According to Birdnet, it was a little flock of Golden-crowned Sparrows I was hearing. I didn’t see them, so I can’t be sure.
Photo refs: Vivek Khanzodé
Zonotrichia atricapilla
Category: Uncategorized
Cardamine californica
It was so nice to see the first milkmaids this morning!
Milkmaids (Cardamine californica) are some of the first wildflowers to appear in the Santa Monica Mountains each year, showing up in winter and early spring. This member of the Brassicaceae (Mustard) family likes shady, moist hillsides or stream banks in riparian areas. Each flower is about 12mm in diameter with four white to pink petals. The flower closes its petals in late afternoon as the sun goes down and nods its pedicel before a rain, protecting the pollen. It is perennial—after flowering and setting seed, it dies back to its roots where it goes dormant until next year’s rains awaken it.
I hiked this trail once before, in summer 2016, and had a bit of a heat exhaustion incident. I was alone at the time. I remember feeling very dizzy and nauseated, and crawling into the scant shade of a tree to rest and cool down. Luckily today was perfect hiking weather. No hyperthermia involved.
Thermonectus marmoratus
Sunburst diving beetles are aquatic, though they can fly. They are found in Southern California, southern Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Mexico. They inhabit various slow-moving freshwater habitats, especially shallow, temporary or intermittent pools and creeks with little or no aquatic vegetation. When their water source dries up they will fly to a new one.
They prey upon and scavenge other aquatic insects, snails, young fish, tadpoles, and mosquito larvae and pupae. The distinctive yellow spots serve as a warning sign to predators that the insect can release a foul tasting chemical from specialized glands found behind the insect’s head.
Source of the ‘mating wars’ info above: Trisha Nichols and Science Daily. I liked Susan’s comment during the livestream: “Guys, if your lady passes out underneath you, you are doing it wrong!”
half full
As I have aged, I am definitely become more pessimistic about human beings, and everything we touch. But today I thought I’d play with some optimistic lettering, just for fun. Because allegedly it’s Optimist Day. And it’s always fun to play with a dip pen.
Encelia californica
Encelia californica is native to southern California and Baja California, where it’s a member of the coastal sage plant community. It’s a bushy, sprawling shrub reaching between one half and 1.5 meters in height. The solitary flower heads are daisy-like, and it blooms from February to June, attracting butterflies, bees, and other insects.
It’s often planted to start a native garden, and then replaced with longer-lived shrubs over time. It can help jumpstart an area to change the soil ecology to help mazanitas and ceanothus plants.
Our block is covered with bush sunflowers, and they’ve just begun to bloom. Yay! 🌻
poor doggie
Bodie’s been off her game (and her food) for a few days. Hopefully she’ll be back to normal tomorrow, and wanting a W.A.L.K.
Meyer mystery
The lemon tree continues to cause me some head-scratching. I’m hoping that rock dust will help normalise its growth. Gardening is an experiment and an adventure!
Melanerpes lewis
Macrosiagon sayi
Wedge-shaped beetles live a part of their life cycle as a parasite on other insects, most commonly bees or wasps.
The beetle lays its eggs on a flower. The eggs hatch almost immediately into small larvae that lie in wait for a visiting bee. The larva crawls onto the bee and rides it back to the hive, where it dismounts and seeks a cell occupied by a bee larva. It then enters the body of the bee larva and waits until the bee larva pupates. It eats the entire pupa, then pupates in its turn and completes its metamorphosis before emerging from the hive to mate and lay eggs. Clever? Creepy? You decide.
Lupinus bicolor
Week four in the Perpetual Journal. As wildflower season slowly begins, I’m loving recording the first flowers I see.
hashiworks 