Does the highway department expect goat-caused landslides?
Chaparral forest reaches to the horizon in the Mayacamas Range, not yet within range of the billy goat duo, but crawling with feral swine, and ganja (from Sanskrit) farmers.
Manzanitas are in full bloom by mid-February. Genus: Arctostaphylos.
Honey bees and a few bumble bees attended them.
New shoots of marah oregonus/ coastal manroot/western wild cucumber/ old man in the ground.
The marah genus, characterized by extreme bitterness, is named for Marah in Exodus, a place of bitter water. Various indigenous peoples used it to treat aching hands, venereal disease, sores, and kidney trouble.
Uncannily concealed in the heart of a quince bush, the four foot tall lodge of dusky footed woodrats, is manufactured from nipped stems.
The southwest cornerstone of Two Buck Ranch.
Blossoms of February. Daffodils and plums.
Puddles in the pear and walnut packing yard.
The red line shows the boundaries of the Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument, designated in the summer of 2015. This swathe of the inner Coast Range is a hundred miles long.
California is an Oak Island. Oaks are intrinsic to our regional identity, both ecologically and culturally. The delicate tracery of green on the map indicates just how limited is the range of our several oak species.
This is the range map of the king of oaks: The California Valley Oak, Quercus Lobata.
All but wiped from the map of it's preferred habitat, the Central Valley, it survives in vestige pockets.
