Tuesday, February 8, 2011

first floral survey... February?

 
Yup, stuff is starting to bloom, already. Kinda started out my survey thinking I'd see mostly non-natives as they seem to get an early start (part of their successful strategy). Looks like I was right, but a few bloomers are native.

Red maids, Calandrinia ciliata, happily, are native, but can be invasive, according to the UC IPM folks. For example, in a field of baby spinach. Learn something new, every day.

Shepherd's purse (NOT lacepod as I'd thought, think I got fooled by this last year, too), Capsella bursa-pastoris, has an INSANE distribution. A highly successful non-native plant. Check out it's distribution in the US and Canada (scroll down). Yowsa!

Chickweed, Stellaria media, or so I think. There are 32 species of chickweed in Stellaria, according to the USDA, so I'm just hopin' my local-ish wildflower guide is on the mark. Non-native.

California burclover, Medicago polymorpha, is also up. And also introduced (non-native).

And the whiteleaf manzanita, Arctostaphylos manzanita, is budding up, gettin' ready to launch.


A particularly well-named native plant, the little apple (manzana=apple ita=diminutive suffix):


Spring is starting, apparently. I'd better get to ordering seeds!

biobabbler

3 comments:

  1. i like 'em all! (i'm going to come to you when I need flowers identified, cause it sure isn't my forte!).

    Please send these blooms and spring my way thank you!:)

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  2. you should be part of project BudBurst!
    http://neoninc.org/budburst/

    ReplyDelete
  3. @ Johnny Nutcase: love to help, tho' I'm SO not a botanist. However, it's all good practice.

    @ sparky: That IS a project I think is super valuable, but to be terribly honest, it takes the sort of consistent attention and precision that's really not something I excel at. It's a chronic effort and I'm better at "acute" projects. Are you going to participate?

    ReplyDelete

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