Date/Time
Tuesday, October 1, 2019
7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
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Location
First United Methodist Church of Santa Monica
1008 11th Street
Santa Monica, California
Tags: California Native Plants, native plants, Woolsey Fire
In 2019 the NPS Inventory & Monitoring team completed over 200 Terrestrial Native Vegetation Monitoring Plots in the Santa Monica Mountains and Simi Hills (SMM & SH), more than twice the number of plots monitored in a non-fire year. By the time of the presentation we hope to have analyzed our large dataset to make conclusions about the status of the vegetation communities following last year’s fires. In general, the SMM & SH experienced a rich and widespread green-up in the winter and spring with the substantial rains received, producing a substantial assemblage of wildflowers (including many fire followers not seen in many years), and a strong recruitment of our native shrubs via resprouting or seedlings. We even documented several populations of the federally endangered Braunton’s milkvetch and one of the rare Blochman’s dudleya. The data we collected will be available for advancing the science of fire ecology, and informing future park management and interpretation programs.
Mark Mendelsohn is a botanist for the National Park Service at the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. A little over one year into the botanist position, Mark has been working with the flora and fauna of the SMM for 6 years, following prior biological research and consulting for the US Geological Survey and private firms.
Programs are free to the public. Refreshments will be served.