GGNRA Endangered Species Big Year

The loneliest plant in San Francisco

The Sierra Club, together with 10 other Bay Area conservation groups under the leadership of Nature in the City, is co-sponsoring the 2008 Endangered Species Big Year project to increase awareness of and help protect the 33 endangered and threatened species found within the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. The GGNRA contains more endangered species than any other national park in North America. Big Year participants are encouraged to get to know these species and explore the diverse habitats of the GGNRA while helping each of the 33 endangered and threatened species that call the park home.

This month we are focusing on the 11 endangered plants associated with the GGNRA. Their status is a reminder of the importance of preserving open space and original habitat.

Tell me, plant, oh what's the reason, though it is your flow'ring season,
And your blooms invite the bees in, yet seeds - you do produce no more?
Quoth the Raven's, "Nevermore."

Spring (actually January to March), when a manzanita's fancy turns to pollination, is perhaps the loneliest time of all for the Raven's manzanita. The lone living wild specimen of this evergreen shrub, which sprouted over a century ago at its secret site in San Francisco's Presidio, bursts into bloom. The bees buzz round its bell-shaped blossoms in anticipation. But incapable of self-pollination, it sets no viable seed. Since botanists at the Presidio Native Plants Nursery have (so far) been able to produce only clones, it is probably the last plant of its kind.

Discovered by and named after prominent botanist and San Francisco native Peter Raven, the Raven's manzanita (Arctostaphylos hookeri ssp. ravenii, aka Presidio manzanita) grows close to the ground on serpentine soil. At one time the Raven's manzanita could be found in multiple locations throughout San Francisco, but its habitat was destroyed by San Francisco's urban growth. Populations were extirpated near the Laurel Hill Cemetery (now bounded by California, Geary, Parker, and Presidio Streets), the Masonic Cemetery (now part of the University of San Francisco campus), and the Protestant Orphan Asylum at Haight and Laguna Streets. No plants were salvaged.

Of the 11 endangered plants found in the GGNRA, eight grow only on serpentine soil. Serpentine, the California state rock, apple-green to black in color, is produced deep in the earth during the subduction of oceanic crust under the edge of the North American continent and has been brought to the surface by a predecessor of the San Andreas Fault. Because of the low calcium, high magnesium, and heavy metal content of these soils, few plants grow on them, and those that do grow on them usually have extremely restricted geographic distributions.

A mostly private plant

One of our few non-serpentine endangered plants is the showy Indian clover (Trifolium amoenum), a member of the pea family, which grows up to two feet tall and produces beautiful white-tipped purple petals up to an inch in diameter. It is an exceptional nectar plant for bees and butterflies, and like many clovers it was long gathered by indigenous populations for food and medicine.

Initial restoration efforts at Point Reyes have been encouraging, but the best-established wild populations are elsewhere in Marin County on private lands at risk of development. These are threatened because of a loophole in the Endangered Species Act. While the Act prohibits most killing of endangered animals anywhere, it generally allows killing of endangered plants on private property.

Moreover, endangered plants receive far fewer resources from federal agencies than animals: while nearly 60% of all endangered species are plants, they receive only about 3% of the overall funding for endangered species.

Conservation organizations are working to fix these flaws by amending the Endangered Species Act.

WhatYouCanDo

A good place to find serpentine and help protect the endangered plants that it fosters is Inspiration Point in the Presidio, where you can help the Presidio Park Stewards restore the endangered Presidio clarkia (Clarkia franciscana) and Marin dwarf-flax (Hesperolinon congestum). The endangered San Francisco lessingia (Lessingia germanorum), which grows on a few of the Presidio's dunes, has benefited from the Stewards' restoration activities at Lobos Creek. To join the Park Stewards, contact Lew Stringer at (415)561-4856.

San Mateo County contains the endangered serpentine-growing San Mateo thornmint (Acanthomintha obovata ssp. duttonii) and San Mateo woolly sunflower (Eriophyllum latilobum). To volunteer in restoration activities, go to www.friendsofedgewood.org

The Tiburon Open Space District and Marin Open Space District, (415) 572-6989, organize habitat restoration for the Tiburon paintbrush (Castilleja affinis ssp. neglecta).

The white-rayed pentachaeta (Pentachaeta bellidiflora) was once widespread, but is now restricted to a single population in the San Francisco Water Department's Peninsula watershed. This species is particularly threatened by invasive non-native plants, in particular by Lolium multiflorum, Italian ryegrass. You can help fight back by joining the GGNRA "Weed Watchers", organized by the National Park Service Inventory and Monitoring Program; to sign up, contact andrea_williams -at- nps.gov

To defend endangered plants on private lands, political action is needed. Contact Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer at:

U.S. Senate
Washington, DC 20510

Feinstein: (202) 224-3841
Boxer: (202) 224-3553
www.senate.gov

and your representative at:

House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515
www.house.gov

Ask them to provide Equal Protection for Plants, amending the Endangered Species Act to provide the same protection for plants that it currently provides for animals - through all of its policies, programs, and penalties.

More information on this campaign is available at the Native Plant Conservation Campaign web site (click at left on "Equal Protection for Plants").

For a calendar of scheduled restoration events and links to more information about these campaigns, see the GGNRA Endangered Species Big Year web site

The Big Year will be holding an Endangered Species Day party on Sun., May 18, at 11:30 am at Rodeo Lagoon/Fort Cronkhite. (This is not a Sierra Club event.)

Pete Klosterman and Brent Plater

 

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© 2008 San Francisco Sierra Club Yodeler