The Spring Equinox was a few weeks ago, and the natural world around the Monterey Bay is full of signs of the season. From wildflowers to birds, from the gophers to the grass, life is waking up. Forest bathing or any sort of time in nature is good for the soul and actively seeking out personal interactions with the signs of the season allows us to stay in touch with ancient rhythms of life…slowing down…nurturing our roots in this wonderful place.

Wildflowers

We’re already past the first wildflowers of the year, but we haven’t missed many. Footsteps of spring is still in bloom- patches of bright yellow color splash across shallow soiled areas in grasslands. Nearby in those same grasslands and in the adjoining shrubby areas, you can see peopleroot, aka wild cucumber, a romping vine pushing up spikes of wonderfully scented cream-colored flowers. Still in those grasslands, poppy flowers have opened: the first ones are always the biggest, tulip sized! Santa Cruz’ Moore Creek greenbelt, Monterey’s Point Lobos, and the grasslands at Fort Ord are all good places to see grasslands’ unfolding spring wildflowers.

Get to some chaparral and you can see the first Ceanothus flowers alongside the waning honey-scented manzanita bloom. Fort Ord is a fine place to see a rare type of chaparral with unusual manzanitas and ceanothus species. Henry Cowell and Wilder Ranch State Parks have some nice patches, too. Report back on the state of the wildflowers in chaparral or grasslands, please!

Swallow Arrival

The first barn swallows returned to Santa Cruz County’s North Coast on March 19, 2023. They traveled from somewhere way south – the tropics where they spent the winter getting fat on different types of bugs. They arrived just in time to eat the early season bees, mosquitoes, and moths. They left when this place was dusty and dry and returned to a vibrant, green, moist landscape. They are just settling in and will soon be scooping up mud to repair or build new nests. I haven’t seen any other swallow species, yet- have you?

Furry Critters

Gophers are throwing soil with gusto, having just woken up for the Spring. The voles have been awake and active for a while, already. Baby voles are dispersing into new areas, and the very violent interactions between voles and gophers has commenced.

Young brush bunnies emerged from their birth dens about 2 weeks ago, half the size of the adults and so very cute. About a month ago, I encountered an adult brush bunny ‘thumping’ – something I’d read about as a youth in Richard Adams’ book Watership Down. An anxious-looking bunny was rushing between shrubs, ducking under cover and then thumping its hind legs onto the ground so hard as to make a drumming noise. It had its eyes on me-  very odd, since I thought I had previously had a fairly trusting relationship with the local bunny families. Perhaps this individual was an interloper from another family as this behavior was a one-time thing.

Long tailed weasels are feeding on gophers, voles, and young rabbits as are coyotes and bobcats. It had been a long time since I saw any bobcats, but two appeared in the area in the last month, so maybe their population is rebounding around Davenport.

Grass

It is the season of grass. Get to a weedy wet patch and you’ll see the most remarkable bright shiny green of Italian ryegrass, an invasive species that reflects light brightly from its leaf blades. The cold nights have tinged some grasses red or purple. Disease from the moist winter makes other grasses turn yellow or orange. The first grass flowers are emerging, but most are a ways away. I was surprised to see some foxtails already, normally a later spring grass flower. How tall with the grass grow? You can see it gain height by the day right now, but not long ago it just got slowly thicker across the ground. The longer and warmer days make for rocketing grass growth. Later rains keep it getting taller, but without rain grass drinks up the soil moisture and patches start to brown on shallow soil quickly after warm spells.

Trees

This is the moment of Spring where we can enjoy the colorful signs of the genetic diversity of coast live oaks. Some coast live oaks unfurl their spring leaves earlier, some later. Examine patches of coast live oaks and see the personalities shine with varying leafing out timing, and even varying colors of new leaves. I like the more maroon new leaves, but the paler spring green trees are also wonderful.

Buckeyes and big leaf maples are breaking bud. Rare in our area, patches of black and valley oaks are also starting to think about leafing out. I recently travelled through the Sierra Nevada foothills and saw the blue oak forest waking up. I love to catch blue oak bud break as patches of that forest turn the most amazing purple-blue right as their leaf buds start to swell, before the leaves unfurl. Now is that time.

Time Passing

The moments of Spring pass quickly, so that if you miss visiting natural areas a few weeks in a row, you will miss an entire sub-portion of the season. The birds will come to you, though – keep an eye out for the swallows wheeling in the air, harbingers of spring! If you haven’t planned on visiting your favorite lupine patch, start planning: they are a few weeks away, but a spring without lupines isn’t ever quite the same.

-this post originally published by Bruce Bratton at his wonderful weekly blog, BrattonOnline.com – donate, subscribe, and so forth and you’ll be regularly in touch with so much around the Monterey Bay