"NEWS FLASH START OF SPRING 2018 WILDFLOWER SEASON COINCIDES WITH POPPY RESERVE VISITORS CENTER OPENING By Michael Powell With Marsha Neill & Bob Waidner Coincidentally, the Poppy Reserve s 2018 spring wildflower season effectively started on 28 February; one day before the Reserve s Visitors Center opened. Although the spring wildflower season more typically starts with the blooming of the yellow blossomed slender keel fruit, after this dry winter the spring season has started with finding the first open forgetme-nots blossoms (typically, another early blooming plant species) but, because the blossoms are so tiny, a magnifying glass is almost needed to see them, see Figure 1. FIGURE 1: FORGET-ME-NOT PLANT WITH TWO OPEN BLOSSOMS
The entire plant is only approximately two inches across; giving a sense of the blossoms size. This plant certainly qualifies as a Jane Pinheiro belly flower. The north leg of the Antelope Loop Trail is covered with this species plants. Only the open view of the trail makes it possible to see these small plants. The plants size makes it very difficult to find these plants among the other, taller vegetation growing off trail but I am guessing they are there as well. The report on finding poppy blossoms is not so exciting, unfortunately. There doesn t seem to be much progress in poppy plant growth from what Mary Wilson observed during her 18 February visit to the Reserve; see her posting under the field observations link on this website. The poppy plants that we found during our visit are about the same size as Mary noted. Several photographs, Figures 2 and 3, of the poppy plants we saw are provided at the end of this posting. The lack of apparent plant growth is not unexpected because this has been observed in past years. The poppy plants seem to grow to a certain size and then stop growing for an extended time period until the air temperature starts to rise and the buds start to form. My guess is that the plant s energy is going into growing the root system so it can support the eventual stem, leaf and blossom growth. What is different this spring is the size of the stagnated plant size. The plant size is substantially smaller than what is observed in most years with rainier winters. We can only wait to see if any March rainstorms result in more plant growth. There is some potentially good poppy news though. During our visits to the Reserve earlier this year (see previous News Flash website postings), three of the established monitoring plots were inventoried to document the number of poppy plants growing in the plots; giving an early indication on the quality of the upcoming wildflower season. These inventorying efforts found very few poppy plants; the plot near the Visitor Center having only eight or nine plants, the east ridge plot having only two or three poppy plants, and no poppies were found in the plot near the old well but it was really hard to find poppy cotyledons among the mass of young goldfield plants in this plot. During this visit we had an opportunity to inventory another monitoring plot located near the head of the valley above the small wooden bridge. Surprisingly, 30 poppy plants were found, and marked, growing in this plot. Although 30 is well below the 200 to 300 poppy plants found growing in the plots in a few past years, 30 plants is probably still enough to give a reasonably good color display, if the poppy plants eventually grow to a reasonable size. Although there is no monitoring plot located in this area, we also informally surveyed an area near the northwest corner of the north leg of the Poppy Loop Trail and again we found what appeared to be a comparable number of poppy plants. If a large percentage of these poppy plants survive, it appears that the best poppy displays will be on the west side of the Reserve this year. Further inventorying along the south leg of the Poppy Loop Trail during planned upcoming visits to the Reserve will give a better indication of the scope of the expected displays. In the last News Flash posting, I extended a challenge to the readers to find the young poppy seedlings located in the east ridge monitoring plot photograph. I received no replies so I don t know if everyone was unsuccessful or, maybe, there were no readers. When I did the actual inventorying survey, I found and marked one poppy seedling. It was only when I looked at the photograph taken of that seedling that it became clear that there were actually two, closely spaced seedlings. In any case, a short time was spent at this monitoring plot during this visit looking for more poppy plants. It appears that a lot has happened since the last visit. First, only one poppy plant was found near the marking pick placed last visit so one poppy plant has already died. There was a noticeable decrease in the amount of growing grasses; to the point that the poppy plant can now be easily seen as shown in Figure 2. Many of the filaree true leaves have turned red indicating that these plants are highly stressed and are probably lost already, Figure 4. The pygmy-leaved lupines true leaves also appeared to be wilting. All of these signs indicate that the east ridge area is losing the few wildflowers that were growing here. The size difference between the two poppy plants shown in Figures 2 and 3 may indicate that the east ridge s drier soil is either delaying the development of the poppy plants growing in that area and/or stunting their growth. The last posting included a photograph of an unidentified plant with red colored dicotyledons found in the monitoring plot near the old well. These plants have continued to grow and most now have their first few true leaves, Figure 5. Hopefully, these plants will continue to grow to the point that a definite identification can be made. If a reader can identify this
species, I would be greatly appreciative of any feedback so I can let all the readers know what the wildflower is during my next posting. Even though this year is not going to be a good spring for poppy displays, there are several other plant species that have done very well during this extremely dry winter. The first, as mentioned above, is the tiny version of the forget-me-nots. Although the plants are small, there were a very large number of these plants growing in the trails we walked during this visit. The second plant species that we have observed having a large number of following the early January rainstorm is the fiddleneck. It appears that a high percentage of the fiddleneck seedlings resulting from seed germination triggered by the January rainstorm have survived the extended dry period following that storm. The plants are still quite small but look healthy. The third species of wildflower that we have observed a large number of during our Reserve visits this spring is the goldfields. Although not seen on the east side of the Reserve, small goldfields seedlings seems pretty pervasive everywhere on the west side. That is species seems to be thriving this winter is not too surprising. Because goldfields also grow profusely on Saddleback State Park and its nearby Los Angeles County Preserves on the east side of the Antelope Valley (AV), which has significantly different climatic conditions than the west side of the AV, indicates that the goldfield species is adapted to a wide range of conditions. Although Saddleback Park is typically hotter during the summer and colder in the winter than the Poppy Reserve, the major climatic difference is the amount of rainfall each receives. For example, right now the Poppy Reserve has received approximately 2.5 inches of total rainfall where Saddleback has received only 0.32 inches. Any plant species that grows on Saddleback Park must be able to survive pretty extreme drought conditions. Several of the Reserve s rare perennial plants, the golden bush and apricot mallow, were also visited to check their status. Although golden bush grows profusely at Ripley, only three or four golden bush plants have ever been found growing on the Poppy Reserve. The golden bush plant growing near the Visitor Center has a good crop of new leaves and even a few buds starting to form, Figure 6. This is really good news because much of the plant died during the recent drought years and it wasn t clear that the plant was going to survive. It now appears it is going to recover quite nicely. The single apricot mallow plant known to be growing on the Reserve is also doing nicely with a good crop of new leaves and a few buds already forming, Figure 7. These rare plants raise several interesting questions to ponder and, potentially, investigate. Both of these perennial plants have been observed to blossom, set fruit and disperse seeds over the many years since they were originally found so Why haven t any of their dispersed seeds germinated and more plants become established in the subsequent years? Because almost all flowering plant species use crosspollination to maintain genetic diversity, the second question is What is the source of the pollen required for these isolated plants to grow fruit? With a forecast for another rainstorm coming in the next day or two, the primary objective of this visit to the Reserve had to be manually recording the rainfall from the 26 February storm before emptying the five recently installed, new style collection rain gauges. Table 1 gives a summary of the rainfall from the two rainstorms that have occurred since the new style rain gauges were installed and the approximate locations of these rain gauges. Unfortunately, this data does not include the rainfall amounts for this winter s only major rainstorm in mid-january. When the rainfall was collected from that storm, we discovered that the old style rain gauges had developed leaks leading to the new rain gauges being purchased. The maintenance yard collection rain gauge was installed approximately 20 feet from the official digital rain gauge. The data shows a slight variation between the recorded rainfalls by these two different styles of gauges. Collecting additional rainfall data should allow us to eventually determine if there is a consistent bias between the two and how much of the noted differences are due to actual rainfall variations resulting from the short spacing between the two rain gauges. Even these relatively weak rainstorms resulted in some variation in rainfall based on the rain gauges locations. Even though the differences appear minor they still represent a 16% variation between the maximum and minimum rainfall
values. This same percentage value would have resulted in a difference in rainfall of 0.3 inches for the stronger mid-january rainstorm. DATE OF RAINSTORM "OFFICIAL" RAIN GAUGE TABLE 1: RECENT RAINFALL AMOUNTS MAINTENANCE YARD RAIN GAUGE KIOSK RAIN GAUGE RAIN GAUGE #2 RAIN GAUGE #4 RAIN GAUGE #5 12/13 Feb '18 0.16 inches 0.15 inches 0.155 inches 0.155 inches 0.18 inches 0.17 inches 26 Feb '18 0.28 inches 0.265 inches 0.27 inches 0.27 inches 0.32 inches 0.32 inches NOTES: 1. "Official" rain gauge is a digital rain gauge located within the Maintenance Yard 2. Maintenance Yard rain gauge is a new style collection rain gauge located just outside the Maintenance Yard near the "official" rain gauge 3. Kiosk rain gauge is a new style collection rain gauge located just west of the entrance kiosk 4. Rain gauge #2 is a new style collection rain gauge located off the north leg of the Antelope Loop Trail 5. Rain gauge #4 is a new style collection rain gauge located near the old well 6. Rain gauge #5 is a new style collection rain gauge located near the northwest corner of the north leg of the Poppy Loop Trail 7. Rain gauge #6 is a new style collection rain gauge located near the head end of the valley above the small wooden bridge on the north leg of the Poppy Loop Trail A new style rain gauge was also installed during this visit. This completes replacement of the old style rain gauges. At this time, we are considering installing rain gauges at two new locations. One is in the southwest corner of the south leg of the Poppy Loop Trail and the second is at the very eastern end of the Lightning Bolt Trail. These two new gauges would provide a more complete picture of the rainfall variation across the Reserve. Almost every visit to the Reserve provides the researchers with what we consider are special moments. I end this posting describing three that happened during this afternoon visit. The first was two, low altitude flyovers by a raptor; tentatively identified as a red-tailed hawk. We don t know if it was the same bird coming over us twice or two separate raptors but, in either case, it is always a special opportunity to see these beautiful birds up close. The second special moment was seeing a coyote loping down the Tehachapi Trail in the middle of the afternoon. Mary Wilson has reported seeing coyotes when she visits the Reserve early in the morning but it is very unusual to see a coyote during the middle of the day. I have probably previously seen coyotes during the day only two or three times in the sixteen years of volunteering at the Reserve. Most often, we will hear the coyotes start calling each other at deep dusk and then, if we are really lucky, see a pack move onto the Reserve from south of Lancaster Road a short time later. The final special moment was spooking up a jack rabbit and watching it bound off. It is nice to have proof that rabbits are on the Reserve because, without any real evidence, I suspect that it is rabbits that are harvesting the leaves of young poppy plants leaving only a chewed end to the stem. I m going to attempt to continue to prepare and post News Flashes for individual visits to the Reserve to report the major findings but won t promise to cover each and every Reserve visit. It would be valuable to receive feedback if these postings are enjoyed. My email address is: mfpowell@verizon.net
POPPY PLANT FIGURE 2: POPPY PLANT IN EAST RIDGE MONITORING PLOT FIGURE 3: POPPY PLANT ALONG EDGE OF TRAIL NORTH OF PICNIC AREA
RED FILAREE LEAVES FIGURE 4: FILAREE TRUE LEAVES TURNED RED TRUE LEAF RED DICOTYLEDON FIGURE 5: UNIDENTIFIED PLANT WITH TRUE LEAVES
FIGURE 6: GOLDEN BUSH WITH BUDS FIGURE 7: APRICOT MALLOW WITH BUD