Polyphylla Barbata
''Polyphylla barbata'' is a rare species of beetle known by the common name Mount Hermon June beetle. It is endemic to California, where it occurs only in Santa Cruz County. There is only a single occurrence of the beetle on a stretch of territory of under . This is a federally listed endangered species of the United States.''Polyphylla barbata''. The Nature Conservancy. The beetle is about 2 centimeters long, black and brown in color with broken white longitudinal stripes on the back. The are covered in a thin coat of hairs. The female is slightly larger than the male. The female spends most of her time underground, coming out only to mate with the male. [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Polyphylla Barbata At Mt Diablo
''Polyphylla'' is a genus of scarab beetle includes more than 80 species distributed in North and Central America, southern and central Europe, northern Africa, and southern Asia—from Asia Minor to Japan. They typically reside in forests and orchards with most being identified by white elytra scales forming stripes. The adult beetles are often attracted to lights. Polyphylla lay their eggs on soil near plants from where the larvae hatch and burrow down to the roots on which they will feed. They reach maturity in two to three years. Species These 85 species belong to the genus ''Polyphylla'': * '' Polyphylla adspersa'' Motschulsky, 1854 * '' Polyphylla aeola'' La Rue, 1998 * '' Polyphylla aeolus'' La Rue, 1998 * '' Polyphylla alba'' (Pallas, 1773) * '' Polyphylla albertischulzi'' Kuntzen, 1933 * '' Polyphylla albolineata'' (Motschulsky, 1861) * '' Polyphylla anivallis'' La Rue, 2016 * '' Polyphylla annamensis'' (Fleutiaux, 1887) * '' Polyphylla anteronivea'' Hardy, 1978 (sali ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Biological Life Cycle
In biology, a biological life cycle (or just life cycle or lifecycle when the biological context is clear) is a series of changes in form that an organism undergoes, returning to the starting state. "The concept is closely related to those of the life history, development and ontogeny, but differs from them in stressing renewal." Transitions of form may involve growth, asexual reproduction, or sexual reproduction. In some organisms, different "generations" of the species succeed each other during the life cycle. For plants and many algae, there are two multicellular stages, and the life cycle is referred to as alternation of generations. The term life history is often used, particularly for organisms such as the red algae which have three multicellular stages (or more), rather than two.Dixon, P.S. 1973. ''Biology of the Rhodophyta.'' Oliver & Boyd. Life cycles that include sexual reproduction involve alternating haploid (''n'') and diploid (2''n'') stages, i.e., a change of pl ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Fire Suppression
Wildfire suppression is a range of firefighting tactics used to suppress wildfires. Firefighting efforts in wild land areas require different techniques, equipment, and training from the more familiar structure fire fighting found in populated areas. Working in conjunction with specially designed aerial firefighting aircraft, these wildfire-trained crews suppress flames, construct fire break, fire lines, and extinguish flames and areas of heat to protect resources and natural wilderness. Wildfire suppression also addresses the issues of the wildland–urban interface, where populated areas border with wild land areas. In the United States and other countries, aggressive wildfire suppression aimed at minimizing fire has contributed to accumulation of fuel loads, increasing the risk of large, catastrophic fires. History Australia Wildland fire, known in Australia as bush fire, has played a major role in Australia due to arid conditions. Notable fire services tasked with wildfire ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Sand Mining
Sand mining is the extraction of sand, mainly through an open pit (or sand pit) but sometimes mined from beaches and inland dunes or dredged from ocean and river beds. Sand is often used in manufacturing, for example as an abrasive or in concrete. It is also used on icy and snowy roads usually mixed with salt, to lower the melting point temperature, on the road surface. Sand can replace eroded coastline. Some uses require higher purity than others; for example sand used in concrete must be free of seashell fragments. Sand mining presents opportunities to extract rutile, ilmenite, and zircon, which contain the industrially useful elements titanium and zirconium. Besides these minerals, beach sand may also contain garnet, leucoxene, sillimanite, and monazite. These minerals are often found in ordinary sand deposits. A process known as elutriation is used, whereby flowing water separates the grains based on their size, shape, and density. Sand mining is a direct cause of erosion ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Cupressus Abramsiana
The Santa Cruz cypress (''Hesperocyparis abramsiana''; formerly classified as ''Cupressus abramsiana'') is a species of North American tree within the Cypress family. The species is endemic to the Santa Cruz Mountains within the Santa Cruz and San Mateo counties of west-central California.Wolf, Carl B. (1948) Taxonomic And Distributional Studies Of The New World Cypresses, Aliso: A Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Botany: Vol. 1: Iss. 1, Article 2. p. 206. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service listed the species on the Endangered Species Act in 1987 due to increasing threats from habitat loss and disruption of natural forest fire regimes.U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. 1987. Endangered and threatened wildlife and plants; Determination of endangered status for ''Cupressus abramsiana'' (Santa Cruz cypress). Federal Register 52: 675-679. https://ecos.fws.gov/docs/federal_register/fr1017.pdf In 2016, the conservation status of the Santa Cruz cypress changed to Threatened. The cite ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Chorizanthe Pungens
''Chorizanthe pungens'' is a species of flowering plant in the buckwheat family known by the common name Monterey spineflower. It is endemic to California, where it is known from the San Francisco Bay Area south along the Central Coast. Description It grows mainly in coastal habitat and that of the hills and mountains overlooking the coastline. This is a generally erect but sometimes spreading or prostrate plant with stems up to half a meter in length. It is green to gray to red in color and usually hairy in texture. The leaves are located at the base of the plant; there are also bracts along the stem at the bases of the inflorescences which look like leaves. The inflorescence is a dense cluster of flowers, each flower surrounded by six white to pink hairy bracts tipped in hooked awns. The flower itself is only a few millimeters wide with jagged tepals. Varieties There are two varieties of this species: *var. ''pungens'' is the more common *var. ''hartwegiana'' is known only f ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Erysimum Teretifolium
''Erysimum teretifolium'' is a species of ''Erysimum'' known by the common names Santa Cruz wallflower and Ben Lomond wallflower. It is a very rare plant endemic to Santa Cruz County, California, where it grows on inland sand spits, chaparral, and sandstone deposits in the southern Santa Cruz Mountains. It is a California state and federally listed endangered species. This plant is a biennial or perennial herb with one or more unbranched erect dark reddish-purple stems reaching anywhere from 15 centimeters to nearly a meter in height. There are a few straight, somewhat toothed, dark greenish leaves along the stems. At the tops of the stems are thin clusters of flowers with rounded bright to dark yellow or orangish petals, each one or two centimeters long. The flowers drop to leave long, flat fruits which are siliques up to 15 centimeters long, sticking out from the stem. This species is found only within a strip of land measuring 9 miles long by 5 miles wide.USFWS''E. teretifoliu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Chaparral
Chaparral ( ) is a shrubland plant community and geographical feature found primarily in the U.S. state of California, in southern Oregon, and in the northern portion of the Baja California Peninsula in Mexico. It is shaped by a Mediterranean climate (mild wet winters and hot dry summers) and infrequent, high-intensity crown fires. Chaparral features summer-drought-tolerant plants with hard sclerophyllous evergreen leaves, as contrasted with the associated soft-leaved, drought-deciduous, scrub community of coastal sage scrub, found often on drier, southern facing slopes within the chaparral biome. Three other closely related chaparral shrubland systems occur in central Arizona, western Texas, and along the eastern side of central Mexico's mountain chains (mexical), all having summer rains in contrast to the Mediterranean climate of other chaparral formations. Chaparral comprises 9% of California's wildland vegetation and contains 20% of its plant species. The name comes from th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ponderosa Pine
''Pinus ponderosa'', commonly known as the ponderosa pine, bull pine, blackjack pine, western yellow-pine, or filipinus pine is a very large pine tree species of variable habitat native to mountainous regions of western North America. It is the most widely distributed pine species in North America.Safford, H.D. 2013. Natural Range of Variation (NRV) for yellow pine and mixed conifer forests in the bioregional assessment area, including the Sierra Nevada, southern Cascades, and Modoc and Inyo National Forests. Unpublished report. USDA Forest Service, Pacific Southwest Region, Vallejo, CA/ref> ''Pinus ponderosa'' grows in various erect forms from British Columbia southward and eastward through 16 western U.S. states and has been successfully introduced in temperate regions of Europe, and in New Zealand. It was first documented in modern science in 1826 in eastern Washington near present-day Spokane (of which it is the official city tree). On that occasion, David Douglas misidenti ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Zayante Band-winged Grasshopper
The Zayante band-winged grasshopper (''Trimerotropis infantilis'') is a species of insect in the family Acrididae. It is endemic to a small portion of the Santa Cruz Mountains in California. Background and description The Zayante band-winged grasshopper is in the Order Orthoptera and Family Acrididae. It is known to be located only in Santa Cruz County, California within the Zayante sandhills, chiefly within a Maritime Coast Range Ponderosa Pine forest. The area has little vegetation and is primarily made up of sand and soil sediments. The male grasshoppers range from 13.7 to 17.2 millimeters in length, and females a little larger from 19.7 to 21.6 millimeters. (Donald J. Barry. 2000). They have forewings that are tan to gray with darker bands, pale yellow hind wings, with one faint thin band that is visible when they are in flight; its eyes are also banded. Its lower legs (tibiae) are blue and gray (Donald J. Barry 2000). They have good flying skills, being known to fly distan ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Santa Cruz Mountains
The Santa Cruz Mountains, part of the Pacific Coast Ranges, are a mountain range in central and Northern California, United States. They form a ridge down the San Francisco Peninsula, south of San Francisco. They separate the Pacific Ocean from the San Francisco Bay and the Santa Clara Valley, and continue south to the Central Coast, bordering Monterey Bay and ending at the Salinas Valley. The range passes through the counties of San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, San Benito and Monterey, with the Pajaro River forming the southern boundary. Geography The northernmost portion of the Santa Cruz Mountains, north of Half Moon Bay Road ( SR 92), is known as Montara Mountain; the middle portion is the Sierra Morena, which includes a summit called Sierra Morena, and extends south to a gap at Lexington Reservoir; south of the gap, the mountain range is known as the Sierra Azul. The highest point in the range is Loma Prieta Peak, west of Morgan Hill, with a height of , near the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ben Lomond, California
Ben Lomond is a census-designated place (CDP) in Santa Cruz County, California, United States, and also the name of the mountain to the west. The CDP includes the communities of Glen Arbor and Brackney. The population was 6,337 at the 2020 census. History The nearby Ben Lomond Mountain was named after the mountain in Scotland by John Burns, a Scottish man who settled on the west side of the ridge in 1851. Burns became one of the first vintners in the Santa Cruz Mountains, and is usually also credited with naming the community of Bonny Doon. The San Lorenzo River watershed contains extensive forests of Coast redwood, and was an early center of the logging/lumber industry in Santa Cruz County. The community was originally known as Pacific Mills, after a sawmill operation located there. When, in 1887, the community applied for a U.S. Post Office, residents voted to adopt the name of the mountain. Alba School, a one-room schoolhouse, was constructed in 1895 and was in use unti ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |