Early morning sun illuminating the Eastern Sierra Nevadas
Nearly a month and a half into my internship at the Ridgecrest Field Office and I am beginning to settle in. I still marvel at the view of the Argus Range whenever I step out my front door and pause in admiration of the sun setting over eastern Sierra Nevada’s to the west. By no means has day to day life become ordinary – each day in the field has its own surprises. So far, we have suffered a flat tire at the hands of a rough route (nothing like that foreboding hissing sound of all the air leaving your tire at once) and made acquaintances on two occasions with desert tortoises bravely journeying across the perilous road. We also saw our first adorable wild burros and experienced a brief sprinkling of rain. I had previously written off rain as a myth belonging to distant, non-desert lands, but discovered that it does indeed rain here!
A desert tortoise poses with my “tortoise awareness” sticker.
Our seed collections are up and running, as we have completed two collections and are working on the third. Our first collection was of Plantago ovata. At first glance, desert indianwheat reminds me of its rather weedy plantain relatives abundant in un-mowed Midwestern lawns. Looking more closely reveals delicate and nearly translucent flowers set against deep purple seed cases, actually quite beautiful! This observation led me to wonder how often I have overlooked simple beauty, even in urban settings. The seeds themselves are tiny and the collection took several days to complete. Our second collection was of Descurainia pinnata, a tansy mustard with the habit of growing around the base of large shrubs, particularly Lycium cooperi, a very thorny fellow. Our latest collection endeavor has been Stipa hymenoides, an interesting plant historically because the Indian rice grass was a main food staple for indigenous tribes living in the area.
Plantago ovata, Desert Indianwheat
In addition to seed collections, we have also been conducting rare plant species monitoring. This involves visiting locations of known rare plant populations and recording damage or threats to its habitat. Our first plant safari, as we have deemed them, had us on the hunt for a tiny flower endemic to Kelso Valley in the Bright Star Wilderness of the Eastern Sierra Nevada’s. There are only nine known populations of the Kelso Valley Monkey Flower (Mimulus shevoccki), all in and around Kelso Valley. The flower itself is miniscule, often less than an inch tall, and proved challenging to find. Our first day, we spent several hours searching unsuccessfully. Just as we were about to try another site, we finally found the population. As I approached the population, at first I saw just one, then two, then they seemed to materialize out of nowhere in front of me. It was a fulfilling end to our day!
Mimulus shevocckii, the elusive Kelso Valley Monkey Flower
We also surveyed for Phacelia nashiana, a brilliant blue phacelia. Charlotte’s phacelia certainly has a knack for finding hard to reach places. Its preferred habit is impossibly course granite soil on rocky outcroppings, often near the top of steep slopes. Thus our search in each valley began with looking up and locating the nearest high rocky outcropping. Unfortunately, we were monitoring at the end of its bloom period. Summer is rushing in quickly here and the landscape has already begun to turn crispy and brown. After scaling several phacelia-less, dried-up slopes, we came upon a slope alive with flowers. The geography of the slope had kept it shaded from the relentless sun and it was as though we stepped back in time to the height of spring. Sure enough, over two hundred Charlotte’s phacelia were in full bloom at the top!
Phacelia nashiana, Charlotte’s Phacelia
Sometime finding these plant populations is a bit like going on a treasure hunt. We head off into an unfamiliar maze of roads and routes armed with a GPS “X” marking the spot where the population was previously recorded. A successful search yields a view of a rare species or a seed collection, treasures invaluable to plant conservation and research.
E. O’Connell
Ridgecrest BLM Office