Saturday, March 26, 2016

New Spring Finds at Tejon Ranch by Dr. Mike White, Conservation Science Director



Spring 2016 at Tejon Ranch is off to an exciting start!  Lots of great work by our partners continues to demonstrate not only how important the Ranch is for protecting California’s biodiversity but also that it is an important place to better understand how our biodiversity originated. For example, you may remember that Dr. Jim Parham from California State University Fullerton posted a blog on his work with legless lizards in the genus Anniella back in August http://tejonconservancy.blogspot.com/2015/08/surveying-for-legless-lizards-on-tejon.html

Jim and his colleague Dr. Ted Papenfuss from the Berkeley Museum of Vertebrate Zoology have been studying legless lizards to better understand how the different species are distributed across California and related to each other in order to better understand the factors that drove the evolution of these species.  Last year we found a juvenile legless lizard under a coverboard (actually a piece of cardboard on the ground), but juveniles can’t be positively identified without looking at their DNA.  This year we went back to the same spot and found another adult legless lizard that has been positively identified as (drumroll please…) the Bakersfield legless lizard (Anniella grinnelli)!  We also found a Bakersfield legless lizard along the Caliente Creek drainage at the edge of the northern part of Tejon Ranch, and another juvenile legless lizard at the Panofsky property also along Caliente Creek http://tejonconservancy.blogspot.com/2015/08/the-conservancy-receives-its-first_31.html

Bakersfield legless lizard (Anniella grinnelli).  Photo by Todd Pierson

Bakersfield legless lizard.  Photo by Alex Krohn.

As explained by Jim in his blog, the Bakersfield legless lizard was only known to occur in two locations north and northwest of Tejon Ranch.

Previous distribution map with new locations of Bakersfield legless lizard shown as purple stars.

These new records extend the known range of the Bakersfield legless lizard over 15 miles to the extreme southern end of the San Joaquin Valley.  In addition, the Bakersfield legless lizard that Jim found along Caliente Creek extends the range of the species up that drainage as well.  Interestingly Jim and Ted have found the Southern California legless lizard (Anniella stebbinsi) along Caliente Creek near the Caliente Post Office, a mere 6 miles from the new Bakersfield legless lizard record on Caliente Creek. And it gets better.  The Panofsky property lies between these two locations, so the juvenile legless lizard that we found on Panofsky will allow us to further refine our understanding of the distribution of these species in this region and where one species transitions to another.  The Tehachapi Pass traversed by Caliente Creek is an interesting area that connects the Great Central Valley to the Mojave Desert and the rest of Southern California.  It looks like the contact point between the Southern California and Bakersfield legless lizards could be at Tejon Ranch!

Another animal we found under the legless lizard coverboards was a long-nosed snake (Rhinocheilus leconte), a first for me. The gorgeous long-nosed snake is the only member of its genus, which is endemic to North America (found nowhere else in the world but North America).  The long-nosed snake burrows through the sand like the legless lizard and may prey on legless lizards.
Long-nosed snake (Rhinocheilus leconte) pretending to be a rattlesnake.

In other news from the spring, Nick Jensen continues to make significant new plant finds at Tejon Ranch.  Nick added a new native plant from the morning glory family, spreading alkaliweed (Cressa truxillensis), to the Ranch list.  However the really cool find in the same area was the San Joaquin Valley endemic Lost Hills crownscale (Atriplex coronata var. vallicola), which is a California Native Plant Society List 1B.2 plant (plant considered rare, threatened, or endangered in California and elsewhere).
 
Lost Hills crownscale (Atriplex coronata var. vallicola).  Photo by Nick Jensen.
 And just to give you a taste of what is starting on the Antelope Valley side of the Ranch.  A few photos of the wildflower bloom from this past week.
Hillside daisies and Phacelia on clay soils in the western foothills.
Nonnative filaree (Erodium spp.) puts on a show in Canyon del Gato Montes.
 
California poppies and hillside daisies.
 
Hillside daisies and Phacelia brighten the landscape where clay soils occur.

As you can see, Tejon Ranch continues to slowly reveal her hidden gems, and our knowledge grows with each of those revelations.  We hope that you will join us in experiencing, exploring, and enjoying, as well as protecting, enhancing and restoring Tejon Ranch.  Check out our website for upcoming activities!

Thursday, March 10, 2016

2016 Winter Weather Summary


Snow along Blue Ridge and the green skirts of the Tehachapis.

If you weren’t paying close attention, you may have almost missed the wet El Niño weather we were so hoping for. On the cusp between Southern and Central California, Tejon Ranch did benefit from a higher frequency and amount of precipitation from the weather systems that seemed to stay rather north this winter. Although this was not a record precipitation season on the Ranch, analysis of our weather station data show some differences in both temperature and rainfall when compared to the same time last year.

November 2015




Region
Temperature (°F)
Precipitation (in.)
Average
Maximum
Minimum
San Joaquin Valley
50.6
80.5
32.8
1.65
Tehachapi Mtns.
41.6
70.0
21.8
0.49
Antelope Valley
46.8
74.9
26.6
0.98





December 2015




Region
Temperature (°F)
Precipitation (in.)
Average
Maximum
Minimum
San Joaquin Valley
44.5
67.6
31.0
1.15
Tehachapi Mtns.
39.5
66.4
20.3
1.33
Antelope Valley
42.5
70.0
27.0
3.92





January 2016




Region
Temperature (°F)
Precipitation (in.)
Average
Maximum
Minimum
San Joaquin Valley
48.4
65.0
32.4
2.76
Tehachapi Mtns.
42.2
67.7
26.6
2.15
Antelope Valley
44.2
61.4
24.9
2.72

Curiously, both the Tehachapi Mountains and Antelope Valley precipitation data is very similar to the winter of 2015. Due to access issues, we were relegated to using this winter’s mountain weather station data from our office in Lebec, which is probably not indicative of the higher elevations of the range—the real level of precipitation may be higher. The other station data were averaged by region. From our existing data, the real eye-opening difference between our comparative months in 2015 and 2016 was the amount of precipitation recorded in the San Joaquin Valley—a difference of over 4 inches! It’s no small wonder that the Ranch is gloriously abloom this year when compared to last. 
Fields of golden fiddleheads just east of Arvin.

Precipitation (in.)
Region
2015
2016
San Joaquin Valley
1.02
5.56
Tehachapi Mtns.
3.76
3.97
Antelope Valley
8.37
7.62
 
Emerging poppy patches in the Tejon Hills.
Additionally, all regions of the Ranch tended to be several degrees cooler this winter when compared to 2015—until February. February data will be assessed by our fantastic volunteer docents (thank you Richard and Lisa Chapleau!) in a few weeks, but we know anecdotally that last month was unseasonably warm and dry—prompting the lower elevations of the Ranch to burst into early bloom. Peak bloom this early is not a common occurrence, according to Tejon locals. While meteorologists predict a cool and wet March, all bets are off with how the biology of the Ranch will respond to this roller coaster that is modern California weather. 

Stay tuned for the next installment of our quarterly weather saga to see what happens next! Better yet, come out and visit us and see for yourself!