Anna's nest

A nest of a Calypte anna - Anna's Hummingbird Colibri d'Anna (French), Colibrí coronirrojo (Spanish). She decorated it with lichen and built it on a scrub oak (Querqus berberidifolia) that was burned in the 2007 Witch Creek fire that burned thousands of homes. The scrub oak has a huge burl that it resprouts from after fire. This one wasn't burned at a very hot temp so you can see it resprouting underneath her nest. This is away from houses and gardens, her main nectar plants seemed to be Mimulus aurantiacus and Lonicera interrupta Keckiella cordifolia and Penstemon spectabilis.






I tried my best not to disturb the mother hummer when i took these, i used my camera zoom and took the pictures quickly then left. The nest is about at eye-level on this burned scrub oak. The male Anna's get all the attention, so here is a female in her well crafted and decorated nest.




To me the chick looks more than a few days old but the other egg hasn't hatched yet. Do you think the other egg is a "dud" or they hatch staggered more than a couple days?




And here is a skull of one I found on the ground a few years ago. so delicate...

Sarcostemma cynanchoides ssp. hartwegii

Sarcostemma cynanchoides ssp. hartwegii - climbing milkweed

The ones that grow at Torrey Pines state park on the coast do get visited by the monarchs that rest on the pines during their migration. The inland populations such as these don't seem to get as many monarchs but the Tarantula Hawk wasp (Pepsis formosa) use these as nectar plants. Also the milky sap smells like rotten onions to me but does not seem to be caustic as some species are. Supposedly the only stem-succulent plant native to Australia is a Sarcostemma species (no cacti or euphorbs are native) . Another species (S. hirtellum) usually found in the desert has flowers that smell like onions. Deer will eat the spring shoots and new growth. Perhapse this is why they seem (to me) to be most plentiful in cactus patches where the mule deer cant get at them.





See the Mutant flower! The one on the upper right has an extra sixth petal and 6 orbicular appendages on the corona instead of 5. Milkweed floral morphology confuses me so if I called the parts by the wrong name please correct me.

Matilija

The house burned down in the Oct 2007 Witch Creek firey. They have not rebuilt and the lot has been usurped by Matilija Poppies (Romneya coulteri) among other things.

Crest Canyon

Torrey sandstone with haemetite nodules:





This cryptic geophyte Dudleya brevifolia grows here:




Both the plant and the substrate it grows on are endangered.