The sugarstick is a parasitic plant that relies on the Western Matsutake mushroom.
Naturalist’s Notebook: A Plant That Relies on a Mushroom
January 18, 2022 •
Botany
The study and science of plants.
Learning to Love Dandelions
November 4, 2021 •
It’s the epitome of the unwanted weed — but there are reasons to choose to want dandelions.
Redwood Memory
June 23, 2021 •
Old redwood trees have seen fire many times in their lives. It’s because of their fire scars—not in spite of them—that the redwood forest thrives.
After the Lightning Fires in the East Bay Parks
June 23, 2021 •
The SCU Lightning Complex fires burned 6,000 acres of East Bay Regional Park District land last year. And already, green ground cover, reptiles, and raptors are returning in Morgan Territory.
Naturalist’s Notebook: Fire Pines
June 23, 2021 •
A visual explanation of how fire helps release the seeds of knobcone, bishop, and Monterey pine trees, plus a fun experiment to try at home!
Listen Closely, the Trees are Talking
March 30, 2021 •
When people say that trees “talk” to each other, that’s a concept that rests, in part, on an extraordinary and microscopic relationship between arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi and the roots of 90 percent of all plants.
Meet the Rare Dawn Redwood at a Bay Area Park
February 4, 2021 •
Rare and once thought extinct, the dawn redwood is an ancient relative of the more familiar coast redwood.
San Bruno Mountain: An Ark of Diversity
January 3, 2021 •
The plants that grow on this 2,400-acre island amid a sea of city—including these four endemic manzanita species—help make San Bruno Mountain a world biological hotspot.
How the Mistakenly Named “Himalayan” Blackberry Became a California Summer Tradition
July 7, 2020 •
With five to seven leaves resembling outstretched fingers on the palm of a hand, the blackberry Rubus armeniacus grows from curved, blood-red stalks resembling veins. Sonoma County horticulturalist Luther Burbank acquired the seeds in 1885 from a trader in India, … Read more
The Tree That’s Rare, Endangered and Common
June 21, 2020 •
Should we worry about the Monterey pine going extinct?