July 1976 FREMONTIA A Journal of the California Native Plant Society ,>*": p / i California Native Plant Society Dedicated to the Preservation of the California Native Flora The California Native Plant Society is an organization of laymen and professionals united by an interest in the plants of California. It is open to all. Its principal aims are to preserve the native flora and to add to the knowledge of members and the public at large. It seeks to accomplish the former goal in a number of ways: by undertaking a census of rare, endangered, and extinct plants throughout the State; by acting to save endangered areas through publicity, persuasion, and, on occasion, legal action; by providing expert testimony to governmental bodies; and by supporting fi- nancially and otherwise the establishment of native plant pre- serves. Its educational work includes: publication of a quarterly journal,Fremontia, andaperiodicfiu/fe/m; assistance to teachers and school projects; meetings and field trips and other activities of local chapters throughout the State. Non-members are welcome to attend meetings and field trips. The work of the Society is done by volunteers. Money is provided by the dues of members and by funds raised by chapter plant sales. Additional donations, bequests, and memorial gifts from friends of the Society can assist greatly in carrying forward the work of the Society. Dues include subscriptions to Fremontia and the Bulletin. Individual $ 8 Sustaining $ 50 Family 10 Contributing 100 Retired 5 Patron 250 Student 5 Donor 500 Clubs and Societies 10 Benefactor 1000 Supporting 20 Life 250 Send check with address and ZIP code to the Treasurer. ADDRESSES Treasurer; Dues and Subscriptions; Changes of Address: CNPS, Suite D, 2380 Ellsworth St., Berkeley, CA 94704 Officers and General Society Matters: care of Virginia Rumble, Corresponding Secretary, CNPS, P.O. Box 639, Areata, CA 95521 Donations to Conservation Trust Fund: Mrs. E. Ellsworth Seibert, Star Route, Albion, CA 95410 Fremontia: Margedant Hayakawa, Editor, P.O. Box 100, Mill Valley, CA 94941 Bulletin: R. Mitchel Beauchamp, Editor, P.O. Box 985, National City, CA 92050. Rare Plant Project: W. Robert Powell, Director; Dept. of Agron- omy & Range Science, U.C. Davis, CA 95616 OFFICERS Honorary President....................... Lester Rowntree President....................................John Sawyer Vice-President .............................. August Fruge' Recording Secretary....................... Horace K. Burr Corresponding Secretary................... Virginia Rumble Treasurer................................... Don Falconer CHAPTER PRESIDENTS Dorothy King Young Chapter, Gualala .. R. Ellsworth Seibert Marin................................. William E. Bortfeld Milo Baker..................................Jack Guggolz Monterey Bay............................Bruce D. Cowan Napa......................................... June Foote North Coast............................. Constance Vigno Northern San Joaquin Valley ..............Joseph Medeiros Sacramento Valley.......................... Albert: Delisle San Diego................................. Fred T. Sproul San Francisco Bay.......................John H. Mathews San Luis Obispo......................... Malcolm McLeod Santa Clara Valley....................... Suzanne Schettler Santa Cruz County ....................... Glenn McGourty Sierra-Santa Monica......................... Grace Heintz DIRECTORS AT LARGE William B. Critchfield, Susan Fruge', Leslie Hood, Alice Howard, Betty Lovell, Donald Lynch. CHAIRMEN OF SOCIETY COMMITTEES Conservation................................. Leslie Hood Horticulture .................................. James Roof Membership................................... Joyce Burr Publications ...........................James P. Smith, Jr. SPECIAL ASSIGNMENTS Coastal Commission....................... David Bockman Environmental Impact Coordinator..............Ken Taylor State Board of Forestry Representative....... Marie Toscano Public Lands Coordinator....................... Jean Jenny Fellows Committee........... Larry Heckard, Marian Reeve Rare Plant Project Director...............W. Robert Powell Bulletin Editor......................R. Mitchel Beauchamp Fremontia Editor .................... Margedant Hayakawa Fremontia Designer.................... Laurence J. Hyman FREMONTIA Vol. 4 No. 2 July 1976 Copyright »¦¦¦¦ 1976 California Native Plant Society MATERIALS FOR PUBLICATION Members and others are invited to submit material for publication in Fremontia and the Bulletin. All time-value material should be addressed to Ihe Bulletin. Fremontia is ajournal for laymen about California plants. It hopes to be both readable and scientifically accurate. Technical botanical articles should be directed to other more scholarly journals. Please double-space copy, using wide margins and fresh typewriter ribbon, on 8V4-by-ll paper, and include name, address, and phone number on the MS. As a general rule, in the interest of consistency, botanical nomenclature will conform to Munz, A California Flora. Please identify each plant referred to by its botanical name and, if there is one., by its common name. Photographs should be black-and-white glossy prints, preferably 8-by-10 size or accompanied by negatives. THE COVER: Labrador tea. Ledum alandulosum, a white-flowered evergreen shrub, member of the same family as manzanitas and rhododen- drons, is found in the Sierra and the northern Coast Ranges. It was photographed in Butterfly Valley by J. Fraser Muirhead, whose picture-story appears in this issue. ¦*¦ ..>W^ y** i-B,"..'-' »¦ »¦• ;. '*-, »"?."Tim i"." *.'*! ¦: f& K.» ' I&& i-i- ,-M «¦ -*SC "%j&ilt»* ^- ¦: '3£'4&^ -" *x 'i-*«^piii/ Photographs by J. Fraser Muirhead BUTTERFLY VALLEY BOTANICAL AREA by Norden H. Cheatham I. THE PLANTS AND THE PEOPLE Butterfly Valley, located six miles northwest of Quincy, in Plumas County, has an interesting flora and a varied history. First mined in the early 1850s, it wasn't until about 1860 that rich pay dirt was struck, and thereafter, for a time, a community of about sixty miners tried their luck in the Valley. After the mineral values gave out, the Galeppi brothers grazed cattle there in the early 1900s. About that same time the Murphy Lumber Company did some railroad logging, which was later increased when the company was purchased by the Quincy Timber Company. The present access road follows the old railroad alignment, but today nothing remains of the former logging camp that existed side by side with the area's botanically interesting features. The area varies in elevation from about 3500 to 3900 feet and receives an annual precipitation of approximately forty inches, much of it snow. The major vegetation is mixed conifer forest from thirty to seventy years old, with occasional trees scattered throughout the area. Slopes are gentle except in some draws with steep sides. The forest is open and park-like with numerous boggy sites and seepages providing the environment for unusual plants. Many of the seepages drain into a shallow bog-like lake about one acre in size. There are also examples of stream-side vegetation of alder and dogwood. In their Vegetation Survey of the Butterfly Valley Botanical Area, published in 1970, Walter and Irja Knight and John Thomas Howell document some very interesting facts. For instance, there is an unusually rich representation of the lily family, and there are twelve kinds of orchids, over half the 3 number in California. There is an unusually rich assortment of violets, perhaps the largest concen- tration in the state. There are four insectivorous plants, the pitcher plant (Darlingtonia californica); the sundew (Drosera rotundifolia); and two bladder- worts (Utricularia minor and U. vulgaris). John Thomas Howell says this is the only place in Cali- fornia known to him where four insectivorous plants occur together. Butterfly Valley has many plants that are not common in the Sierra. Among them are Aster elatus, water-shield (Brasenia schreberi), the sedge Car ex buxbaumii, ladyslipper (Cypripedium montanum), sundew {Drosera rotundifolia), Sierra-laurel (Leu- cothoe davisiae), Lupinus onustus, the saprophyte Pleuricospora fimbriolata, and two beaked-rushes, Rhynchospora alba and R. glomerata. Many of the plants of Butterfly Valley are at the limits of their range. Pitcher plant, bog-asphodel (Narthecium californicum), Schoenolirion album, are near the southern limits of their Sierra Nevada distribution. The following species are growing at elevations near their lower Sierra Nevada limits: mountain alder (Alnus tenuifolia); ranger's button {Sphenosciadium capitellatum), and the grass Muhlenbergia filiformis. II. THE DARLINGTONIAS Butterfly Valley is not, as you might think, known for its butterflies but for its pitcher plants. The pitcher plant (Darlingtonia californica) is a curiosity because it is insectivorous and because of the odd shape of its leaves. Insectivorous yes, but not in the dramatic and active sense of the Venus fly-trap (Dionaea muscipula). Darlingtonia goes about it in a more insidious fashion. The curiously shaped fishtail-like appendages near the top of the hollow, inflated leaves serve as a runway leading to the opening of these highly modified leaves. Once inside, flying insects are attracted away from the downward-facing opening toward the translucent spots at the roof of the inner chamber. It is the shape of this vaulted, dome-like roof that leads to the plant's other common name, cobra plant. In 1875 Henry Edwards, vice-president of the California Academy of Sciences, in a lecture at the Academy described these plants: "Viewed from a little dis- tance, a growth of Darlingtonias presents a most beautiful and singular appearance, having a fanciful resemblance to a number of yellow hooded snakes, with head erect, in the act of making the fatal spring. I may here observe incidentally, thatcaput-serpentis would have been an appropriate specific name." The waxy smoothness of the upper portions of the chamber provide the next step in the one-way trip to the waiting doom below. Then further down in the chamber are the recurved hairs that provide the final entrapment. Dr. Edwards studied the contents of the leaves and identified as many as forty-three insects belong- ing to eight different orders. He also reported the presence of larvae living among the detritis, nour- ished by the remains of other insects which had perished. These larvae are now thought to be Metri- ocnemis edwardsi. F.M. Jones reported in 1916 that the association of this insect with Darlingtonia is "habitual and possibly exclusive." There are known to be two other insects associated in an apparent symbiotic relationship with Darlingtonia, Aphand- trigonum darlingtoniae, and a sphaerocerid in the genus Leptocera (Szerlip 1974). Another interesting fact reported by Edwards is the presence of a small spider which spins its web near the opening of the hood "as if aware of the attractive nature of the plant, and concludes that its own prey could be thus easily captured." Darlingtonia californica was first collected by William D. Brackenridge, assistant botanist for the U.S. Exploring Expedition commanded by Captain Charles Wilkes, USN. The collection was made in 1841 in the upper Sacramento Valley, a few miles south of Mt. Shasta, while Brackenridge was on an overland expedition commanded by Lt. George F. Emmons, USN. The expedition was enroute from Willamette Valley to the Sacramento River where it was to rejoin the rest of Wilkes' Fleet, the first scientific expedition ever fitted out by the United States Government. The collected specimen eventually reached botanist John Torrey, who noted: Owing to the lateness of the season (it was October), the flowers had passed; and not even a seed vessel was found, but only the leaves and tall scapes, with the remains of a single capsule. The leaves, however, were so peculiar, that no doubt was entertained of the plant being either a Sarracenia, or a near ally of that genus. Without the flowers, nothing further could be determined respecting it; but from the bracteate shape and deeply parted lamina or appendage of the leaves, it seemed more probably that it was distinct from Sarracenia. Final description had to await better specimens. Finally Torrey's friend, Dr. G.W. Hulse, brought flowered specimens that were collected in May 1851. The genus was at last described by Torrey in 1853 and dedicated to "my highly esteemed friend Dr. William Darlington, of West Chester, in Penn- sylvania, whose valuable botanical works have contributed so largely to the scientific reputation of our country." 4 This drawing accompanied the original description of Darlingtonia californica by John Torrey in Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge in 1853. Curiosity was aroused on the east coast to see a living specimen of such an unusual plant. Asa Gray wrote in 1853, During the autumn and winter, living roots of this plant, packed in dry peat-moss, might be transported to the Atlantic coast, with good hope of success. Let our Cali- fornian readers take notice, that a small box of such roots, delivered alive in Boston, New York, or London, would be pecuniarily as valuable as a considerable lump of gold, and would furnish a handsome and highly curious acquisi- tion of our gardens. Torrey wrote, "it is one of the most remarkable of all vegetable productions and its acquisition would exceedingly gratify the botanists of this country and Europe." It is not known whether anyone took Dr. Gray's challenge seriously, but the September 24,1870 issue of the Scientific Press reported that, Early in the spring of 1869, some living plants were sent to Dr. Torrey, via Panama, which were placed in the hands of several florists, none of whom succeeded in making them grow. Later in the season, however, its successful cultivation in England was announced. During the summer of 1869 Prof. Henry of the Smithsonian Institute and Dr. Torrey, not despairing in their efforts to succeed in the cultivation of this plant at the East sent to the Agent of Wells, Fargo & Co. at Nevada [Nevada City?] for more specimens of the plant, which were immediately obtained at Moore's Flat by Frank Henry, of Nevada, and forwarded to the Smithsonian Institute, via Overland railroad. These plants arrived in fine condi- tion, and it was one of them, if we mistake not, which showed the first bloom, on the Eastern side of the conti- nent, much to the gratification of our New York florists, and which was duly noticed in the issue of the Scientific Press of the 14th of June last. It was reported that darlingtonia was successfully cultivated in England as early as 1869, but it wasn't until 1871 that J.D. Hooker reported the first success of British horticulturists in bringing it into flower. The genus Darlingtonia belongs to the family Sarraceniaceae, a highly specialized family of only three genera, restricted mostly to eastern North America, with one species occurring in northeastern South America. Darlingtonia has only a single species, D. californica, limited in distribution to scattered locations in northern California and the southern half of Oregon. In California it is found in the Klamath Ranges from Trinity County to Siskiyou County, in Del Norte County, and, in the Sierra, in Nevada and Plumas Counties, where it occurs at a higher elevation than usual. These latter locations constitute the southern and eastern limits of its range. Darlingtonia occurs in bogs in cold locations where there are permanently waterlogged soils that are low in available nutrients. It is frequently asso- ciated with soils of high magnesium content derived from serpentine materials. Even though there is no serpentine apparent in Butterfly Valley, it has been suggested that the presence of dolomite in the under- ground aquifers provides the high magnesium content in the waters supplying these bogs. Because they are so unusual, darlingtonias are sought after by curiosity seekers. I have seen them on sale at supermarkets and in florist shops. I suspect these specimens have been rooted out of their native habitats and are destined to languish at the hands of would-be growers who fail to dupli- cate the bog-like conditions necessary for their growth, or who, not knowing that these plants die back to the root crown during the winter months, throw them out in the belief that they are dead. Because of such heedless digging and commercial depredations, as well as the draining of much of its boggy habitat, darlingtonia has been placed on the list of endangered and threatened plants published by the Smithsonian Institution. It is listed as a threatened species, that is, it is a plant likely to suffer extinction throughout all or a significant part of its range. From I Ik- ITiiiiI Insliliik- Colli/elion C;inii:.s:k- Mellon Uni\i.TMt\ III. REBECCA AUSTIN, BOTANIST Had there been a California Native Plant Society in 1866,1 am sure that Rebecca Merritt Austin would have been a charter member. Born in 1832 in Cum- berland County, Kentucky, she found her way to Butterfly Valley by a rather circuitous route involv- ing Piatt County, Missouri, Illinois, Kansas, and finally the gold mines of Black Hawk Creek, in Plumas County, Califoria. Orphaned at an early age, she turned adversity to advantage. As a school marm at age sixteen she supported her own academic career at Granville Academy, in Illinois, where she studied such unlikely subjects, for a gold miner's wife, as chemistry, astronomy, botany, Latin, and human physiology. The latter subject, combined with experience gained from her first husband, a physician, served her well later when she was called upon to be informal physician to the settlers of the California gold fields. She arrived at Black Hawk Creek in 1865, and spent her later years at Davis Creek, in Modoc County. This remarkable woman was a remarkable botan- ist as well. Her collections and observations of the flora of the northern Sierra and northeastern Cali- fornia began in 1866, the year after her arrival and continued until about 1900. Her correspondents included such notables as D.C. Eaton, Asa Gray, STATUS OF BUTTERFLY VALLEY The California Native Plant Society has long been interested in the protection of Butterfly Valley. In 1966 G. Ledyard Stebbins, then presi- dent of CNPS, wrote to the Regional Forester expressing the Society's strong support of a proposal then being developed by the Plumas National Forest to have Butterfly Valley desig- nated a Botanical Area, a protected classification provided for in the Forest Service Manual. The proposal was forwarded in January 1967. Itfailed to receive final approval and was redrafted and updated in 1971. It is still awaiting the Regional Forester's signature of approval by his authority under section 36 part 294.1 (a of the Code of Federal Regulations. In the meantime the area has been classified by authority of the Forest Supervisor as the Butterfly Botanical Unit. The District's Multiple Use Plan states that "This Unit will be managed to protect and preserve the botanical associations and environment in their present condition; to provide for use of the area as an outdoor labora- tory or classroom; to discourage public use not related to the botanical attraction and preserva- tion thereof." Management responsibility is assigned to the Quincy Ranger District. —N.H.C. 7 E.L. Greene, Sir Joseph Hooker, and Sereno Watson. Several new species were described from her collections including Polystichum munition var. imbricans, Thelypteris nevadensis, Botrychium californicum, and Vaccinium arbuscula. Some of the plants were named after her; Eburophyton austinae (the phantom orchid), Lomatium austinae, Nemophila austinae, andSymphoricarpus austinae. She lived in Butterfly Valley from 1873 to 1878 and it was here that she did her work on Darling- tonia. Jepson in an article in Madrono in 1934 quotes Frank Morton Jones, whom he describes as "a specialist on the pitcher liquor of the Sarraceniaceae and its biochemistry." "Mrs. Austin's letters to W.M. Canby of Wilmington, Delaware, number twenty, and in date extend from Feb. 9, 1875 to March 6, 1877. Some of them are many pages in length, five of them more than a thousand words each, one of about three thousand words. They give in detail her experiments and observations on Darlingtonia, with occasional reference to other plants. Most of her observa- tions on Darlingtonia seem to have been made without suggestion from others; most were original and first dis- coveries in regard to that interesting plant. Recognizing its carnivorous nature, her experiments related mainly to its trap structure. She discovered and mapped the distri- bution of the nectar exudation upon the pitchers, deter- mining that this sometimes took place for two successive seasons upon the same pitcher. She detected the fluid in the bottoms of closed pitchers, hence identifying it as a secretion of the plant; determined that it increased greatly in quantity upon the capture of insect prey, which sug- gested to her the introduction of nutrient matter (such as raw meat) into the pitchers, and she recorded the surpris- ing response in the pouring out by the leaf of a great quantity of fluid. She concluded that the nectar bait had no stupefying qualities and that the pitcher-fluid has no digestive power, but that decomposition rather than digestion takes place in the pitchers. By necessarily crude experiments, she determined that under some circum- stances absorption takes place in the pitcher cavity. By sitting among the plants through the rare event of a summer thundershower, she confirmed her belief that the entrance of rain-water is precluded by the pitcher struc- ture. She was highly elated by the discovery that the age of an individual plant may be determined by counting the leaf-bases attached to the rhizome. She made prolonged observations upon the pollenizing insects; and especially upon the dipterous larvae which inhabit the pitchers, feeding upon the captured insects. Her observations began before she had any literature whatever in regard to insectivorous plants; and not until 1875 did she have even a hand lens, her letter of March 22 of that year requesting that Mr. Canby send her one. References Anonymous. 1870. "The California Pitcher Plant — Darlingtonia californica." Scientific Press, Sept. 25, 1870. Edwards, Henry. 1876. "Text of a Talk Given to the California Academy of Sciences, in Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences, VI: 161-166 Gray, Asa. 1853. "Comments on Darlingtonia cali- fornica" in American Journal of Science and Arts, second series XVI:425 Hooker, J.D. 1871. "Darlingtonia californica, Native of California." Curtis's Botanical Magazine. XXVII, third series: Tab 5920 Howell, John Thomas. 1974. Personal correspondence. Jepson, W.L. 1934. "The Botanical Explorers of Cali- fornia—X." Madrono 2:130-132 Jones, F.M. 1916. "Two Insect Associates of the Cali- fornia Pitcher Plant, Darlingtonia californica (Dipt.)." Entomological News XXVII (9):385-392 Knight, Walter and Irja and J.T. Howell. 1970. "A Vege- tational Survey of the Butterfly Botanical Area." The Wasmann Journal of Biology. 28:1 Navy Department, Office of the Chief of Naval Opera- tions. (No date.) Naval History Division (OP-09B9) Ships' Histories Section. Smithsonian Institution. 1974. "Report on Endangered and Threatened Plant Species of the United States." Also published as House Document No. 94-51, 94th Congress, 1st session. 199 pp. Szerlip, S.L. 1974. "Preliminary Report on Insects Asso- ciated withDarlingtoniacalifornica." Mimeo. Uni- versity of California Dep't. of Entomology and Parasitology. 3 pp. Torrey, John. 1853. "On the Darlingtonia californica, a New Pitcher Plant, from Northern California." Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge. VI:3-7 SUMMER IN BUTTERFLY VALLEY Photographs and Captions by J. Fraser Muirhead It was late afternoon when we reached Butterfly Valley. I had missed connections at the Downieville rendezvous with the group coming from the Marin Chapter, but by luck three others had already arrived. So we four, nearly total strangers, joined forces and with great anticipation started our explorations in the rapidly fading sunlight. Tom Harris, a retired professional forester, became the leader for our group, the other three of us being novices of varying experience; and a knowledgeable leader he proved to be. We began exploring at Darlingtonia Bog, which lies on the hillside above the valley proper. The bog extends from above the road, draining down below it through the Sweetwater Meadow to Pond Reservoir. The pitcher plants were in bloom, and it was particularly interesting to see them here, having read of Mrs. Rebecca Austin, who made some of the first field observations and studied the nectar found in the hooded pitchers, right here in Butterfly Valley. The round-leafed sundew, Drosera rotundifolia, another of the four insectivorous plants found in Butterfly Valley, grows near the bog. Its common name derives from the shape of the leaves and the purplish, shiny, gland-tipped hairs which edge them. Habenaria dilatata var. leucostachys, the white rein orchid grows nearby, but it does not excite the imagination as much as the little sundew. Masses of white bloom of Labrador tea (Ledum glandulosum) and the fragrant flowers of western azalea {Rhododendron occidentalis), were around the edges of the bog. - . -•¦ t 03 C/i n u. 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