On the Ranch
By Operations Director Tim Bulone
There is really no substitute for true friends. The people who show up at dawn when you’ve asked them for help. The ones you can count on to do what they’ve said they will. They care about the things you do and help you do them. Here at the Tejon Ranch Conservancy, we call them docents and volunteers, and we are lucky to have some of the best friends around.
At right, docent Chris Gardner tells guests about the history of Tejon Ranch.
Their help takes many forms. Some lead tours, relaying the history of the Tejon Ranch, identifying plants and animals, and discussing, with incredible knowledge, their habitats, and unique behaviors. Some perform citizen science activities, locating, quantifying, and recording certain species and their activities. Volunteers are frequently the muscle needed to clear invasive species, remove old fences, set up a workshop site, check a wildlife camera, or simply work the Ranch gates so visitors can have great wildflower experiences. The directors on the Conservancy Board are ALL volunteers.
At left, volunteers removing invasive plant species on Tejon Ranch.
Many things happen here as a result of volunteers’ hard work that we would be unable to do as a staff of six. And what’s more, they do it willingly, excitedly, joyfully, and without complaint. We may call them docents or volunteers, but they have all the attributes of a true friend: they’re there when we need them, they believe in us, they are adaptable when we must change how we do things, and they forgive our occasional awkward missteps. They are unwaveringly loyal and trustworthy. They care about us, and that is no small thing for a small organization like the Conservancy. They care. And we are better for it.
At right, Conservancy Board Member Gary Hunt addresses visitors at a Conservancy event.
I think Mark Twain was up to mischief when he said, “To do good is noble. To tell others to do good is even nobler and much less trouble.” We ask many things of our docents and volunteers, but they are and have always been the most noble bunch we know. We couldn’t ask for more.
Sincerely,
Tim Bulone
At left, docent Steve Justus and others remove barbed wire.
Farewell Spring, Hello Summer!
By Staff Biologist Mitchell Coleman, M.S.
We are still drying off from what was a wild, wet winter and spring. Rains persisted in a series of atmospheric rivers straight through mid-May, making much of Tejon Ranch both ideal for water-stressed organisms and difficult to access via dirt road.
We are just now getting back into the high country, after months of muddy roads, tree falls, and impassable walls of snow. Now the seasons shift, even though, due to the later-than-normal rains, many wildflowers persist. As the Ranch dries off and spring annuals senesce, the Tejon Ranch Conservancy shifts gears into the melodic season of summer. It’s a perfect time to discuss how the richly biodiverse organisms on Tejon are adapted to these hot, dry conditions.
As is often discussed, Tejon Ranch sits at the confluence of four ecoregions: the coastal range comes in from the west, the southern spine of the Sierra Nevada from the north, the Mojave Desert from the east, and the San Joaquin Desert from the northwest. Each region has its own suite of native species, which thus co-occur on Tejon in ways that cannot be seen elsewhere. This is the overarching cause of Tejon’s amazing biodiversity.
Despite a wide variance in temperature, precipitation, and geomorphic patterns, the confluence of the four ecoregions on Tejon all share a Mediterranean-type climate, broadly characterized by hot, dry summers and cool, moist winters. While this climate type occurs in approximately 5% of the earth’s surface, it harbors almost 20% of known vascular plant taxa, many of which occur nowhere else. Long, drought-prone summers are a huge driver of this diversity and endemism. The organisms that have evolved in these areas have many behavioral and physiological adaptations to cope with the extremes of heat, light, and water stress.
Desert animals, for example, employ numerous methods to maintain sublethal body temperatures. This can be achieved through a combination of activity and metabolic regulation, body size, microhabitat selection, and hyperthermia (storing body heat to be released later). Many animals (including mammals, reptiles, and invertebrates) burrow into the ground during the day to avoid the extremes of heat, preferring to venture out into the relative cool of night.
Such creatures must also work to conserve water during the summer, not merely because of the hot, dry conditions, but also because it is the time of year when water is most limited. Desert vertebrates, for instance, greatly limit water loss through reducing water in feces and body surfaces, using nasal passages to reclaim water and using salt glands to excrete salts. Desert-adapted vertebrates, such as black-tailed jackrabbits (Lepus californicus) and coyotes (Canis latrans), obtain almost all their water through their food, be it plant or prey. They do not drink water at all!
Summer is a great time to observe invertebrates on the Ranch.
Many pollinators, for instance, busy themselves with the pollen and nectar of flowers that bloom in the summer. Desert invertebrates have their own suite of adaptations for survival in the harsh conditions, such as larger body sizes, higher abundances of predatory insects, and increased sociality in groups with predictable food sources compared to related non-desert taxa.
Larger body sizes help reduce the rate of heat intake, and thus, how quickly the insects can remain active without overheating. Waxy coats called cuticles also help prevent water loss. On the extreme end, some desert invertebrates can undergo anhydrobiosis, the ability to suspend all activity until winter rains arrive. Conversely, some species can replenish water by absorbing it from unsaturated air in their burrows, thus maintaining their activity year-round.
Much, much more can be said of the amazing adaptations of desert organisms. Indeed, in the context of climate change, fresh questions and perspectives are being used to understand the ecological importance of these adaptations, and what they might mean going forward. This is one reason desert-focused research is so vital, and much of that research is taking place right here at Tejon Ranch.
Meet our summer interns!
Now in its fourth year, the California State University, Bakersfield, and Tejon Ranch Conservancy internship program has seen many students and projects through its doors, or gates to be more accurate. The Conservancy holds high hopes for this year’s crop of interns, introduced here:
Brenda’s familiarity with the outdoors is not tremendous; in the future she’d like to work in a lab with microbes, whether it’s related to the environment or to people. She was interested in this internship because, as she says, “It would allow me to experience something new and learn what hands-on field work is like.” She also hopes to discover other facets of ecology work to better understand how and what affects other species and how different branches of science relate in this kind of work. Brenda is a senior this year at CSU Bakersfield; her major is Biology.
“This is my first internship and I decided to go for it because I love being outdoors. After visiting the Tejon Ranch for a class I was enrolled in this past semester, I was hoping to return and further explore what goes on at the Conservancy,” offers Waleed, a senior at CSU Bakersfield studying Biology. “I hope to learn as much as I can about conserving our environment and gain more knowledge about plants and wildlife.” He describes his ideal career as “working on something that makes me happy, while also being able to help others and try to make the world a better place to live.”
As a senior studying Geology at CSU Bakersfield, Eneas says his dream job would be as a research scientist for either the California Geological Survey or the United States Geological Survey. As to his motivation for applying for the intern position at the Conservancy, Eneas, who loves the outdoors, sees it as “an opportunity to explore and further my understanding of the ecosystems and the geology of the Tejon Ranch. I am hoping that my work here on the Ranch will help others understand the diverse population of rocks on Ranch land and the formation of its breathtaking landscapes.”
VIDEO: A LONG, COOL DRINK OF WATER
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Tejon Ranch Conservancy E-News produced by co-editors Tim Bulone and Susan Chaney. If you'd like to contribute to E-News please let us know.