Ivy Clark plants Castilleja seedlings (photo by Wendy Gibble)

Reprinted from the Rare Plant Press

Graduate student Lauren “Ivy” Clark has been knee deep in seeds ever since
she started her Master’s work at University of Washington. She first came to work with Rare Care in 2009 to develop protocols for propagating ten shrub-steppe species from seed for a project Rare Care was working on with BLM. Having developed an interest in germination ecology, Ivy also started working with Rare Care’s rare plant seed collection, conducting germination tests on collections held in the Miller Seed Vault. This ongoing work dovetails nicely with her thesis work, in which she explores the potential for hybridization between golden paintbrush (Castilleja levisecta) and harsh Indian paintbrush (C. hispida).

Both Castilleja species occur on Puget Sound prairies, and hybridization has been observed in a nursery setting. Recent golden paintbrush reintroductions have resulted in both species growing in close proximity to one another at out-planting sites. After ascertaining that the same pollinator species frequent both species, Ivy collected seeds from both species where they co-occur and is propagating them in the greenhouse. She will evaluate morphological features of the progeny to determine whether and to what extent hybridization is occurring at these reintroduction sites and whether the risk of hybridization is reduced by increasing the distance between neighboring individuals of the two species.

Ivy has had an interest in plants for as long as she can remember. Growing up in Texas, her interest in the natural world was nurtured by her parents. She’s held a variety of jobs since becoming a biologist, many of them restricting her to laboratories. Finding that she really enjoys being in the field, she hopes to use her skills and degree to work in the restoration ecology field. In the meantime, we are delighted to have her working on Rare Care projects and caring for our ex situ collection.

Did you know that the Washington Park Arboretum often serves as a research site for researchers at the School of Environmental and Forest Sciences? Recently, researchers at UW have been using the Arboretum to study LiDAR and its applications. LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) is a method of airborne laser scanning that can be used as a tool to inventory and manage forests. Below are some of the research papers discussing their findings.

Akira Kato, L. Monika Moskal, Peter Schiess, Mark E. Swanson, Donna Calhoun, Werner Stuetzle, Capturing tree crown formation through implicit surface reconstruction using airborne lidar data.  Remote Sensing of the Environment. Volume 113, Issue 6, 15 June 2009, Pages 1148-1162.

Kim, Sooyoung; Hinckley, Thomas; Briggs, David. Classifying individual tree genera using stepwise cluster analysis based on height and intensity metrics derived from airborne laser scanner data, Remote Sensing of Environment. Volume 115, Issue 12, 15 December 2011, Pages 3329-3342.

Moskal, L.M.; Zheng, G. Retrieving Forest Inventory Variables with Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) in Urban Heterogeneous Forest. Remote Sens. 2012, 4, 1-20.

Richardson, Jeffery J.; Moskal, Monika; Kim, Soo-Hyung. Modeling approaches to estimate effective leaf area index from aerial discrete-return LIDAR. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, Volume 149, Issues 6–7, 15 June 2009, Pages 1152-1160.

Vaughn, N.R.; Moskal, L.M.; Turnblom, E.C. Fourier transformation of waveform Lidar for species recognition. Remote Sensing Letters, 2011, Volume 2, Number 4, 347 – 356.

Vaughn, N.R.; Moskal, L.M.; Turnblom, E.C. Tree Species Detection Accuracies Using Discrete Point Lidar and Airborne Waveform Lidar. Remote Sens. 2012, 4, 377-403.

Nisqually Delta dike footprint tidal freshwater swamp revegetation. Photo by Caitlin Guthrie.

Join us at the Elisabeth C. Miller Library (at the Center for Urban Horticulture) for the opening reception on Friday, May 11th, 5:00 pm – 7:00 pm.  Light refreshments will be served.  All are welcome to come meet the researchers and browse the posters.

Student posters will remain on display in the Library from May 11th to May 30th.

Poster topics include:

• Elwha Dam Removal Revegetation: Lake Aldwell Seeding Trials
  
• Tidal Freshwater Forested Wetlands: Assessing Restoration Effectiveness After Tidal Dike Removal
• Project E-PIG: Studying the Ecology of Pollinators in Gardens at Multiple Scales
• Alternate hosts of threatened Castilleja levisecta (golden paintbrush): Improving PNW prairie restoration.
  

Photo by UW Photographer Kathy Sauber

UWBG professor, Soo-Hyung Kim, just published a paper in PLoS ONE that describes his study of the impact future climate change may have on the bloom dates of flowering cherries. The authors,  including Uran Chung, Liz Mack, Jin I. Yun, studied the cherry trees in Tidal Basin, Washington DC and the timing of the annual cherry festival. The cherry tree cultivars studied, Yoshino and Kwanzan, are the same cultivars growing on the UW campus campus (Quad: Yoshino, Rainer vista: Kwanzan). The authors state in the abstract:

“Our results demonstrate the potential impacts of climate change on the timing of cherry blossoms and illustrate the utility of a simple process-based phenology model for developing adaptation strategies to climate change in horticulture, conservation planning, restoration and other related disciplines.”

The full text of the paper is available on the PLoS website: Chung U, Mack L, Yun JI, Kim S-H. 2011. Predicting the timing of cherry blossoms in Washington, DC and Mid-Atlantic States in response to climate change. PLoS ONE 6, e27439.

Twenty-five volunteers, agency partners and Rare Care staff gathered in Klickitat County in mid-June to monitor known populations of rare plants in the Klickitat Wildlife Area, Conboy National Wildlife Refuge and surrounding areas. We knew from the outset that our survey plans had to be adjusted. Late wet spring conditions caused as much as a one-month delay in the onset of flowering for many species. We were too early to catch the long-bearded sego lily (Calochortus longebarbatus var. longebarbatus) in bloom. But we caught the tail end of Baker’s linanthus (Leptosiphon bolanderi), a tiny spring annual that normally blooms in April and May. Our timing was perfect for finding Pulsifer’s monkey-flower (Mimulus pulsiferae), another tiny annual found in seasonally moist areas that seemed to have benefited from the spring moisture.  

Klickitat County was an ideal location for Rare Care’s fifth annual monitoring weekend. It’s at the east end of the Columbia River Gorge, a region that hosts some of the state’s most diverse flora. The Gorge is one of the few places in the northwest where moist Pacific air meets dry Columbia Basin air near sea level, providing a corridor for migration and a refuge for relict populations from previous glacial and interglacial periods. The Columbia River system also provides a significant corridor for species movement from its headwaters in the Rocky Mountain ecoregion of British Columbia, through the Okanogan highlands, Columbia Basin shrub-steppe, and east Cascades, and out to the wetter ecoregion of the west Cascades. The convergence of these topographic features is likely a major factor in the high number of endemic species found in the vicinity.

Twenty-four surveys were completed over the three-day campout, including new populations of rare plants such as oblong bluecurls (Trichostema oblongum), western ladies-tresses (Spiranthes porrifolia) and common bluecup (Githopsis specularioides). Regional endemics such as Barrett’s penstemon (Penstemon barrettiae), gooseberry-leaved alumroot (Heuchera grossulariifolia var. tenuifolia), and Suksdorf’s lomatium (Lomatium suksdorfii) are locally common on the cliffs and steep slopes of the Klickitat River. We monitored several populations of each and documented several new sites while surveying for other rare plant populations. We also monitored blue-flowered diffuse stickseed (Hackelia diffusa var. diffusa) and the very rare Ames’ milk-vetch (Astragalus pulsiferae var. suksdorfii), found in Washington only from an area around Conboy National Wildlife Refuge.

Although we accomplished so much in the short three days we had, we wrapped up the monitoring weekend with the impression that there is still much ground to cover in the region. We look forward to more explorations in the basalt canyons and pine woodlands in the coming years.

Images from top left:

• Barrett’s penstemon, photo by Janka Hobbs
• Barrett’s penstemon, photo by Betty Swift
• Keying gooseberry-leaved alumroot on a steep slope, photo by Julie Bresnan
• Gooseberry-leaved alumroot, photo by Julie Bresnan
• Diffuse stickseed, photo by Julie Bresnan
• Monitoring rare plants in a cool June, photo by Bev Linde

You may view additional photos on Rare Care’s page on Facebook.

Rod Crawford, Curator of Arachnids at the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture, reports, “I just finished fully curating the spiders from last May’s Foster Island bioblitz. The unusual Philodromus crab spider from the Waterside Trail, is not P. imbecillus nor is it P. insperatus (only member of the imbecillus group known from Washington). It is very similar to an Atlantic-states species Philodromus marxi, but is more likely to be an altogether new species. Full confirmation will have to await more specimens including males, but we can tentatively consider it new.”

The Foster Island female spider’s reproductive organs don’t match those of Philodromus insperatus, a spider found in this state but mainly in sagebrush country. And the Atlantic states’ P. marxi’s body coloration is metallic, very different from that of the spider found on Foster Island. And so the research continues.

Rod Crawford maintains a website called The Spider Myths Site. Interestingly, two of the myths are “Spiders are easy to identify” and “The spider you found has to be a species you’ve already heard of.”

Photograph by Rod Crawford

The inventory of the Arboretum’s birds, bats, lichens, fungi, reptiles, amphibians and plants (not counting the Arboretum’s plant collection, which is already documented) started at 3:00 PM May 21 and lasted 24 hours, including night-time shifts for cataloguing nocturnal life. One nocturnal lesson: participants collected regurgitated barred owl pellets, dissolved all of the material but bones, and identified bones and skulls to determine that the Arboretum’s owls dine primarily on Norway rats.

The après-BioBlitz is now in session. Data is being processed. Plant and invertebrate identification continues. Rare species are being confirmed. And plants such as Lonicera periclymenum, an ornamental Eurasian vine not known to be invasive here but found scrambling over plants, will be investigated to see whether they are potential new invaders in this region.

BioBlitzes have served as vehicles for biodiversity data collection for several years in locations ranging from the Nisqually Delta to Cape Cod and New York City’s Central Park. Seattle’s BioBlitz will be useful in establishing baseline data before the Highway 520 bridge project gets underway. Dr. Sarah Reichard, professor and co-associate director of the UW Botanic Gardens, worked with the Washington NatureMapping Program to organize this major undertaking, and the Arboretum Foundation funded it. Although insects were underrepresented due to cold weather and no bats were netted, more than 400 species of plants, animals, lichens and fungi were recorded. View the species tally to date and a list of predicted vs. observed birds, amphibians, reptiles and mammals.

Check out the photo gallery accompanying this Seattle Times article. Thank you to all who contributed time, effort, expertise and enthusiasm to the BioBlitz.

Sponsored by Chicago Botanic Garden, Floral Report Card aims to integrate existing phenology citizen science programs into elementary, middle and high school classrooms through garden replication on school grounds. The UWBG Climate Change Garden serves as the model demonstration garden for teachers, students and community members in our region who want to be involved in the Floral Report Card project. The project is currently funded through an Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) planning grant that supports collaborative development for adapting Climate Change Gardens and related curricula and technology for schools, teachers and students.

Floral Report Card program implementation is in its planning stages, and recruitment of interested educators and community members is underway. In May, Master of Environmental Horticulture Candidate Allison McCarthy will host a teacher focus group with local educators who have expressed interest in being a part of the Climate Change Garden.

Educational goals of the Floral Report Card include:

• Engaging formal education institutions and communities in citizen science, field studies, and scientific research skills;
• Increasing visitor awareness of climate and climate change impacts;
• Understanding the social, cultural, and economic effects of climate change;
• Understanding how plants and people can mitigate the effects of climate change;
• Bringing more botany into the formal education curriculum; and
• Nurturing and empowering students and citizen scientists to be “local experts” on climate change.

Allison McCarthy and Washington Park Arboretum Education Supervisor Patrick Mulligan are presenting at the “Cool School Challenge Training Workshop with a Special Focus on Climate Change and Plants” Saturday, May 1, at the Center for Urban Horticulture. Registration is currently open for this workshop.

Content by Allison McCarthy. Photos by Jennifer Youngman.

Top left: Species are laid out for planting in the Climate Change Garden. Top right: Allison McCarthy plants one of 16 raised beds in the UWBG’s Climate Change Garden.

On March 23, 2010, Principal Investigator Soo-Hyung Kim, Ph.D, Master of Environmental Horticulture Candidate Allison McCarthy, Washington Park Arboretum (WPA) Horticulture Staff Supervisor David Zuckerman, Center for Urban Horticulture (CUH) Gardener Annie Bilotta and WPA Education Supervisor Patrick Mulligan planted a Climate Change Garden at the CUH. It includes cloned plants of eight species, each collected from four USDA hardiness zones.

View more photos of planting day.

Climate Change Gardens are replicated in a range of climatic conditions, yet they maintain standard growing conditions and eliminate the confounding effects of genetic variance with the use of clones. Plants in these gardens therefore act like a network of climate sensors or “phytometers.”

Plant responses to the different climates of participating gardens will allow inferences about how the species might respond to future climate change. For example, how will zone 5 plants respond if the climate becomes more like zone 7? The species selected are long-lived  species that exhibit a variety of breeding systems and wide geographic ranges, which allow them to be planted in different climates across the country. They have flowering times that are initiated by temperature, are easy to clone, and are attractive in a garden setting. Each species will be represented by four ecotypes from each of the USDA hardiness zones 4, 5, 6, and 7. The Climate Change Garden offers a methodology for citizen scientists to explore the implications of climate change for plants.

Plant species to be monitored:

• Aster novae-angliae, New England aster, blooms August- September
• Baptisia australis, blue wild false indigo, blooms May-June
• Monarda fistulosa, wild bergamot or bee balm, blooms  July-September
• Panicum virgatum, switchgrass, blooms  July-February
• Penstemon digitalis, beardtongue, blooms  April-June
• Physostegia virginiana, obedient plant, blooms  June to September
• Schizachrium scoparium, little bluestem, blooms  August-February
• Syringa rothomagensis, Chinese lilac, blooms late May- July

Text by Allison McCarthy. Photos by Jennifer Youngman.

Top left: Annie Bilotta and David Zuckerman plant Syringa rothomagensis. Top right: Soo-Hyung Kim plants Monarda fistulosa. Bottom: Allison McCarthy lays out the plants for planting.