From aceska@cue.bc.ca Wed Dec 15 12:06:39 1993 Date: Tue, 14 Dec 1993 15:56:47 -0800 From: Adolf Ceska To: ben@cue.bc.ca Subject: BEN # 66 BBBBB EEEEEE NN N ISSN 1188-603X BB B EE NNN N BBBBB EEEEE NN N N BOTANICAL BB B EE NN NN ELECTRONIC BBBBB EEEEEE NN N NEWS No. 66 December 14, 1993 Address: aceska@cue.bc.ca Victoria, B.C. ---------------------------------------------------- VANCOUVER ISLAND MYCOLOGICAL SOCIETY Several conspirators met on December 9 in the house of Hannah Nadel in Victoria and decided to establish "Vancouver Island Mycological Society" (please note that the name is provisional). The society will have its monthly meetings each first Thursday of the month, starting on February 3, 1994. Meeting place will be announced, but it is highly probable that it will be the Pacific Forestry Centre on West Burnside Road. Watch for further announcements. BOTANY BC RAFTING TRIP LANDED IN COURTS From: "Gail M. Berg" The rafting company I hired to take us down the Columbia for the Botany BC field trip has been charged with taking a trip down that river without having a licence to do so on that particular piece of waterway. They refused to pay a $100.00 fine (for some reason) so the Conservation Officer out of Golden has taken them to court. Peter Holmes (the Habitat Biologist from here) and myself have been subpoenaed to go to court on February 22, 1994 to act as witnesses. Hopefully I will make it to the meeting next year in the Queen Charlotte Islands and will be able to show some slides complete with me being led into court in hand- cuffs. Does Botany BC have any sort of a defence fund for this type of incident ? SAN BRUNO MOUNTAIN HABITAT CONSERVATION PLAN DOES NOT WORK From: J. Sigg's article, Fremontia 21, No. 4. San Bruno Mountain is a long ridge (1,314 feet) in northern San Mateo County adjacent to San Francisco. The area has long been of interest of botanists because of the presence of many plants that reach either the northern or the southern limit of their ranges. It has geographic variants of widespread species, several rare or uncommon plants and two or three endangered butterflies. The majority of the mountain is a state and county park, with several hundred privately owned acres on the lower slopes and ridges. Much of the prime habitat for the three butterflies is on private property. The specific goal of the 1982 Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP), the first in the U.S., was to protect the ecosystem of the entire remaining undeveloped portions of the mountain. Several large developments that would destroy butterfly habitat had been proposed for the lower slopes and ridges of the moun- tain. Using the new 1982 HCP process, development on San Bruno Mountain could now proceed. The main threat to the mountain ecosystem and its endangered species - other than development - was and is the advance of invasive exotic plants: gorse (Ulex europaeus), Tasmanian blue gum (Eucalyptus globulus), French broom (Genista monspessulana), Scotch and Mediterranean broom (Cytisus scoparius and C. striatus), fennel (Foeniculum vulgare), and Andean pampas grass (Cortaderia jubata). Other alien species scattered over the mountain are Monterey pine (Pinus radiata), Monterey cypress (Cupressus macrocarpa), Himalayan blackberry (Rubus procerus), cotoneaster (Cotoneaster spp.), pyracantha (Pyracantha sp.), English ivy (Hedera helix) and German ivy (Senecio mikanioides). Singly or in combination, these species are able to displace even healthy native plant communities in this climatic regime. Compared to 1982, there are greater numbers of invasive plants on the mountain, and they occupy a larger area, displacing more native plants. For eleven years the HCP has concerned almost exclusively on gorse, ... but there is as much gorse today as in 1982, possibly more. The county has chained, bulldozed, sprayed, burned, and mechanically removed acres of gorse, yet the stands have remained essentially the same over the years because patches are allowed to regenerate from roots and seeds. While the HCP was locked into obsession with gorse, other aggressive plants were freely proliferating and destroying prime habitat. Once a weed has been extirpated, the area should not be aban- doned. Native plants do not automatically recolonize a disturbed area. The science of restoration must be employed if native plants are to reclaim their rightful place. Otherwise the same weed will return or others will replace them. By 1990 the Yerba Buena Chapter of the California Native Plant Society was disturbed that no one had looked at the HCP and its results in the field since the plan began. For over the decades the chapter members had been fighting weeds in natural areas in the San Francisco area. Since September 1990 the chapter members logged over 2,200 person-hours of weed control work. The Yerba Buena Chapter has formed a San Bruno Mountain Committee to comment on the gorse management draft and the HCP and offered its knowledge and energy to revise, revitalize, or make San Bruno Mountain HCP work to restore butterfly habitat. THE MINI-JOURNAL OF IRREPRODUCIBLE RESULTS From: JIR@MITVMA.BITNET (modified by BEN, without a permission!) The mini-Journal of Irreproducible Results publishes news about overly stimulating research and ideas. Specifically: A) Haphazardly selected superficial (but advanced!) extracts of research news and satire from the Journal of Ir- reproducible Results (JIR). B) News about the annual Ig Nobel Prize ceremony. Ig Nobel Prizes honor "achievements that cannot or should not be reproduced." 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