The intertidal portion of my participation in Snapshot Cal Coast 2017 is complete. I organized four Bioblitzes, two of which consisted of myself and Brenna and the other two for docents of the Seymour Marine Discovery Center (Tuesday) and the docents of Año Nuevo and Pigeon Point State Parks (Wednesday). The four consecutive days of…
Tag: natural history
Blitzin’ the intertidal, part 1
This is the second year that the California Academy of Sciences has sponsored Snapshot Cal Coast, a major effort to document and characterize the biodiversity of the California coast. To this end the Academy has organized several Bioblitzes at various sites in northern California, and solicited volunteers to lead their own Blitzes, either as individuals…
Emblem of the Golden State
Did you know that California has a state lichen? I didn’t either, and it turns out that we’ve had one for over a year! In January of 2016, California became the first state to adopt an official state lichen, and Ramalina menziesii joined the ranks of the California poppy (Eschscholzia californica), the California quail (Callipepla californica), the…
Peanut worms!
If I ask my invertebrate zoology students to name three characteristics of the Phylum Annelida, they would dutifully include segmentation and chaetae (bristles) in the list. And they would be correct. Annelids, for the most part, are segmented and many of them have chaetae. But in biology there are many exceptions for every rule we teach,…
Eight is enough
One of the defining characteristics of the Phylum Mollusca is the possession of a shell, which serves both as a protective covering and an exoskeleton. We’ve all seen snails, and some people may have noticed that snails often withdraw entirely into their shells and even have a little door that they can use to seal up the…
Gastropods x3
This past Monday I did something rare for me: I returned to the same intertidal site I had visited the previous day. I enjoyed myself so much the first time that I wasn’t able to refuse an invitation to go out there again. The site, Pigeon Point, is one of my favorites, especially in all of its spring…
They deserve a prettier name than “rockweed”
As spring arrives in full force, the algae are starting to come back in the intertidal. The past two mornings I went out on the low tides to look for something very specific (which I did find–more on that later) and noticed the resurrection of the more common red algae. So early in the season the…
The hunt concludes
Day 3 (Saturday 25 March 2017): Highway 25 We spent our second night on the coast in Morro Bay and came home via Highway 25. I would have enjoyed a drive up the coast, but given the road closures in Big Sur that wasn’t a possibility. Highway 25, however, proved to be a very pretty…
The hunt resumes
Day 2 (24 March 2017): Tehachapi, Antelope Valley, and Wind Wolves We spent the night in Bakersfield and the next morning (24 March 2017) headed up over Tehachapi Pass and headed into Antelope Valley. It had been many years since I’d driven over Tehachapi Pass, and I didn’t remember ever having seen Joshua trees before….
The hunt continues
Day 1 (Thursday 23 March 2017) cont’d.: Carrizo Plain National Monument The Carrizo Plain is an enclosed grassy plain in the southernmost “toe” of San Luis Obispo County, lying between the Temblor Range to the northeast and the Caliente Range to the southwest. Its average elevation is about 700 meters (2200 feet). The main geological features of…