San Diego Wildflowers
Looks like we get a great wildflower season in San Diego county after all the rains! :)
Go HERE to look at the "wildflower meter"
Well-spaced rains promise spectacular wildflower season
 JOHN GASTALDO / Union-Tribune photos
Tom and Dorothy Hogan of Columbus, Ohio, this
week hiked the Palm Canyon trail in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park,
where recent rains have produced a burst of wildflowers the likes of
which has not been seen in nearly three years.
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October's wildfires may add even more drama: Plants known as “fire followers” are expected to have a field day in the burned areas. That means morning glories, fire poppies and golden eardrops should be out in force.
From Point Loma in the southwest corner of the county to the Anza-Borrego desert in the northeast, the region's natural landmarks – along with manmade spots such as freeway interchanges – are packed with multihued displays of the incoming spring.
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View an interactive field guide
“It should be a great spring, so enjoy the outdoors,” said Cindy Burrascano at the California Native Plant Society in San Diego County.
The major exception is the southeast part of the county, where the flower show is not looking good because it missed out on most of the showers.
The exhibits countywide range from subtle – certain flowers are so small that they require a magnifying glass for good viewing – to kaleidoscopes of color that stretch as far as the eye can see.
Some native cactuses and shrubs, including the bush sunflower, offer eye-catching blooms after a series of rains.
But people typically associate springtime wildflowers with annual botanicals, such as Spanish needles and three-spots. These plants burst onto the scene when the combination of moisture and sunshine is just right.
The explosion of hundreds of plant species typically lures tens of thousands of residents to parks and preserves. Most will be armed with cameras to capture glimpses of nature in its showiest form. Chances are, they will notice old favorites – and discover new gems.
“If people get out and start looking at these landscapes, they are going to be blown away by our local plant diversity,” said Jon Rebman, curator of botany at the San Diego Natural History Museum.
The county is home to some 2,400 different kinds of plants, about half of which are annuals, Rebman said.
Like most flower enthusiasts in the county, he is particularly interested in what will emerge from the roughly 368,000 acres that were scarred by the October wildfires.
Along with volunteers and staff members, Rebman is scouring the landscape to document what nature offers. They expect to see some well-known opportunists, such as the giant-flower phacelia, but they count on finding some surprises, too.
“We don't even know exactly what to predict in terms of what species will come up,” he said. “We are still learning.”
Part of the reason is that “fire followers” are unpredictable. For instance, their seeds may lie dormant for decades before something triggers them to sprout.
Some seeds are activated by the chemicals in fire smoke; others break their dormancy amid the heat of the flames. In still other cases, the excess soil nutrients from the fire ash is the signal.
“As varied as the wildflowers will be, so are the strategies for dealing with fire,” Rebman said.
At the San Diego National Wildlife Refuge in the South Bay, the chocolate lilies started bursting out of the fire-charred ground in early February. The refuge was burned extensively in October, and now native plants are competing with invasive weeds for dominance of the landscape.
While staff members struggle to control the weeds, they are thrilled by glimpses of the native landscape.
“There are parts that are exquisitely beautiful because the native bulbs are coming up,” said refuge official Andrew Yuen.
Even if the county hadn't suffered a firestorm last fall, it still would have plenty to show after the wet storm track in recent weeks.
Coastal areas such as Cabrillo National Monument started lighting up with flowers in January, said Andrea Compton, chief of natural resource science at the park.
“Our coastal sage scrub is coming alive right now,” she said. “We expect our hillside to be golden within next month or so.”
That's partly due to the bush sunflower, which produces yellow heads atop mounding green foliage. It's particularly impressive this year compared to last year, when “you could really see the effects of drought by (less) blooming of the shrub,” Compton said.
On hills and mountains, look for colors from Palmer lilacs, baby blue eyes and popcorn flowers.
“They are just everywhere,” Michael Simpson, a biology professor at San Diego State, said after a hike up Cowles Mountain at Mission Trails Regional Park last month. “There is an enthusiasm and excitement about all these wildflowers coming up.”
The rain also transforms the desert, which seems almost magical in its ability to turn rapidly from brown to green.
This year's wildflower blooms probably won't be as spectacular as they were in 2005 – when it rained about three times as much at the Anza-Borrego park, and flowers seemed to pour out of every crag and canyon. For almost three years since, it's been too dry for grand displays.
Then came the recent series of storms.
The precipitation has revived hope for a solid wildflower season on the wetter west edge of the park. Park officials said they have received about 4.4 inches of rain since July 1. That's less than average, but the rainfall was spread out enough to encourage substantial growth of flowers such as phacelia and brown-eyed evening primroses.
“It's very important that it not rain too hard” all at once, so that it soaks into the ground, said Michael Rodriques, who manages the visitor center at Anza-Borrego.
He said each square yard of desert is littered with thousands of seeds of flowers such as sand verbena, chicory and many others. Those seeds are nature's hedge against drought and other adverse conditions. In any given winter, only some of them will spring to life, leaving others as backups for following years.
Rodriques is optimistic about the park's chances for a formidable set of blooms.
A true wildflower season, he said, “is an absolute miracle.”
Every few days, Chester posts his online “trail reports” about the park and other spots around Southern California. Those updates – at tchester.org – provide detailed information about many species.
“There were so many annual plants growing along my route that in many places I couldn't avoid stepping on them, which always tugs at my heart,” he said after a Feb. 2 outing at Anza-Borrego.
The next week, he visited the park under wispy clouds. Chester and his small cadre of volunteers charted each type of plant they found in Palm Canyon, which was covered in a green stubble of vegetation.
To Chester, several of the shoots were worth locating with his hand-held Global Positioning System and jotting in his notebook. He plans to leave his records for posterity as a way to mark botanical changes in the park.
The region's first rain of the season was Nov. 30, providing Chester a handy reference point to track the growth of annual plants that were “born” in the following days.
“I have been taking baby pictures and I have (watched) them getting bigger,” Chester said. “It will end with them in bloom.”
Mike Lee: (619) 542-4570; mike.lee@uniontrib.com
Crossposted to LJ, itemid = undefined
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