molds (mold being a misnomer) existed until I posted a yellow-colored many-headed slime (Physarum polycephalum) over 3 years ago.  I haven't been able to tack down an ID on this small white beauty.  Oh, I found plenty of other slime molds, which all seem to be peculiarly named like tapioca slime (Brefeldia maxima), chocolate tube slime (Stemonitis splendens), pretzel slime (Hemitrichia serpula), and dog vomit slime (Fuligo septica).  Lovely.  It doesn't help with ID that slimes change quite a bit as they age, as Stevie Smith captured so well over the course of 60 hours.  I found his pictures through this Flickr Hive Mind that has some beautiful pictures (Is "hive mind" supposed to be like a shared BBC's Sherlock "mind palace"?).  Interesting to note, this slime completely avoided the redwood cones, and yet it seemed to like the needles.  Do the cones taste bad?  Or had they only recently fallen?  I wished I had remembered to go back and check how this one progressed after a couple hours.  How quickly do slime molds move in real time?

stream violet ~ 03/03/14 ~ Purisima Creek

stream violet

Viola glabella

Violaceae

redwood violet

Viola sempervirens

Violaceae

If Ken hadn't pointed out the subtle differences in leaf shape, I would not have known there were 2 different violet spp. here.  I often make the mistake of assuming look-alikes in the same location are, in fact, the same.  Nope.  I believe I got the above sorted correctly with the stream violet having the pointier leaf shape and the redwood violet being more rounded.  Right, Ken?  I find it interesting how the leaves handle water.  Those droplets on the leaf margins are intriguing.

ps 03/10/14 - Per my comments below, I wonder if the "pointy" lower petal of the stream violet, similarly shaped to the leaves, can be considered diagnostic.  Ken has a stunning redwood violet photo in bloom.

mayfly ~ 03/03/14 ~ Purisima Creek

Epeorus flatheaded mayfly with "egg ball"
Epeorus sp.

Ephemeroptera

I first spotted a bright yellow blob flying above my head through a clearing in the forest.  I tried to capture it with my hands, but my best reach with hiking boots is only 6'5".  Fortunately, Ken is quite a bit taller and was fast on his feet.  He gently used his hat as a makeshift net so that I could get a picture.  He wants to know what kind of mayfly it is, but I'm afraid I'm going to disappoint.  

The thing with mayflies is that each species has a unique wing vein pattern.  I was hoping this one would be common enough to be represented online.  Nope.  The closest match I could find was an illustration done by Professor N.J. Kluge out of Saint Petersburg State University.  I've sent him an e-mail query with hopes he may be able to ID this ephemeral beauty.  We'll see if he responds.

I gotta say, this was one of the most entertaining IDs I've researched in a while.  Looking through online images, I found a lot of incredibly realistic mayfly ties and lots of people big and small proudly hugging large fish.  Haha.  In fact, the best online key I found for mayflies in North America is made by The Fisher Monk.  It works better if you have a specimen in hand.  His links don't work so well, but scrolling down shows some very useful illustrations.  It takes a bit of talent and practice to accurately draw wing venation, even with the use of modified scope projectors.  Back in the days before macro digital photography, I was an honorary adjunct professor at the Cleveland Institute of Art (the other CIA) for their Medical Illustration Program.  I gave 2 classes a year, line and form in the fall and color in the spring, using insects from the museum's collections.  The methods for illustration have changed quite a bit since then, including the use of scanners, like what The Dragonfly Woman does.

Lastly, while searching for information, I came across a couple impressive sites:

Aquatic Insects of the Great Lakes @ National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)

2012 Mayfly Emergence @ Ohio Sea Grant and Stone Laboratory on Flickr 

ps 03/10/14 - I heard back from N. Kluge.  He believes "this female imago belongs to the taxon Epeorus/fg2; possibly to Irondes".  I added links in the updated ID above.  This "Meet the Mountain Mayflies" article by Rick Hafele says Irondes is its own genus, but Mayfly Central @ Purdue Unviersity does not include it.  There's quite a bit of fly fishing information, and the Epeorus nymphs are called yellow quills for good reason.  I'll have to remember that fishermen call the subimago a dun and the imago a spinner.  Thank you, Dr. Kluge, for your ID help!

habitat ~ 10/11/12 ~ Memorial Park

Memorial Park

October 11, 2012

For the last 3 years we've headed south to Morro Bay in October.  Forecasts of a major thunderstorm all along the central CA coast made us rethink our usual.  For a 2-night camping trip, we prefer not to drive more than about 2 1/2 hours from home and definitely south of San Francisco to avoid the Bay Area traffic.  Keeping close tabs on weather predictions, north of Santa Cruz seemed like the best place to go with overcast skies and only 10% chance of precipitation.  It's thanks to fellow bloggers Dipper Ranch, Curbstone Valley Farm, Nature of a Man, Way Points, and Town Mouse and Country Mouse that I've become more interested in the Santa Cruz Mountains and even became aware of the extensive county parks, state parks, and open space preserves up there.

Andy found this small San Mateo County Park online and liked how it connected to other parks through trails for his typical trail running outing.  Bay Area Hiker has a nice summary of what the trails are like within Memorial Park.  One thing she doesn't mention, is the showers are old school - corrugated tin stalls painted many times over with that light-colored forest service green and ancient high pressure shower heads for 25 cents per 2+ minutes of very hot water.  Andy likened it to prison showers (not that he'd know), and I declined taking a shower at all because frankly they were a little creepy. And, true to Yelp reviews, the ranger was indeed gruff, but he gave us extra firewood stating he wanted to get rid of the larger pieces that wouldn't fit in neat bundles.  Based on his girth and the fairly new no smoking regulations, I have a suspicion as to why he seemed so grouchy. Actually, there were "no" signs everywhere for everything: no smoking, no hard liquor, no ground fires, no gathering of wood, no chopping wood on fire pits, no using water in fire pits, no washing dishes at water faucets, no raking or sweeping of sites, no swimming, no firearms, no fishing, no pets, no horses, no bikes, no skateboards, no scooters, no amplified music, no feeding wild animals, no this, no that, no, no, no. Not that it was a problem for us, but the signs were excessive.

When we arrived, we were quite surprised at the proliferation of camping sites and wondered why there were only a handful of campers around.  Typical of my rain curse, it thunderstormed right above our heads and dumped rain on us the first evening and drip, drip, dripped on us the remainder of our stay.  Chatting with a fellow camper, we heard we had apparently missed the biggest part of the storm the night before.  Needless to say, it was a bit exciting and extraordinarily beautiful to be camping in a freshly washed redwood forest littered with the changing colors of bigleaf maples. While we didn't get vast views from the summit of Mt. Ellen (not a big hill by any means), the sight of clouds through the mountains was breathtaking. I searched several times along Pescadero Creek for newts with no luck. We did see numerous gray squirrels, which I'm fairly sure were eastern grays and not western due to their brownish heads and casual demeanor around our campsite.  And, bright yellow banana slugs were out in full force probably enjoying the rain.  I would definitely go back again if we can time our visit with as few other visitors as possible.