Falling leaves and moist winter chill

Fallen leaves blown across the forest path, under foot while walking, go “swoosh, swoosh, swoosh.” The sound of moist leaves (not crisply crunchy), an early rain and cool nights softened the landscape, removed the dust, made things gentle again. We are relaxing, slowly shedding the stress of the Fall’s potential for wildfire made more real these past many weeks by wind-carried smoke from prescribed fires across the entire state, even nearby at Wilder Ranch.  

Breezes carry in the clouds and then clear the clouds, waves after waves of clouds and then sun alternate as the dry summer plays with the wet winter, back and forth. This week, winter won with a bit of rain, shy of an inch and not yet wetting the soil more than superficially. After the rain, some sunny warmth and then the wind, fog, and another front , and it got chilly. Tuesday evening fog piled up on the other side of the prominent ridge across Molino Creek and poured over it, falling like a ghostly waterfall backlit by the evening sun. Beautiful!

Neither the rain nor the subsequent drippy fog has been enough to release the cedar-scented petrichor, much anticipated.

we do grow olives…for locals only olive oil!

Big swell, seasonal scents

Last night’s goose bump chill sent us to close the windows, put on sweaters, and some even built their first wood stove fires. And today’s cool air reminded me of how I’ve been taking the sun’s warmth for granted and how I’ll miss that deeply warm sense for a long time soon. The cool air, moisture, and gusty breezes accentuate the piney, resinous smells of redwood, Douglas fir, and coyote brush. Winds across the ocean pushed up an epic swell recently. Roaring and thumping waves reverberated across the landscape, but now there’s just a low more consistent hum. The patterns of breezes with long lulls awaken the senses, especially when it is peaceful on the farm but the trees on the ridge start talking, telling us a big gust is coming.

Feathered visitors

Geese, Canada and white fronted, are honking their melodies overhead near sundown. They are making their way to their winter grounds.

The newest birds are blackbirds, strutting around the fields in flocks, their heads moving curiously straight back and then straight forward with every stride. This evening, the light was catching the glean off the backs of a flock of Brewer’s blackbirds, reflecting the iridescent deep purple-blue of their gorgeous plumage. They let me get close but eventually alighted to show me the bicolor blackbirds in their midst. There are around 50 of this mixed flock and more may still arrive. They love to eat the grass seeds in the cover crop. They might even be anticipating it.

Other wildlife

Otherwise, the wildlife report is all about the Very Big Buck, coyotes, and chirping bright blue bluebirds. Perhaps there’s more than one Very Big Buck, but people are talking about an extraordinarily large, very impressive male deer from here to Davenport and north to Swanton. This creature stands very smart and tall with a giant set of antlers nearly 3’ across. He stood in the roadway looking intently north where he couldn’t traverse without going around the deer fence. He hesitated, looked north again, and then sauntered uphill following the fence line, somehow seemingly begrudgingly.

Nearly nightly, the coyotes sing. They aren’t doing the long musical numbers with multiple animals yipping and howling, but rather it’s a series of solos of the one coyote couple. One evening, they were calling from way up the Molino Creek canyon. Another evening, they sang right outside the window. Each night they try making some song from a different place, perhaps checking out the acoustics: the echoes are always fun.

The throaty, watery chirps of western bluebirds grace our midst. The brilliant blue flashes from the males’ zig-zaggy flights are breathtaking. There were seven birds, up a couple from last count. With that plumage, one wonders if they are considering breeding early…

The fading row crops will soon be tilled in and cover crop will grow, instead

Fall farming

We’re not quite ready to cover crop. There are still 10 days of tomatoes to harvest and the apple harvest is in full swing. The floral crisp sweet Gala apples are almost all gone; we will pick no more for market. Last weekend, we picked all the remaining Mutsu apples which had been devastated by the apple scab disease that enjoyed our late wet warm spring. Next up are the Fuji apples, and there are plenty of those! Plus, there are Golden Delicious, an underappreciated long storing apple of extraordinary flavor. In the Barn there are hundreds of pounds of culled apples that we’ll soon be juicing for cider. And so, we pick, pick, pick…sending on the perfect apples to market. Between picking spells, we spread compost and mow to prepare for harrowing in the bell bean seeds.

those rusty brown tentacles….avocado roots poking up into the loose, month-old compost!

Tentacles in the compost

The Community Orchardists have been spending the last many weeks spreading compost under many trees. Around a month ago, we spread compost under the avocados on Citrus Hill. After that little bit of rain, I noticed those avocadoes looked particularly perky and vibrantly green. So, today I pushed around the compost to see if the avocado roots had invaded it: they had! It is so curious to me that avocado trees push pointy tenacles of roots straight up, out of the soil into mulch. How do those thick pokey roots feed off the mulch? Such a mystery.

young avocado trees are growing fast!

Being Present, Naturally

Our best moments are when we feel the most present. The stories we tell, the good ones and the bad ones, reflect on the times when we were most attentive. If you read that statement and let that realization sink in, you might be inspired to take a break from reading this.

The media we return to is that which absorbs us. When we see or read something that catches our attention, we focus on it and the world around us can fall away. Likewise, when we turn our attention outward, the world opens up. The more we pay attention, the more we see. We are incredibly good observers if we stop to do just that.

My favorite way to open myself to discovery, is to find a quiet place in nature and let all that is occurring there slowly reveal itself. There is so much complexity in any wild place that the discovery goes as deep as you are willing to observe.

Jon Young at least used to live near Santa Cruz and has written and taught a lot about how to become more present in the moment and how that presence of mind can help heal. This 17 minute TedX talk summarizes some of his most poignant lessons. Telling stories, listening to stories, being aware of your natural surroundings, and allowing yourself to become more a part of your surroundings are all central themes.

Mr. Young advocates for choosing a ‘sit spot’ to visit as a door-opening exercise to discovering yourself and nature, to finding a way to be present. Visiting one spot in nature and sitting there for an hour regularly with little movement allows us the time for discovery and the time for those beings that occupy that place to accept our presence and reveal themselves.

The Nature of Being in Nature

When we go into nature, how do we change? Some people go into nature for the most active forms of recreation: extreme or less extreme mountain biking, jogging slow or fast, the many forms of exercise for people or beast called ‘horseback riding,’ and then there is destination hiking or exercise hiking. Some people go into nature for more passive activities such as wildlife viewing, natural history study, art, poetry, contemplation, meditation, teaching children, learning from nature, becoming more at one with the wild and other beings, or just plain observation. The active forms of recreation (fast mountain biking, especially) are not compatible in the same time and place with the more passive types of natural area visitation. And yet, natural area managers mostly plan for ‘mixed use’ or ‘multi-use trails,’ mixing all of those uses together when they design and manage open space. This is despite a very well-honed natural areas planning science enshrined by the National Parks Service and other agencies who manage for visitor use expectations and experiences. There are University degree programs focusing on training natural areas managers in this science. Unfortunately, despite the huge investments in natural areas, I am unaware of any such science being applied in our region.

The Num-Num Cult

I recently came across an example of the kindergarten-level conversation we are subject to by the local open space managers who design the visitor use experiences we must tolerate. Check out this survey to “let us know if trails are meeting your needs” recently offered by the Santa Cruz Mountains Stewardship Network. The survey is meant to help inform the “State of the Trails Project,” which mostly otherwise appears on the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District’s website on web searches. You can view a video presentation about this report at this link.

I was disheartened by the survey in that none of the rich passive uses of parks were reflected in the choices respondents could choose from. Using their terminology, all my friends’ uses of parks would be forced to fit into one use – ‘hiking’ – which is very far off from our real and precious experiences in nature. Luckily for us, the survey has blank spots that allow you to add comments.

Majority Rules?

Such a survey makes me wonder where we are heading with managing natural areas for the quality of visitor use experiences. If businesses have any say, they will support visitor use experiences that raise the most capital, experiences with expensive equipment that breaks or wears out. More passive uses of natural areas will never compete. The most passive uses, the most healing uses, will create the least amount of spending. The frugality of healthy people is astonishing.

Will those of us who are turning away from techno-gadgets and buying things be so marginalized that we will have nowhere to go to have the natural areas experiences we cherish?

Nature Heals

Many of us already understand the importance of nature in helping us stay healthy. The most recent term highlighting this phenomenon is called ‘forest bathing.’ Health care professionals recommend forest bathing, which is about practicing mindfulness, being present in nature so that we see the wealth of colors, sounds, and smells that are around us. This requires peace and quiet, the most peaceful places are the places that heal the best.

Wilderness Changed

The term wilderness is fast disappearing, for better or for worse. The term was problematic, anyways as it ignored the wealth of indigenous presence across the whole earth and the importance of indigenous people’s stewardship. And yet, the idea of wilderness being a place where technology, bustle, and noise is left behind, where contemplation and connection with nature are paramount needs to be attended to in our natural areas. Besides the wonky science of natural areas management for the ‘quality of visitor experience,’ it seems we lack a phrase that well contains such places.

Your Turn

I hope that you take the opportunity to fill in that survey and that you let politicians and open space managers know about the many ways that you cherish nature in open spaces. Let’s inform them of the term ‘displacement’ when you no longer feel comfortable going to a natural area because of the type or number of other ‘users.’ Every one of us has a right to our kind of use in natural areas, and it is open space managers’ jobs to accommodate those uses. They should be asking us about the quality of our experiences and adjusting their management to maximize that quality over time.

I hope that you also take some time to do some forest bathing. It will do a world of good. The more of us that do it, the more peaceful the world will become.

-this column originally posted in Bruce Bratton’s esteemed blog at BrattonOnline.com – I strongly suggest you subscribe (and donate to support it!) – this is precious place to learn much of what you should know to be a citizen of the Monterey Bay.

Returning Friends

High in a fruiting apple tree, harvest bags slung over our shoulders, we stop picking to glance up the road…gravel scrunching noise…a car winding its way down the road onto the farm. A neighbor or a visitor? We narrow our eyes to see where it goes, who is returning home? Who is visiting whom? By car, wing, or scales, we welcome all sorts of friends returning to Molino Creek Farm.

A String of Celebrations

The harvest festivals have already begun. We are pressing apples with two pressings already behind us, 40 gallons of divine apple juice in freezers, refrigerators, or in carboys fermenting. Upcoming is Samhain, the midpoint between the Fall Equinox and Winter Solstice, a time when the veil grows thin separating the ancestors with those here now. We will be attentive to the shadows, echoes and whispers of those who walked and loved this place before. John Brunie used to perform the astrological calculations of the exact date and time of these sacred holidays, but he’s gone so we seek a new calendar keeper for the Farm. Thanksgiving means some leave the farm for gatherings elsewhere and others arrive, a string of quiet days, friends roaming the fields and trails sharing stories and luxuriant first rain smells. The forest floor and roads are often littered with evergreen branches at Thanksgiving, blown about by the winter’s first storm. We weave fallen boughs into circles, recognizing the cycles of time. Winter solstice lies shortly thereafter and then the Wassail brings the string of celebrations to a temporary close. We are at the threshold of gatherings a’plenty.

We regularly hire who we can to mow down acres of flammable coastal scrub

Equinox Birds

The Fall Equinox has hellos and goodbyes. We said hello to hundreds of golden crowned sparrows who returned to this place from Alaska on the very evening of the Equinox as they have done time and time again. With strong site fidelity, these birds love this place more deeply than we can ever understand. These same families, these same clans, have potentially been returning for hundreds of thousands of years to this very spot. If we peer at them enough, we can recognize individuals; they already know each of the neighbors and maybe many of our friends. The Equinox saw the flight of the barn swallows, who returned to Central and South America. They may have spent days singing goodbye, soaring one more time past their favorite trees, and then they were off. As they left, the particularly whiny sapsucker(s?) dove into the orchard from the great migration from who knows where. We need help to see how many there are: last year there were three in the family. Sapsucker is elusive and shy, requiring some focused time searching for each individual to figure out how many will be here this winter. The changing birds greatly alters the soundscape. The dominant noise in the spring and summer were the creaky whistles and laughing chatter of swallows. Now, the dominant bird noise is the golden crowned sparrows’ forlorn call, a descending set of notes that might be, ‘Oh dear me,’ repeated from every shrub and tree. What hasn’t changed is the sheer biomass of birds inhabiting the Farm. Stepping out the door still flushes 50 birds. A walk down the roads or paths creates a continuous wake of fleeing birds. Feather flutter and alarm cheeps everywhere.

Winter Waves

The sets of roaring and breaking big winter waves have returned. Lately, there has been no still peace as the reverberations of the ocean form a white noise backdrop to a cacophony of warm night crickets interspersed with bouts of hooting owls. The waves create a mist that blankets the ocean side farms, spreading a bit up the coastal canyons. When the waves are big and there’s even the gentlest onshore breeze, we can smell the fresh sea scent from the Farm, 2 miles inland and 900’ up. When the waves get really big, it seems the ground rumbles beneath our feet. These are familiar phenomena which make this seem more like home.

A view across the farm

Coyote Friends

In Spring, we saw a female and her pup coyote. She had a peculiar white line behind her shoulders, a ridge of brighter fur that stood up a little above the rest. She was lithe and wary, always on the move, never playing as so many of our wild dog friends had done before. The other day, I saw her again, following the large male neighbors had been talking about. We have a pair of coyote friends! May they find a fine place to have pups nearby and feast on the rabbits and gophers that are so common around the farm. From their scat, it looks like they are enjoying apples and tomatoes for now. The two sing many nights, a deeper growly staccato barking paired with a longer noted, high yipping song.

Fall Scenes

The cycle of seasons delivers us a quintessential peaceful Fall. Time slows. The sun very gradually sets into longer and longer nights. The hills are muted colors now, dry leaves rattling. Once tall upright golden grass has settled, askew and gray-brown. The fruit and nut trees show hints of yellow. In the forest, maples, thimbleberry, and hazelnut are dropping lemon yellow leaves, splashes of color in the shade of the towering redwood forest. Bright squash litter the Two Dog fields as their peppers turn deep red. The poison oak is still moist, only a few bright red patches on the drier shrubby sites. The sunset sky is streaked with smoke from prescribed fires, humans returning to their roots, stewarding the land once again.

The last rays of sunset from a tall spot on the farm

May you take the time to meander about, soaking up the warm fall evenings.

Slowing Down -or- Rushing?

So much environmental degradation seems to be due to our rushing around. How can we best slow down? Each of us can do our part in creating the Great Slowdown that we need to sustain the planet.

Save More, Buy Less

The first and easiest way to help the Great Slowdown is to stop buying so much Stuff. If you haven’t watched the Story of Stuff in a while, or not at all, DO IT NOW. This 21-minute video is compelling, fun, and has changed more lives than many a 20-some minute experience otherwise. I think it’s worth watching regularly, perhaps in October just before the stuff-a-thon holiday season besets our culture. 

If you listen to the news, you will understand how important buying stuff is for our unsustainable economy. “Inflation is up, but ‘luckily’ consumer spending is cooking right along, otherwise our economy would be hosed.” A president once said in a national crisis, something like, “Just keep buying stuff!” Time is money, and by spending your money on useless crap, you are wasting your time, carelessly throwing away your life, and helping to wreck the planet. A few years ago, someone did a calculation and the transaction cost of each dollar spent was a liter of oil. I’m betting it’s worse now. Save a buck, keep a liter of oil from burning up.

Stop Rushing at Work

There is so much pressure to do more at work, but is that really helping anything? Chances are good that the more we rush, the worse off the planet is. How about we slow down? Carefully watch those who rush around with their work: why are they doing that? I’m betting that they mostly want to impress people, get others to work harder, or they are avoiding problems at home or something they might better be doing for Real Good.

The labor movement has something called ‘working by the book,’ which we might emulate to improve the planet. What is absolutely necessary to do with your work? What does the job description say? What are the metrics for success? Often, organizations keep the productivity targets elusive, to keep everyone guessing or trying to push for more. On the other hand, if productivity targets are defined, ask yourself if they are set too high. If so, it might be time to work with your colleagues to reduce them to something more manageable.

Slowing down at work is part of the solution, part of the Great Slowdown.

Working for the Planet

 The capitalist system mostly asks each worker to create efficiencies that are bad for the planet. As we learn to care more for the planet, we will find ways to sneak improvements into the workplace that will help Earth. Is there a way to reduce driving, material transport, waste? Does your workplace purchase recycled paper, organic foods, and other eco-friendly products? Maybe there’s a sustainability policy on your business’ horizon.

Beware the Fakes

If you see potential greenwashing, ask about it! I recently asked a seemingly eco-conscious caterer what they meant by “gourmet sandwiches, made from the finest local ingredients” and it turned out that they used very mainstream factory-farmed meats and conventionally grown produce distributed from warehouses far away. They soon thereafter changed their menu language. That was the third time I was able to affect that kind of change. Do we choose places that are true to their word about their products? How do we know if we don’t ask? Why would they be true to their word if folks never asked?

Buy Green

The list of businesses that are truly green is getting smaller, not larger in Santa Cruz. There are fewer restaurants serving local, organic foods than there were a few years ago. Local grocery stores are sliding further from, not closer to, sustainability. I suspect all of this is because people are not pursuing green purchases.

Keep Your Keel

How easy it is to go with the flow, but is that truly the best thing for the planet? There is a concept called ‘slippage’ where environmental policies are interpreted in ways that slip away from the intent of the policy, usually with negative environmental consequence.

If your work entails intersection with environmental policies, it is time to ask how you can help interpret those to environmental benefit, not environmental degradation. It is time also to ask what is the greatest good you can do with your work, focusing on the issues of greatest impact for environmental improvement. As I’ve said in prior posts, the metric should be species conservation: how can our work best affect that outcome? The answers are usually easy to arrive at.

Beware of False Dichotomies

Those who are most invested in slippage often use false dichotomies. Parks managers often note that they have a difficult dual mandate: to provide for public recreational access while conserving wildlife. For a large portion of Santa Cruz County, managers are leaning heavily on this false dichotomy to ‘sell’ the concept that it’s just fine for our wildlife to disappear because of their mismanagement. Trails erode tons of sediment into streams and wetlands, trash litters our beautiful beaches, and graffiti proliferates on sea cliffs because of the slippage that is embraced by the poor logic presented by parks managers’ adoption of their false dichotomies.

Parks Management Slippage

Many of these parks’ managers use other forms of slippage. The California Public Resources Code says this about State Parks: “Following classification or reclassification of a unit by the State Park and Recreation Commission, and prior to the development of any new facilities in any previously classified unit, the department shall prepare a general plan or revise any existing plan for the unit.” Look at the North Coast beaches, and Gray Whale Ranch…and, enter slippage: none of those have general plans, and all have ‘new facilities.’ I’m sure that someone, somewhere can provide some beautiful logic about how that can be possible. Has someone said ‘if anyone asks just tell them we never “classified or reclassified” those “units” and they were never “previously classified” (hardy-har-har-har, that’ll get ‘em).’ Anyone in their right mind would know that the responsible thing to do would be to create a general plan before opening a park, and that’s what was meant by that part of the Resources Code. Meanwhile, we must all ask WHY are these precious places opened to visitation without a plan to conserve wildlife on those spectacularly biodiverse places?? If you work for State Parks, you must ask yourself what place you have played in allowing such things to happen and how you might reverse this slippage. If you work for other land conservation organizations, you might have similar things to ponder: do you hold a false dichotomy promulgated by those with anti-conservation agendas? Where do you lie on the spectrum of serving Earth or serving Greed? If you are torn and in doubt, maybe it’s time to slow down and ‘work by the book.’ It might be better if you embrace the Great Slowdown in your job while you increasingly help others become aware of slippage.

-this post originally found at BrattonOnline.com

Winter Wrestles with Summer, Fall Progresses

Two nights ago, the lower portions of our farm dipped into the chilly 40s. Today, it was in the 80’s, tomorrow even warmer with two ‘warm’ nights not lower than 65F. Such warm nights bring a cacophony of crickets along with late summer katydids. Our ears seem to ring, and seeking the source of any one of the insect songs creates a confusing, 360° immersive dizziness. A visitor remarked, “what IS that noise?” Such sounds are not found in the City. Such sounds are not even everywhere on the farm, only in places on the farm. There are pockets of nightsong. Seek them where you can, it is a worthy experiential destination.

Sundown on the Pacific, just a short ways from the Farm

Country-style Night Show

Even where they sometimes fill the air from all directions, the insect songs fade in and out, sometimes louder and sometimes softer. Some species go quiet leaving the chorus to others and those then fade to the next song, a repeating pattern that never grows old. Some insects sing trill….trill….trill and others have a more constant chitter. Some play lower stridulations, others high, shrill ear-piercing whines. For biologists, I note black field crickets persist in lower numbers than in the early summer; now there are more brown ones. Also, the invasive green tree crickets sing with oscillating medium-toned trills from which you can calculate the temperature. The late summer, and this year in particular, features the massive laterally compressed long-legged bug-eyed katydids, a source of high-pitched, especially ear aching whining: you particularly notice when they take a break. On warm nights like tonight, there is no real silence of insects, only lulls, and always with the green tree crickets’ consistent “wee….wee….wee….wee….wee….wee….wee….wee…” Under the insect chorus, enter a baritone montage: wave sets crashing, their pulsing drone carried by the gentle onshore cool breeze. The light show for the orchestra: fields of stars and the stripe of the Spectacular Milky Way that us country dwellers get to enjoy far from the polluting night lighting which ostensibly provides increased safety and orientation in the cityscapes.

Dawn Revealing

In the East, the first glimmers of dawn cast doubt on night, but darkness at first prevails, some stars still brightly shining. The wakening mind returns to semi-slumber, the day’s return a dream (?). Another thought, eyes wider, the sky a new brighter gray and another glance brings certainty…a new day, a return to the waking life and the tasks at hand. Awakening brings smiles and gladness for the peace of country life and ease of transition into farm routines.

Watering and Harvest

Many fields are dry-farmed, and those are curiously bedecked with fading green foliage and the brightening fruit harvest. Other areas are irrigated and so still vibrant green, though the last planting of sunflowers is fading.

Those irrigated areas need regular attention during this, the driest part of the Mediterranean summer. The waves of heat alternating with cool and even drizzle make for irregular water demand. In anticipation of heat waves, we saturate the soil more. With spells of cool and drizzle, we slack off a bit and catch up. Shovels explore the soil to record the moisture condition, sometimes surprisingly dry… trees full of ripening apples are especially thirsty. We are trained to keep the soil moisture above 50%, but predicting where it will be any one day is a learning opportunity, always.

Sunflowers at Dusk

Midday Warmth

The hot days tax farmworkers and birds, alike. Tomato and pepper harvest comes midday with backs bent, sun baked and sweating; picking commences no matter the weather.  Above the farmers, migrating hawks ride warm thermals higher, soaring up and then south. A very rare occurrence: there were six red-tailed hawks and another large raptor even higher over the farm today. The great migrations called “hawktober” often co-occur with the recurring shimmering heat waves so common this month. Other birds avoid the open sun, chipping lazily from the shade of shrubs. Late in the afternoon, down by the ocean, a mixed flock of various blackbirds alighted on the roadside. Their beaks were open, panting, even as the day cooled at 5pm.

Evening

If we can, we wait to harvest apples outside of the hottest part of the day, and we can stand while doing it…easier on the body. Heavy picking bags leave the shoulders achy, and we switch sides to even the ache. The hurried apple harvest races the setting sun. What started as bright sun fades to soft golden light so briefly before all sunlight retreats to muted dusk, quickly darkening. Boxes and buckets of apples go into the barn with the last available light. Overnight, boxed apples cool naturally before the market delivery the following day.

On warm evenings like today, a great emergence of moths alights. Big moths and small zip and float everywhere, and it is impossible not to get hit in the face as they flit about. The bats are getting fatter. Poor-wills clumsily flap and dart, pouncing on their insect prey.

Also at dusk, the deer arise from their folded legs to traipse about looking for forage. Lately, they’ve been munching on the leaves of freshly felled walnut tree trimmings. Someone improved our farm road tree tunnel and left piles of fallen black walnut tree branches: this is a seasonally favorite food of the deer. Momma and her adolescent offspring deer (still unnamed) are at that salad bar. A young male caught her scent and wandered onto the farm this evening, a rare sight. The wayward bucks are very flighty and he was no exception. Upon being noticed, he bounded away, alert and head held high.

The last light of dusk barely illuminates the fading sunflowers at Molino Creek Farm

Night

Great horned owls, coyotes, foxes, and more. Two great horned owls have been having regular evening hooting contests. They sit in trees not too far apart and hoot loudly, taking turns, back and forth. There’s a silent bit, then one of them starts on some odd, non-hooty noises but then returns to the hoots soon thereafter. Is this a long conversation, or do they revel in the joy of creating or exchanging subtle variations in pitch and enunciation? They do not tire. They must be day sleepers.

Coyote barks seldom. Cassandra reports seeing a particularly large one. They leave big poops full of tomatoes and apples. Sylvie reports fox feasting on her Asian pears- a tree worth. There are poops from fox, too, all across the farm. Weasels excavate gopher runs in the apple orchard, freshly dug soil mounds ending at large gopher holes each morning.  There may be a weasel den under a prune tree.

Night strolls to manage irrigation reveal black widow spiders more commonly than any other spider. One striking large female complained about my opening the gate she was building a web trap at the base of.

Mice scurrying (but never seen) is another commonality.

These balmy nights bring pulses of warm air settling onto the farm from higher up the mountain. Warm blobs of air get pushed around by cooler onshore breezes, or nudged here and there by sinking chillier streams of Molino Creek canyon air. The half mile walk across the Farm sends me through boundaries of three or four contrasting temperature air masses, and the new temperature also brings new scents and different humidities.

Seasons Passing

We have already passed through several waves of harvests and are set to see the last run of this year. Last February saw baskets of citrus and then Spring brought us peas and cherries. The first tomato, not until August, was a real delight, now we are in peak production. The prune plums are nearly gone as are the early comice pears. We are entering a marathon of 6 weeks of apple harvest, and that will be the end of the harvest season with the transition back around to citrus and all that follows next year. We compare years of apple harvest and the resulting cider. We mark our annual cycles as ‘before the Fire, or since the fire.’ Rains return and we burn huge piles of cut brush then the brush piles build again to be reduced the next year. On and on. Earth whirls around the Sun and we bound through space and time.

A Fine Legacy

How do we leave a good legacy that will benefit future generations in a world of uncertainty? Some suggest well-raised children are a sure bet, but with this the humble must demur. We must however try. I suggest two other things that are essential: 1) species and ecosystem restoration on natural lands and 2) building soil health on agricultural lands. These are things we can each find a way to support, and they are both crucial for the future of life on Earth.

A World of Uncertainty

We live in extraordinary, unprecedented times. Humans have built a remarkable global civilization with a burgeoning population. To survive, we are in a race to shed polluting fossil fuels. But, we have no idea if and how we can replace all that petroleum has provided to fuel population growth and the civilizing of landscapes. No matter what superficial form of government seems to be in place, the “oilogarchy” is deeply entrenched, exercising economic and political control. For evidence, just watch US politics: both parties’ have an inability to act in the expeditious way that the vast majority of citizens know to be necessary. And so, life, including human life, on Earth will likely become much more difficult for the next several hundred years. Of course, we should rise up and protest as if life itself depends on it, but there are other tangible things we can do to make the world more habitable for future generations.

Species and Ecosystem Restoration

There are a variety of activities you can partake in to help restore species and ecosystems, which humans will increasingly rely on for their wellbeing. As global warming creates climate chaos, and as humans increasingly falter without boosts from cheap petro-supplies, species diversity and resilient ecosystems will become more closely tied to better standards of living.

Oil and Water

For an example, let’s consider water. Some suggest oil and water don’t mix, but the two are closely intertwined over most of the world. We might suppose that the role petroleum plays in repairing, creating, and powering our water supply will be replaced by some renewable energy supply in the future. Plastic pipes will be made from hemp, renewable energy will power our pumps, electric vehicles will transport the legions of water district workers who maintain water systems, etc. However, when rain comes in torrential bursts or not at all, we will rely on very well-tended ecosystems to absorb and meter out rainfall so that we can benefit from more dependable surface or groundwater supplies.

Dust Storms

For another example, let’s consider erosion. The stability of our infrastructure- homes, utility lines, roads, dams, communication towers, airports, etc., depends on more than just good geological anchors: that stability is deeply dependent on functioning ecosystems. Species hold our stuff together. On the coast and along rivers and streams, species protect shorelines. On hillsides, in the mountains and on the plains, species hold the land in place. Without a wealth of species supported by resilient ecosystems, everything will come unzipped – gullies, floods, landslides…infrastructure collapse. At the same time, the bared soil will start to blow and dust storms will become more frequent, destroying engines, burying buildings and roads, and darkening the sky.

Restoration Means Now

The species that currently perform best at the “holding the soil in place” function are likely not the ones that will do best in a hundred years, given the rapidly changing climate. So, we must conserve every species, and plan to allow species migration through a healthy landscape of resilient ecosystems. Right now, this very year, we must quickly turn increasingly to restoration of the land because we have degraded too many places already. You can help by volunteering with the many habitat restoration projects in our area, taking better care of your land, voting for politicians that support ecological restoration and land care, spreading the word, and/or giving money to groups that are making a difference. Many people are joining this movement, we are making a difference, and we need more help.

Bye-Bye Soil, Hello Agricultural Substrate

Since World War 2, agricultural systems have become increasingly intertwined with petroleum at great expense to the soil that humans rely on for sustenance. Petroleum-fueled mechanical cultivation has destabilized billions of tons of soil which has already washed or blown away due to recklessness. You can watch it happening, still: in the Salinas and Pajaro valleys and along Santa Cruz’ North Coast watch the soil blow or wash away, depending on the season. At the same time, cheap fertilizers and expedient pesticides have been made possible by petroleum and the application of these have destroyed ecosystems that once sustained and built topsoil. Farmers for years have acted like soil is just a substrate, something to hold a plant in place long enough to harvest a crop. And so, most agricultural land is highly degraded and production is increasingly and deeply dependent on the supply of petroleum. While we can, there is a great opportunity to build the kind of soil health that will be necessary to feed humans when petroleum-subsidized fertilizers become too expensive, and the human population is still larger than it is now.

Soil Health

Healthy agricultural soils can retain more water, provide plants more dependable nutrition, and stabilize pest outbreaks. So, why would a farmer not create more healthy soils? There are two main reasons. First, investing in healthy soil reduces profits. For example, using cover crops to cover and build the soil during the rainy season means the loss of one or more potential harvests. That also drives up food costs, which then helps to create the second reason: mandates for soil health are politically difficult. The good news is that you can help with both of these conundrums.

You Can Help Create Healthy Soil

We all purchase groceries, and the choices we make can help support soil stewardship. Already, the organic agriculture movement has been growing and makes a difference for soil health. Certified organic agriculture requires farmers to find alternatives to pesticides and fertilizers that are synthesized from petroleum. In ‘conventional’ agriculture, novel petro-created compounds working alone or as a mixed concoction are released into agricultural systems without analysis on long-term soil health. Organic farmers more often rely on soil health as a means of production, and the higher cost of those products reflects that investment. Some tell me that they can’t afford organic foods, but discussions reveal that they are unwilling to make more basic food choices, preferring to rely on processed foods or meat that are especially more expensive when certified organic. Going organic may mean dietary changes that might be more healthy, anyway.

Besides using the power of your purse to support farmers who build soil health, you might more directly create healthy soils in community orchards or gardens. You can volunteer in a school garden which has the added benefit of helping children better understand soil health and healthy foods. You might also support, by volunteering or donations, organizations that are working to improve soil health on agricultural lands.

-this piece originally published by Bruce Bratton in his extraordinary BrattonOnline.com, the place to go for movie reviews and local news…unparalleled. Sign up and get it weekly. Donate and it is money well spent.

The Arrival of Fall

Last Friday, Night equaled Day; it was the Equinox, and our world stood in balance. From here, things tilt rapidly towards the dominance of Night, and we share the Sun increasingly with the South for a while.  There, Spring is emerging. The cooling temperature change switch is not thrown quickly; there is a lag of the Sun’s heating, and we often are assaulted by wilting, week-long heat waves in October. The return of the rainy season will likely be a way off. Meanwhile, the Harvest is in full swing at Molino Creek Farm with all of its various enterprises. Welcome to Fall.

Organic Gala apple fruit are laden on one of many trees in our older trees

The Orchard

Apple trees hang heavily with giant loads of ripening fruit. The branches bend more each day as fruits get bigger, juicier, and more colorful. Gala apples are finally gaining their peachy blush, underlaying the sun-side bright red streaking, overlaying the shade-side yellows. Our much smaller crop of Mutsu apples are getting Really Big and kissed with a patch of purply red where they see the most sunshine. The Braeburn and Jonagold crops, a total failure due to apple scab, a combined result of the long, moist, cool spring and our own lack of applying sulfur to kill it. There are so many other varieties…one tree each…to taste, to give to friends to taste…to revel in the diversity of apple flavors and textures. Oh, and then there’s the patch of Wickson Crabs, which are laden with the tart poppy nuggets that will tint so many batches of hard cider, real soon.

The gold-red-purple French prune-plums are past but the yummier deep purple Italian prune plums are getting ripe now: tarts a’hoy!

Nearby, young avocado trees are stretching with late summer growth shoots, so well-tended and vigorous. And, an array of citrus also puts on pale new growth while slowly swelling their fruits toward a February harvest.

A Big Moon rises over Molino Creek Farm and its patches of dry-farmed Early Girl tomatoes

The Tomatoes

Rows and rows of tomato vines are laden with fruit of all colors. The harvest will continue for a while. There are plenty of pale green orbs from tiny younglings to larger plumpers. Pale orange fruits are transitioning to the bright reds, nestled within distinctly green foliage. Between the rows, tossed rejects of tomatoes melt into the soil and flocks of birds flit around chowing on their remains, hungry especially for the protein-rich seeds.

Quince!

Harvesting

The ripening tomatoes go into buckets only so full. The apples go into shoulder-mounted bags. Both fruit get sorted for sale. Tomatoes of varying quality go for varying prices. Only the perfect apples go to sale, the rest to home use, charity, or juice (cider!). Starting tomorrow, apple harvesters will gather a few times a week and we will be handling 6,000 pounds between now and Thanksgiving. Wow.

Seasonal Wildlife

On the drive down to the highway last Monday, I saw the Largest Buck…a real beauty with big antlers, a broad chest, and massive muscles. That large of a male is a rare sight, one I’ve experienced only three times since 1986. Back on the farm, we have a much smaller mother deer and only one of her twins from last season. Their still summer coats are shiny and light-roast coffee brown, and they appear well fed and relaxed. They have enough food to not be walking around on two legs reaching up for the Fall walnut leaves, but I smile remembering that ridiculous-looking behavior.

Like clockwork, the golden-crowned sparrows returned last Friday night. They always return on the night of the Equinox. The sound of their songs are now coloring the days; they have transformed the soundscape to mark the seasonal transition. This is somehow deeply comforting.

Scent Landscape

With the sweet sparrow song also arrives the scent of Fall. So many things contribute to the scentscape. Mostly, it is the piney-bitter smell of coyotebush, but add to it wafting sweetness of flowering domestic garden plants- angel’s trumpet, San Pedro cactus, four-o’clock and ornamental ginger. Also, the breezes bring other scent ingredients like agricultural sulfur, pungent tomato foliage, cidery apple culls, and so much more. The dry, cool air accentuates and mixes these scents and creates the Molino Creek fall perfume. Emerging from the night warmth of shelter, we breathe deeply the outdoor air to experience all that’s on the air.

When the clouds and fog clear – the minority of nights as of late – the star-filled sky is bright with the Milky Way. Tonight, a Big Moon hails and lights the farm in its blue glow, illuminating the soon-to-be walk to juggle irrigation valves once again.

Somewhere, somehow…it is all Right Now

Right, now

Posted simultaneously at the website for Molino Creek Farm.

BLM Overlooking Precious Wildlife Conservation

Santa Cruz County’s newest conservation land managers are supposed to conserve the wildlife prioritized by the State of California, but are failing to acknowledge their obligations, which means some of our area’s iconic wildlife species will disappear faster due to lack of Federal cooperation at Cotoni Coast Dairies.

Background

The Bureau of Land Management oversees management of Cotoni Coast Dairies, but it is following much-outdated wildlife conservation guidance. Land management agencies like the BLM are guided by policies and procedures that guarantee that they do a good job of managing wildlife. For instance, BLM has its 6840 Manual “Sensitive Species Management,” which notes:

“The objectives of the BLM special status species policy are:

A. To conserve and/or recover ESA-listed species and the ecosystems on which they depend so that ESA protections are no longer needed for these species.

B. To initiate proactive conservation measures that reduce or eliminate threats to Bureau sensitive species to minimize the likelihood of and need for listing of these species under the ESA.”

In other words, BLM recognizes that the agency should not be contributing to wildlife species becoming rarer and so receiving more regulatory protection, which would impact private landowners by restricting the uses of their property.

Mouritsen’s Duty, Neglected

To avoid that, BLM California’s State Director Karen Mouritsen is required to, “at least once every 5 years,” review and update the BLM-maintained list of sensitive species in coordination with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW). It is unusual for such policy guidance to lay out a specific timeline, which adds clarity to expectations. The last time California BLM’s sensitive wildlife list was updated was in 2010, before Director Mouritsen’s tenure: 13 years ago! A lot has changed in those intervening years, and scientists have recognized that many more wildlife species are in need of protection by BLM.

Repercussions at Cotoni Coast Dairies

What happens when BLM’s sensitive wildlife species list isn’t updated? Let’s look at the Cotoni Coast Dairies example. BLM has already completed a Resource Management Plan that is meant to guide wildlife conservation on the property. Under the guidance and environmental review provided by the RMP, the agency is building miles of trails and parking lots, implementing a cattle grazing program, and allocating funding to other prioritized activities. BLM will soon embark on a Science Plan for the property. The RMP didn’t and the Science Plan will not consider conservation of wildlife species that do not appear on the BLM’s sensitive species list. And so, the following 10 rare wildlife species will receive no attention, pushing them further towards extinction: ferruginous hawk, grasshopper sparrow, Northern harrier, olive-sided flycatcher, American badger, San Francisco dusky-footed woodrat, Western pond turtle, California red-legged frog, American peregrine falcon, and short-eared owl.

A Deeper Dive – Grasshopper Sparrow

Let’s consider one of those species with a little more detail, the grasshopper sparrow. If this species is nesting in an area, under California law they are protected and our state wildlife agency, CDFW, has been charged with their conservation. According to BLM guidance, Director Mouritsen is 13 years overdue in updating the agency’s sensitive wildlife list for California to include this species. As their name suggests, grasshopper sparrows are grassland-dependent organisms. There is an abundance of nesting grasshopper sparrows at Cotoni Coast Dairies.

Without active management such as with carefully planned livestock grazing or fire, all of the grasslands at Cotoni Coast Dairies will disappear, being invaded first by brush and then by trees. This is already happening with extensive French broom and coyote brush invasion.

Already, BLM has planned its livestock grazing and recreational trail uses without consideration of preferred habitat for nesting grasshopper sparrows. Livestock grazing could be taking place to the detriment of the species, already. The construction of recreational trails and parking lots may have already destroyed important nesting habitat. When recreational visitors start using those facilities, it may occur before BLM has a baseline study of the density and location of nesting grasshopper sparrows. So, the agency will be unable to understand how land uses are impacting the species and so will be unable in an informed way to adjust its recreational or livestock management to better conserve the species.

It may well be that BLM’s management of Cotoni Coast Dairies will further reduce nesting populations of grasshopper sparrow, pushing the species closer to the point where they will need to be listed as threatened or endangered. When that occurs, private landowners whose land supports nesting grasshopper sparrows will see increased regulation and oversight by the State and/or Federal government. Their property values will be reduced and their ability to develop homes, farms, or other uses will be diminished.

An Alternative

On the other hand, if the California BLM State Director Mouritsen were to meet her regulatory obligation and update the BLM State Sensitive Wildlife Species List in the near future, a bunch of good would result. First, Cotoni Coast Dairies’ Science Plan could provide guidance for conserving those species. Second, because BLM funding is tied to the number of sensitive species on each property, Cotoni Coast Dairies would be better situated for increased conservation funding. If the Science Plan succeeded in moving forward the conservation of sensitive species like the grasshopper sparrow, BLM’s leadership on these issues could help many other land managers do the right thing for species, contributing to the potentiality of ‘delisting’ species, reducing the potential for increased regulatory burden and loss of private property values.

Do Your Part

I’ve said it before in this column, but I’ll say it again. NOW is the time to write Director Mouritsen to urge her to do her job. She hasn’t replied to any of the numerous letters she’s already received, so evidently she needs more pressure to take this seriously. Here’s some language to send to her via her email kmourits@blm.gov Please let me know (or cc me) if you send something.

Dear Director Mouritsen,

I care about wildlife and plant conservation on BLM’s Cotoni Coast Dairies property in Santa Cruz County. I write to urge you to help by adding sensitive species found on that property to the State BLM’s sensitive species lists. Only if those species are on the State’s lists will local administrators consider impacts of their management on those species in their analyses and planning for the property. So, I ask that you please:

  • Publish an updated State BLM sensitive wildlife list in collaboration with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, as mandated by the BLM’s 6840 Special Status Species Manual.
    • This list was last updated in 2010, but you are required to update it at least every 5 years.
  • Publish an updated State BLM sensitive plant list to include the State ranked 1B plant species documented at Cotoni Coast Dairies, as mandated by the 6840 Manual.

I would appreciate a reply to this email with details about how you intend to address these issues.

Signed, xx (you!)

-this post originally appeared as part of Bruce Bratton’s amazing weekly blog at BrattonOnline.com You an sign up and receive it automatic-like if you visit this site. You will be rewarded by getting smart commentary and news that is very relevant to life in general and life on the Monterey Bay specifically.