Walt
Fidler, Jim Roberts, Abbyann Sisk, and I had a flower-filled hike in
the vicinity of the Vallecito Creek Wash Road below its junction with
the Arroyo Heuso. We came to enjoy the carpets of sand verbena
reported by Fred Melgert and Carla Hoegen, and boy, did we see
carpets of Abronia; wow!
I posted eight obs of the
Abronia from throughout the trip. Many of these include pano
shots showing the territory here. The last obs below has
multi-colored variants for the flowers.
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141844624
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141844625
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141844626
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141844627
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141844628
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141844629
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141844632
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141844633
We weren't the only ones enjoying the Abronia.
There were clouds of Painted Lady butterflies on the Abronia wherever
we went. But it was frustrating to try to take pix of them,
since they were a skittish bunch. I got lucky with the first
post below, since one butterfly was very intent on getting nectar
from the Abronia flowers.
My pix from five times during
the day:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141824671
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141824669
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141823547
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141823549
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141823550
Abbyann's pix:
http://tchester.org/temp/221110/sisk/painted_lady_P1001430.jpg
Jim took a pix of a Queen butterfly:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141911707
We enjoyed a fair number of other species in bloom,
too, mostly the usual monsoonal suspects. In addition, we saw
Astragalus insularis harwoodii in bloom, that we got all excited
about in early 2019 in this area, as well as a few younger plants.
My post of A. insularis harwoodii:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141846635
Jim's post:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141900580
Wherever we went, there were huge numbers of
frostmat plants. Jim's post:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141913235
Some usual monsoonal suspects were much less
numerous here than in other places. We did see some Pectis, but
only as scattered plants, never a carpet. We saw only two
plants of Amaranthus fimbriatus, and a few plants of Stillingia
spinulosa. Boerhavia was almost non-existent here, only a small
number of plants of B. wrightii. Despite this being a wash
area, Datura discolor was only found in a few patches where it
appeared wetter, from the dried-up mud. There were also few
plants of Kallstroemia californica.
In addition to
the fields of Abronia villosa, there were fields of Plantago ovata,
coloring the ground silvery-green in many places. My posts:
P.
ovata fields:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141849107
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141849109
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141849112
One plant was especially interesting; P. ovata with
"rabbit ears":
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141849115
Jim and I posted 116 obs of 64 species, including
some posts from Scissors Crossing and two stops near Agua Caliente
County Park:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?on=2022-11-10&place_id=95385&user_id=jimirob1,tchester
Jim posted a whopping 90 obs of 60 species; I
posted 26 obs of 9 species.
Abbyann posted one
observation linked below, which can't be included above since it has
the wrong date on it.
Details:
There
were only a few plants of Encelia actoni and Senecio flaccidus in
bloom along S2 in the San Felipe Valley. The Pectis fields had
all faded away.
I met Jim and Abbyann at Scissors
Crossing at 10:30 a.m.
In Shelter Valley, the
Pectis fields still had some yellow color.
We
seemed to be going back in time, to a time with more flowers, as we
traveled south. The Pectis started looking fresher near the
Vallecito Stage Station County Park. As we rounded the curve in
S2 where S2 heads south toward Agua Caliente, and the road parallels
Vallecito Creek for a short distance, fields of happy Datura discolor
appeared. We stopped to photograph them. Jim's post:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141933319
On the walk back to the car, Abbyann spotted a
beautiful Chamaesyce pediculifera (= Euphorbia p.), Carrizo Mountain
spurge, with its distinctive flowers (two long petaloid appendages
and two short) in head-like clusters at each node.
My
post:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141859172
Jim's post:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141932638
The ocotillos, however, were beginning to discard
their leaves. Plenty were still green, but a noticeable number
were in "fall color".
We stopped at Agua
Caliente, which was looking very good now. There were fields of
Cryptantha angustifolia next to S2.
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141859264
We met Walt at the beginning of the Vallecito Wash
Road.
We car-caravaned on the Wash Road, intending to
play it by ear as to where we'd park for our hike.
The
first thing we noticed on the drive along the first part of the
Vallecito Wash Road were the rabbitbrush, Ericam paniculata, in
bloom. I had forgotten about them; what a bonus!
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141859561
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141859562
Abbyann made another good find, a sand wasp on a
rabbitbrush:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141935555
This is a different species than the ones we found
sleeping together at SnJt, since the pattern on its back is very
different, a "horseshoe" or "omega" instead of a
face. Compare to the feline face here:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/132316230
The environs of the road got better and better, and
when we saw wonderful carpets of sand verbena at the junction with
the Arroyo Heuso, we parked there.
We spent 45 minutes
surveying the vicinity around the car, finding good diversity there,
ate lunch, and then started hiking to the southeast in the vicinity
of the road.
We actually first hiked directly south, to
get to the base of the hills on the southwest side of Vallecito
Creek. But it got less interesting in that area, since it was
less sandy.
We then headed directly east to a sandy area,
and the fields of Abronia returned. We hiked to the base of the
hills there, which had numerous plants of both Dalea species.
We
then hiked southeast, but that section was fairly uninteresting,
mostly being a huge field of Plantago.
Things picked up
again farther southeast.
We were hiking toward some
pretty dramatic scenery. Abbyann took this pix of Jim and me in
front of that scenery:
http://tchester.org/temp/221110/sisk/tom_jim_heading_into_interesting_area_brighter_P1001499.jpg
We found just a handful of plants of
spectacle-pod. Jim's post:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141915187
We turned around at 3:15 p.m., crossed over the the
southwest side of the road, and mostly hiked back to the car.
We
did find five plants of turtleback along that route, two of which
were blooming. My posts:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141860290
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141860292
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141860293
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141860295
And I spotted a single monkeyflower in bloom.
Jim's pix:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141912136
Near the car, I gathered some fruit of Abronia for
Eric LoPresti, an Abronia researcher, who was curious as to whether
these "unseasonal" plants would set fruit. I tried to
cut open the fruit to check for seeds, but the perianth clings so
tightly to the seed that I couldn't do it.
Eric gave me
the tip how to expose the seed; use fingernail clippers! That
did the trick; see the last pix here, which shows a developed seed:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/141844624
We got back to the cars at 4:25 p.m., with just
enough light to show Walt the Chamaesyce pediculifera north of Agua
Caliente, since he had never seen that species. We weren't 100%
sure we could relocate it, since we didn't have easy access to a GPS
point for it, and we didn't have a clear memory of exactly where it
was. Fortunately, the collective recollections of Jim, Abbyann,
and myself, had enough information to pinpoint the spot where we had
parked and seen it.
Finding the single observed plant was
then the last difficulty. I was worried I might have parked on
top of it, or driven over it. But within less than a minute, Jim
cried out "Bingo!", making for a perfect end to a good
day. (:-)
--
tom
chester
