Our weather has finally turned, if only temporarily, and the smoke in the sky has (blessedly) lessened. It is such a treat to get outdoors, to hike and to garden! I will never be complacent about clear air again. Today I plan to get the winter garlic and spinach seeds in the ground. I am woefully behind in these tasks. I must admit that the school workload this fall is much heavier than it ever has been before and I am struggling to get through it all! Meanwhile, I am in the process of rethinking my entire garden space, which is a huge project to contemplate and will have to be done in fits and starts. I very much feel an urgency to plant for the future, which will likely be as hot and as smoky as it has been this summer, and at least as dry. This will require me to rethink my plant choices and, in fact, the entire layout of my garden.
I’ve been interested to read several good articles about plant life and fire. The first is from the University of California Botanical Garden in Berkeley.
Here’s the relevant info, though I think it’s worth reading the entire article: “While there are much data pointing to the beneficial effects of fires on plants, especially in regard to acting as an environmental cue for seed germination and in seed dispersal, in general, as for humans, smoke and ash are detrimental to plants. Chemically, more than 100 different compounds have been identified in smoke, including toxic levels of nitrous oxide, sulfur dioxide and ozone. Short-term exposure to smoke (as little as 20 minutes) has been reported to reduce photosynthesis by as much as 50%, as a consequence of both the destruction of chlorophyll, the light-capturing green pigment, and in impeding the movement of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the plant through leaf pores (stomata)” (Dr. Lew Feldman, garden director, UC Berkeley Botanical Garden). He goes on to say that ash may have a beneficial impact on our soil, at least in small quantities, but that it might acidify it slightly. This made me think of how people used to spread their fireplace ashes over the garden to enrich the soil. That usually happened in the fallow season to prepare for the next crop, though. I’m sure we’ll begin to see some studies that help us understand how smoke and ash affect our gardens in the coming years.
image credit: UCANR
The Master Gardeners (also a UC program around here) sent out an interesting email which said, “In our summer issue, featuring Firescaping, we emphasized how ALL plants can burn under the right conditions. California natives are no exception. As a matter of fact some of them are quite flammable. Proper selection and maintenance are key! Considering the current devastating wildfires and extremely unhealthy air stretching over our western states, we'd like to revisit some important features of fire-resistant plants. Look for the following characteristics:
store water in leaves or stems
produce very little dead or fine material
possess extensive, deep root systems for controlling erosion
maintain high moisture content with limited watering
grow slowly and need little maintenance
low growing in form
contain low levels of volatile oils or resins
open & loose branching habit with a low volume of total vegetation.”
This also helps me with my plan as I move forward with new garden design. Many home owners around here have basically given up on their gardens, and either “landscape” with rocks or mulch, or just leave dead grass in their expansive front yards. I think we can figure something better out. I have always had multiple goals for our garden: it must feed us, feed the ecosystem, regenerate the soil, conserve resources, and look pretty. The list hasn’t changed, but I now want to add “future climate friendly” as well.
While working on a paper a couple of days ago, my attention wandered to a squirrel in our front garden. The squirrels (mostly fox squirrels) are very active this time of year, collecting the enormous acorns from our valley oak tree, and burying them mostly in my pots of bulbs, which is very annoying. One particular squirrel has figured out a path from our fence to our gate to our roof, and s/he goes back and forth constantly. I was watching her when suddenly she dropped down flat onto her belly on the fence. I was worried that she was sick or dying, but when I looked it up, it turns out this is a defensive posture. According to Geography Realm, “the act of lying flat hides the lighter colored belly of a squirrel. The fur color on the outer side of a squirrel evolved to help the squirrel blend in with its environment… the posture of lying flat on a surface also helps to protect the vital organs of a squirrel should it be attacked.” We have several kinds of flying predators around here, day and night, so I wonder if the squirrel saw a hawk and immediately dropped? She stayed there for about ten minutes, and then went back to her usual pattern of roof-gate-fence. There is another squirrel who tends to hang out in the back garden, who is missing a foot. I’m hoping these are all signs that the predators are becoming more numerous in our yard. We often hear owls at night, quite close, and since we have a perennial family of rats living in the compost, we are hoping that their numbers are being thinned by them. We can use all the help we can get!
I heard a sparrow in the garden yesterday, which made me realize that I hadn’t heard one in quite a while. That led me to wonder if sparrows migrate.
image credit: UC Santa Cruz
Well, it turns out, they do. Here in central/northern California, the year-round temperature is fairly mild, so we don’t often think about things migrating. It doesn’t seem as neccessary as it would from say, Michigan to Florida. But there are lots of things that migrate to escape colder temperatures, or to find food, or to breed in different places. It turns out that golden-crowned sparrows (like the one pictured above) spend winters in the Bay Area, and head north to Alaska to breed in the spring and summer. According to study published by PRBO, “Each bird, which weighs approximately 30 grams, migrated from 1600 to 2400 miles one-way to their breeding grounds. Their individual breeding locations spanned approximately 750 miles along the coast of Alaska, and their north migration averaged only 29 days while southbound migration averaged nearly twice that (53 days).” This kind of distance blows my mind. White-crowned sparrows (also commonly seen and heard in my garden in the wintertime) also make this kind of migration each year. “Breeders in mountains mostly migrate to wintering grounds in lowland southern California and south into Mexico, departing in September and returning in April and May. Coastal breeders mostly present year-round; not migratory (Mewaldt et al. 1968). Other individuals winter elsewhere in California lowlands and foothills and migrate to Canada and Alaska in April and May; often return to same wintering sites the following September or October (Mewaldt 1976). In montane habitats, fairly widespread in fall, but descend below heavy snows for winter and spring (Grinnell and Miller 1944)” (CA Dep’t of Fish and Wildlife). So do song sparrows. “Song Sparrows are resident throughout much of their range, although the northernmost populations are migratory. Resident populations extend as far north as coastal Alaska. The wintering range stretches across the southern United States and dips into northern Mexico. Birds at high altitudes may also descend into the lowlands during the winter” (Birdweb).
I’m glad to have the sparrows back in residence! They contribute beautiful songs during the dawn chorus, and I enjoy the music.
Lastly, have you seen the new David Attenborough documentary? I found it very compelling. What a career this man has had, and what amazing things he has seen! I love that he considers this documentary his “witness statement.” It is not an easy thing to watch, as he lays both history and the future of the environment out in plain language. But I believe that we, too, are witnesses. And as such, we cannot turn away from this. It enrages me that the political debates include few questions about climate, and are often phrased “do you believe?” or “what will you eliminate?” Let’s get past all that. Let’s start asking, “what is your plan to DO? how will that look? how will we all be included?“ Let’s be honest about what it will cost. The truth is, it will cost us everything; it will be enormously expensive, far more than Covid has been. But it must be done. I would encourage everyone to start accepting and facing what’s to come, and vote accordingly (though I will readily concede that from a climate perspective, there is no perfect candidate; so ask yourself, which candidate will get us further faster?).
On that note, I’m off to plant garlic. What’s happening in your garden this weekend?