Milestone: 5000 Uploaded Observations
On Saturday, October 29th, 2022, I made my 5000th observation: Chamise (Adenostoma fasciculatum), or iipishi in the Kumeyaay language. I have a rather large backlog of observations yet to be uploaded. Sorting through the various photo backups from my devices over the years is a tedious task, not to mention the difficult memories this often trudges up. Therefore, it’s more than likely that this observation is not truly my 5000th. It is, however, the 5000th I have uploaded so far, and that is worth celebrating in itself.
Chamise is a little less common in the northernmost reaches of San Diego County, despite being an extremely ubiquitous chaparral shrub in California. I typically encounter it on more southward and inland hikes. It is of no surprise then that I observed this chamise in the Rancho La Costa Habitat Conservation Area in Carlsbad and San Marcos while photographing organisms for my bioblitz.
Chamise is a xerophyte that occurs in dry, wildfire-prone habitats. It thrives following such fires and regrows quickly even after being burnt down to their water and food-storing basal burl, also known as a lignotuber. They are an essential food source and home to a variety of animals, and they provide stability to the soil through their deep-reaching and extensive taproots. The local Kumeyaay people use the greasy shoots of this plant to kindle fires, the burl is used to produce charcoal, and the heated stems make excellent arrowheads.
Their long, slender shoots grow quite tall, often taller than me such as in this particular observation, and have fascicles of small, richly olive-colored and (typically) narrowly oblanceolate leaves, similar to the foliage of California buckwheat or rosemary. Panicles blossom densely with stunning five-petaled white flowers that produce achenes following fertilization.
Fire does not kill chamise. Rather, its seeds can sit dormant in the soil for decades until germination is facilitated by exposure to smoke produced by fires. The resinous leaves promote quicker burning, which suggest that flammability may be beneficial to the health of this centenarian species.
I think I would like to be more like chamise, finding prosperity after being scorched time and time again, rather than devastation.
