It is hard to believe September 09 has rolled around so quickly!  It seems like we were all together just weeks ago watching condors sore along the Grand Canyon’s south rim.  As I am certain those amazing birds continue to sore and flourish in that  place of grandeur, here in central Colorado, my experience with plants is soaring for me.  I truly am enjoying working and learning with one of the best botanists in the country, Carol Dawson.  I also have had the opportunity to work with Peter Gordon, who has worked with Carol now for 5 years.  Both of these folks are fantastic mentors and have shared their knowledge and skills with me throughout this internship experience.  We focus our time monitoring rare Colorado plants and collecting native seeds for SOS.

So I have a couple stories to share with you.  One is about a very rare Penstemon.  I had the opportunity to help monitor and obtain data regarding this plant a couple of weeks ago.  The other story involves collecting seeds for Seeds of Success.  Peter Gordon took all of these great pictures (well I took the one of him), so thanks Peter!

So beautifully rare and precious: It is hard not to think about Darwin and speciation when you work with rare endemic Penstemons.  I always do (think about Darwin when I work around Penstemon species).  And I have a special love for the genus Penstemon since I worked on a rare endemic Penstemon for three years in grad school.  Penstmon is the largest endemic genus in North America.  Scientists believe this is one of a few genera that is an example of continental radiation.  So rather then tons of species evolving quickly on an island setting (adaptive radiation), here tons of Penstemons evolved relatively quickly (5-10 million years) on a Continent, our continent.  Lots of these species are endemic and many are considered rare,  threatened, and globally imperiled.   This summer we have worked with and observed a few more here in Colorado including: Penstemon grahamii, P. penlandii, and P. debilis.

A couple weeks ago we took off toward Glenwood Springs, Colorado to monitor P. debilis, or Parachute Beardtongue. From I-70 looking north you can see the approach raod to get to the place these plants grow.

Sadly you can not see the road zig zagging in this photo, but the site is up in the far oil shale cliffs where they mined for oil shale rock in the 1980's and I think the 1990's.

It looks like a trail zig zagging back and forth switch-back style, a trail you would hike up maybe, but certainly not drive up!  Peter assured me our final destination was near the top of the plateau on an upper most zag.  He did suggest I sit on the left side of the car so as not to pass out while looking down out the window.

Looking down on the road to the site where we worked with Penstemon debilis.

We did zig-zag up, and true to Penstemon style, I was amazed at where these plants had decided, (I know there is no deciding in evolution), to evolve to selective pressures and become a species, absolutely unbelievable.

Here is a small population growing near the opening of one of the mine shafts. I think you can see flags indicating individual plants.

The plants literally live on steep rocky slopes with thin slabs of shale constantly falling on top of them.  Just like plants that have adapted to shifting sands in sand dune environments, these plants have adapted to thin pieces of shale rock constantly covering up their little plant bodies.

Shale rock cliffs above the plants. Rocks are constantly falling adding to the talus slope made of shale rock. Actually a rock fell near Peter as we were collecting data!

Their stems continue to grow outward beyond the rocks that land on them.  You begin to realize why this is one of the rarest Penstemons in North America!  We proceeded to stretch the measuring tapes across the monitoring site and began the process of counting stems.

This is the population of plants we monitored on the steep shale slope.

With this plant it is impossible to count plants.  Most of the plant is covered with rock which makes it difficult to distinguish separate plants.  Carol Dawson decided years ago, when they first began monitoring this little jewel, that the best way to determine the health of the population from year to year was to simply count stems.  So count the stems we did.

Peter Gordon counting stems of Penstemon debilis.

Here I am struggling to keep stable on the shifting shale as I count Penstemon debilis stems.

We also determined how many stems had flowers or fruit and how many for simply vegetative.  I was amazed and the amount of seeds these plants were producing.  And with my interest and love for pollination biology, I wondered which bees were hard at work pollinating this plant.  Most Penstemons are pollinated by Osmia bees, so I suspect these were insects hard at work weeks before the seeds developed.

Penstemon debilis flowering. Notice all the seeds below the plant indicating a bee was hard at work weeks before!

Another lovely shot of this extrordinary plant, Penstemon debilis.

And then you have to wonder, where do those seeds go with all of this rock, and just how do the seedlings get started??  It really is all so amazing that species can survive in such seemingly adverse environments.  I think this is one of the most incredible plants I have seen and had the honor to work with, and this is by far one of my favorite experiences this summer.