I saw a bobcat for the first time in the Mojave two days ago while doing field work . I wrote this a short time afterward.

THE BOBCAT – by Aaron Sedgwick

Rising from the sand slinks the carnivorous grendel,
Jewel of the Mojave. Diamond eyes and cat-sized.
Shadows run from her gaze, Silent steps on the salt flats.
Maneuvering the wreckage of a thousand burned out buggies,
Glass bottle shards, Shotgun shells.
Fixed on the resting jackrabbit,
Tunnel vision stalking, buzzards hawking for the kill to come.
She… p o u n c e s
Bounding and bouncing jackrabbit shatters the calm.
Dust devil cage binds the pair together,
Freeing them when the howling stops.
Smiling and lapping the last drop from her chin,
She returns to silence.

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I made three seed collections over the last two days! They were all from previously scouted populations that I had scouted for way back in April. It’s exciting to successfully utilize previously scouted information from the same field season that I’ve personally collected.

One difficulty with the abnormally dry conditions in the Mojave has been that population data and vouchers from previous wetter years do not reflect the current conditions and distribution of species in the field.  Frequently, many of the populations that we are documenting are not even flowering , but the population data may be useful either next year or later in the summer when monsoon season begins. This means that every seed collection is sensational and precious this year. I’ve often thought that the plants that are producing seed this year could have particular sets of traits that are favored during dry years, making their genetics valuable for restoration. They could possibly be better adapted to the climate change projections for southern California, which predict a drier and hotter Mojave.