HOME
*





Myrtle's Silverspot
Myrtle's silverspot (''Speyeria zerene myrtleae'') is a medium-sized butterfly in the brush foot family (Nymphalidae), an endangered subspecies of the zerene fritillary. It is endemic to California, where it is known from only about four locations just north of the San Francisco Bay Area, including two at Point Reyes National Seashore. Its wingspan is approximately . The upper surfaces of the wings are golden brown with numerous black spots and lines. The undersides are brown, orange and tan with black lines and silver and black spots. Larvae are dark colored with many sharp branching spines on their backs. Myrtle's silverspot is larger and paler than the closely related Behrens' silverspot (''Speyeria zerene behrensii''), which is now limited to the vicinity of Point Arena in Mendocino County.USFWSSpecies Account: Myrtle's Silverspot Butterfly/ref> Myrtle's silverspot is also closely related to the Oregon silverspot (''Speyeria zerene hippolyta).'' The female lays a single brood ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Butterfly
Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the Order (biology), order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The group comprises the large superfamily (zoology), superfamily Papilionoidea, which contains at least one former group, the skippers (formerly the superfamily "Hesperioidea"), and the most recent analyses suggest it also contains the moth-butterflies (formerly the superfamily "Hedyloidea"). Butterfly fossils date to the Paleocene, about 56 million years ago. Butterflies have a four-stage life cycle, as like most insects they undergo Holometabolism, complete metamorphosis. Winged adults lay eggs on the food plant on which their larvae, known as caterpillars, will feed. The caterpillars grow, sometimes very rapidly, and when fully developed, pupate in a chrysalis. When metamorphosis is complete, the pupal skin splits, the adult insect climbs o ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Grindelia
''Grindelia'' (gumweed) is a genus of plants native to the Americas belonging to the family Asteraceae. The genus was named for Latvian botanist David Hieronymus Grindel, 1776–1836. They are herbaceous plants or subshrubs with annual, biennial, or perennial life cycles. The flowerheads are composed of numerous yellow disc florets (usually between 100–200) and from zero to sixty or more yellow or orange ray florets. ''Grindelia squarrosa'', a plant with bright yellow flowers indigenous to much of the United States, is commonly called curlycup gumweed. ''Grindelia robusta'', found in the western states, is a coastal scrub bush that is reputed to have several medicinal uses. Hairy gumweed, ''Grindelia cuneifolia'', occurs in brackish coastal marshes of western North America, such as in some portions of the San Francisco Bay perimeter. The genus is native to South America, Mexico, and western North America, though some species have been introduced and naturalized in eastern North ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Fire Regime
A fire regime is the pattern, frequency, and intensity of the bushfires and wildfires that prevail in an area over long periods of time. It is an integral part of fire ecology, and renewal for certain types of ecosystems. A fire regime describes the spatial and temporal patterns and ecosystem impacts of fire on the landscape, and provides an integrative approach to identifying the impacts of fire at an ecosystem or landscape level.Morgan, Penelope; Hardy; Swetnam; Rollins; Long (1999)"Mapping fire regimes across time and space: Understanding coarse and fine-scale fire patterns"(PDF). ''International Journal of Wildland Fire''. 10: 329–342 – via Google Scholar. If fires are too frequent, plants may be killed before they have matured, or before they have set sufficient seed to ensure population recovery. If fires are too infrequent, plants may mature, senesce, and die without ever releasing their seed. Fire regimes can change with the spatial and temporal variations in topography, ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Marin County, California
Marin County is a County (United States), county located in the northwestern part of the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 262,231. Its county seat and largest city is San Rafael, California, San Rafael. Marin County is across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco, and is included in the San Francisco–Oakland–Berkeley, CA Metropolitan Statistical Area. Marin County's natural sites include the Muir Woods Sequoia sempervirens, redwood forest, the Marin Headlands, Stinson Beach, CA, Stinson Beach, the Point Reyes National Seashore, and Mount Tamalpais. As of 2019, Marin County had the sixth highest income per capita of all U.S. counties, at $141,735. The county is governed by the Marin County Board of Supervisors. The Marin County Civic Center was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and draws thousands of visitors a year to guided tours of its arch and Atrium (architecture), atrium desig ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Local Extinction
Local extinction, also known as extirpation, refers to a species (or other taxon) of plant or animal that ceases to exist in a chosen geographic area of study, though it still exists elsewhere. Local extinctions are contrasted with global extinctions. Local extinctions mark a change in the ecology of an area. In recent times, local extinction has sometimes been followed by a replacement of the species taken from other locations; wolf reintroduction is an example of this. The term "local extinction" is highly vernacular. The more proper biological term is ''extirpation''. Discussion Glaciation can lead to local extinction. This was the case during the Pleistocene glaciation event in North America. During this period, most of the native North American species of earthworm were killed in places covered by glaciation. This left them open for colonization by European earthworms brought over in soil from Europe. Species naturally become extirpated from islands over time. The number ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Golden Gate
The Golden Gate is a strait on the west coast of North America that connects San Francisco Bay to the Pacific Ocean. It is defined by the headlands of the San Francisco Peninsula and the Marin Peninsula, and, since 1937, has been spanned by the Golden Gate Bridge. The entire shoreline and adjacent waters throughout the strait are managed by the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Geology During the last ice age, when sea level was several hundred feet lower, the waters of the glacier-fed Sacramento River and the San Joaquin River scoured a deep channel through the bedrock on their way to the ocean. (A similar process created the undersea Hudson Canyon off the coast of New York and New Jersey.) The strait is well known today for its depth and powerful tidal currents from the Pacific Ocean. Many small whirlpools and eddies can form in its waters. With its strong currents, rocky reefs and fog, the Golden Gate is the site of over 100 shipwrecks. Climate The Golden Gat ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Sonoma County, California
Sonoma County () is a county (United States), county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States Census, its population was 488,863. Its county seat and largest city is Santa Rosa, California, Santa Rosa. It is to the north of Marin County, California, Marin County and the south of Mendocino County, California, Mendocino County. It is west of Napa County, California, Napa County and Lake County, California, Lake County. Sonoma County comprises the Santa Rosa-Petaluma Metropolitan Statistical Area, which is part of the San Jose, California, San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland, California, Oakland, CA San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland, CA Combined Statistical Area, Combined Statistical Area. It is the northernmost county in the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area region. In California's Wine Country (California), Wine Country region, which also includes Napa, Mendocino, and Lake counties, Sonoma County is the largest producer. It has thirteen approved American Vit ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Russian River (California)
The Russian River (Southern Pomo: ''Ashokawna'', es, Río Ruso) is a southward-flowing river that drains of Sonoma and Mendocino counties in Northern California. With an annual average discharge of approximately 1,600,000 acre feet (2.0 km3), it is the second-largest river (after the Sacramento River) flowing through the nine-county Greater San Francisco Bay Area, with a mainstem long. Names The Southern Pomo know the river as Ashokawna (ʼaš:oʼkʰawna), "east water place" or "water to the east", and as Bidapte, "big river". Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo and his expedition may have travelled as far north as the Russian River in November 1542 before storms forced them to turn back south towards Monterey. The earliest Slavic name for the river, Slavyanka, appears on a Russian-American Company chart dated 1817. In 1827 the Spanish called it the San Ygnacio, and in 1843 the Spanish land grant referred to it as Rio Grande. The river takes its current name from Russian Iv ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

San Mateo County, California
San Mateo County ( ), officially the County of San Mateo, is a county (United States), county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 764,442. Redwood City, California, Redwood City is the county seat, and the third most populated city following Daly City, California, Daly City and San Mateo, California, San Mateo. San Mateo County is included in the San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley, CA MSA (metropolitan statistical area), Silicon Valley, and is part of the San Francisco Bay Area, the nine counties bordering San Francisco Bay. It covers most of the San Francisco Peninsula. San Francisco International Airport is located in the northeastern area of the county and is approximately 7 miles south of the city and county limits of San Francisco, even though the airport itself is assigned a San Francisco United States Postal Service, postal address. The county's built-up areas are mostly suburban, and are home to sever ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Dune
A dune is a landform composed of wind- or water-driven sand. It typically takes the form of a mound, ridge, or hill. An area with dunes is called a dune system or a dune complex. A large dune complex is called a dune field, while broad, flat regions covered with wind-swept sand or dunes with little or no vegetation are called ''ergs'' or ''sand seas''. Dunes occur in different shapes and sizes, but most kinds of dunes are longer on the stoss (upflow) side, where the sand is pushed up the dune, and have a shorter ''slip face'' in the lee side. The valley or trough between dunes is called a ''dune slack''. Dunes are most common in desert environments, where the lack of moisture hinders the growth of vegetation that would otherwise interfere with the development of dunes. However, sand deposits are not restricted to deserts, and dunes are also found along sea shores, along streams in semiarid climates, in areas of glacial outwash, and in other areas where poorly cemented sa ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Erigeron Glaucus
''Erigeron glaucus'' is a species of flowering plant in the family Asteraceae known by the common name seaside fleabane, beach aster, or seaside daisy. It is native to the West Coast of the United States. Description ''E. glaucus'' is a perennial daisy reaching heights between with branching, nodding stems which may be glandular and hairy to hairless. It grows from a stout rhizome and produces thick, firm, rounded to spoon-shaped leaves, sometimes with a few teeth along the edges, each long. From April to August, its stems bear inflorescences of 1–15 flower heads which vary in size from about wide. The centers contain golden yellow disc florets and the edges are fringed with about 100 ray florets which may be long or quite short, and are shades of deep blue and purple to nearly white. The fruit is seed-like with many bristles at the tip. Unusual for its genus (but not for plants near the coast), the plant is somewhat succulent. Distribution and habitat The wildflower i ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Cirsium Vulgare
''Cirsium vulgare'', the spear thistle, bull thistle, or common thistle, is a species of the Asteraceae genus ''Cirsium'', native throughout most of Europe (north to 66°N, locally 68°N), Western Asia (east to the Yenisei Valley), and northwestern Africa ( Atlas Mountains).''Flora Europaea''''Cirsium vulgare''/ref> It is also naturalised in North America, Africa, and Australia and is an invasive weed in some areas. It is the national flower of Scotland. The plant provides a great deal of nectar for pollinators. It was rated in the top 10 for most nectar production (nectar per unit cover per year) in a UK plants survey conducted by the AgriLand project which is supported by the UK Insect Pollinators Initiative. Marsh thistle, ''Cirsium palustre'', was ranked in first place while this thistle was ranked in sixth place. It also was a top producer of nectar sugar in another study in Britain, ranked third with a production per floral unit of (2300 ± 400 μg). Description It i ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]