Diario de elliot_goldstein310

On Sunday Feb. 10th, Professor Loarie led a field expedition in Strawberry Canyon. While I have traversed the fire trails countless times over the years I have never closely observed the diversity of vegetation in this mixed coastal forest eco-region.

I made two observations of phenological significance.

The first is of the flowered rubus parviflorus (thimbleberry). This plant has soft leaves and a delicate white single flower a the top of the stalk. "The flowers are 2 to 6 centimeters (0.79 to 2.4 in) in diameter, with five white petals and numerous pale yellow stamens" (Wikipedia). There were no berries present.

I also observed a deciduous willow that has small clusters of budding leaves that almost look fuzzy. This grew by a river on the North side of the canyon and is part of the genus salix. I'm not sure what species it is.

Signing off,
Elliot

Here are five taxa:

Insect - wasp gall growing on the side of a willow branch.

Amphibian - the abundant California Salamander.

Animal - A millipede living by the Salamander.

Mushroom - in the waxycap family

Plant - thimbleberry

I spent this holiday weekend with my girlfriend at Harbin Hot Springs located in the Coastal Ranges of California right outside Middletown, CA. Hiking through this woodland area is beautiful. There is a oak cover of scrub oak (Quercus dumosa) and Coast Live oak. The ground is covered in leaves and there is not a lot of shrubbery. Every now and then a Manzanita can be seen.

"California chaparral and woodlands is a terrestrial ecoregion of lower northern, central, and southern California (United States) and northwestern Baja California (Mexico), located on the west coast of North America. It is an ecoregion of the Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub Biome, and part of the Nearctic ecozone." (wikipedia)

Through the Geog 171 class I have learned a great deal about species interactions. My travels in the Berkeley Hills and Northern California coast ranges demonstrate three species interactions.

The first is an observation of ants decomposing a dead bird carcass nearby my co-op in Berkeley. This is an example of a scavenging from an insect species to a bird species. It is also an example of the lower levels of the food web.

Next is a lichen within the family Lobariaceae growing on the side of an Oak Tree. This is probably a parasitic relationship between the fungus and tree.

Finally we see a wasp gall in the branch of a Coastal Live Oak. This is an example of a parasitic relationship where a wasp injects hormones into a tree branch that makes it swell and produce a "gall" which encases the wasp's larve until they hatch. The tree gains no benefit from the interaction and so it is parasitic.