Celebrate California Biodiversity Day in the Park September 11

Posted on by friendsofthewildernesspark

September 7, 2021 marks the third official celebration of California Biodiversity Day, an annual event created in 2018 to celebrate the state’s exceptional biodiversity and encourage actions to protect it.  This year organizations throughout the state are hosting California Biodiversity Day events from September 4 to September 12, 2021, and the City of Claremont Park Rangers together with the Friends of the Wilderness Park be celebrating in the Claremont Hills Wilderness Park on the morning of Saturday, September 11.

Join us on Saturday morning, September 11th and learn how to use your phone to record observations of Wilderness Park flora and fauna with iNaturalist!  Just look for the canopy near the North Mills entrance for more information! All iNaturalist observations made in California from September 4 – September 12 will automatically be added to the California Biodiversity Day 2021 iNaturalist project.

Already an iNaturalist user?

Please come and help show others to use the iNaturalist app! Contact Vicki Salazar, our Volunteer Coordinator, at vickisalazar01@gmail.com, to let her know when you will be able to come. (Please note that all Friends of the Wilderness Park volunteers are required to be fully vaccinated for COVID-19.)

New to iNaturalist?

iNaturalist is an online social network of people sharing biodiversity information to help each other learn about nature. iNaturalist is a collaboration between National Geographic and the California Academy of Sciences.  Anyone can participate in iNaturalist!

Before arriving on Saturday please:

  1. Go to iNaturalist.org and create a free account. You should see “SIGN UP” featured prominently on the homepage.   Otherwise, there’s a “Sign Up” link in the top right corner.
  2. On your smart phone, go to the Apple Store or the Google Play store and download the iNaturalist app.

Once you’ve signed up, you can enter observations from either your phone or computer.  The iNaturalist site has a really good explanation here:

https://www.inaturalist.org/pages/getting+started
The page also has links to video tutorials.

In addition, we have two printer-friendly handouts created from the iNaturalist guide:

The Wilderness Park Biota Project:

iNat_project_header

In addition to the “California Biodiversity Day” project, any observations you make in the Wilderness Park (at any time) will be automatically added to the “Biota of the Claremont Hills Wilderness Park” project. This project was created by the Friends of the Wilderness Park specifically for documenting the plants and animals of the Wilderness Park.

If you’d like to check out the CHWP project and see what’s already been reported, just go to:
https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/biota-of-the-claremont-hills-wilderness-park

A few tips for best practices:

  • If feasible, crop your photos to feature the subject, especially if it’s not clear whether the subject is the bird or the tree, for example.
  • Include a little description. For one thing, you can use the description to say what’s the subject.  But you can also note any additional details, interesting behavior, type of habitat, odors, etc. that may not be obvious from the photo.
  • Give the most specific ID you can, even if it’s not to the species level. For instance, “insect”, “snake”, or even “plant” or “animal” is better than just having “unknown”.
  • Give a little info about yourself in your profile – it increases your credibility.

We’re back! Second Saturdays have resumed

Posted on by friendsofthewildernesspark

The City of Claremont has lifted the restrictions that prevented the Friends from holding Second Saturday events in the Park. We had a “soft open” with a few volunteers on July 10, when we were visited by Claremont Mayor Jennifer Stark, and a regular Second Saturday event on August 14.

The second Saturday volunteer program is a collaboration of the Friends of the Wilderness Park, CHWP Rangers, and City Staff.  On the second Saturday of each month, for four hours Friends’ volunteers:

  • Answer questions about the Park.
  • Provide directions (with a map that visitors can photograph).
  • Remind visitors to take adequate water for themselves and their dogs.
  • Give water and/or refillable water bottles (or a drink from a dog bowl) to those in need.
  • Remind visitors to keep dogs on leashes and not play music out loud. 
  • Hike the loop, picking up trash and answering questions along the way.

We are always looking for volunteers for Second Saturday, so if you’re interested, please contact our Volunteer Coordinator, Vicki Salazar at vickisalazar01@gmail.com, or if you’re in the Park, stop by and say, “Hi”.

A bagful of trash collected by some of the the Friends on the August 14 Second Saturday. ©Greg Glass.

Help with Monarch conservation July 23 – August 1!

Posted on by friendsofthewildernesspark

If you’d like to help with Monarch conservation, and you like to take photographs, please consider participating in the upcoming 5th International Annual Monarch Monitoring Blitz!

How does this work and how does it help Monarchs?

From the Media Release:

“For 10 days, the Blitz invites people across North America to look for milkweed plants and survey them for monarch eggs, caterpillars, chrysalises and butterflies. This information will help researchers identify priority areas for monarch conservation actions….

“The yearly snapshots of monarch and milkweed abundance help us better understand the dynamic between the summer generations and their breeding habitat. Since both monarchs and milkweed are found across North America during the time of the Blitz, we absolutely need the public’s help during this special week.”

How can I participate?

  1. First, go to the Western Monarch Milkweed Mapper website, and register for an account.
  2. Head out with your camera to look for milkweeds and Monarchs!  In the Wilderness Park, all the milkweed plants we are aware of are in the Johnson’s Pasture area, but you might see Monarchs elsewhere.
  3. If you see a Monarch or milkweed, take a photo, login to the Western Monarch Milkweed Mapper website, upload your photo, fill out the form (location, habitat description, stage or Monarch, milkweed species), and submit. That’s it!
    Tutorial-Image3

Some possibly useful information:

Monarch Identification:

For information about identifying Monarchs and their life stages (egg, larva, pupa, adult), check out this excellent Video on Monarch Identification from the Monarch Joint Venture.

danaus_plexippus_cat-062821-jm09.27.25-1
A fifth instar Monarch caterpillar on Woollypod Milkweed (Asclepias eriocarpa) together with a Longhorn Milkweed Beetle (Tetraopes basalis). ©Jon Moore.

Milkweed Species:
There are only two milkweed species in the Wilderness Park:

    • Narrowleaf Milkweed (Asclepias fascicularis)
      As you might guess from the name, it has narrow leaves, which are green and not fuzzy
    • Woolypod Milkweed (Asclepias eriocarpa)
      This milkweed has very large, fuzzy gray leaves

Narrowleaf Milkweed (Asclepias fascicularis) in Johnson’s Pasture. ©Nancy Hamlett.


Woollypod Milkweed (Asclepias eriocarpa) in Johnson’s Pasture. ©Nancy Hamlett.

If you have any questions, please contact us at info@friendsofthewildernesspark.org. We will be looking forward to your milkweed and Monarch observations!

Northern Harrier Hunting in Johnson’s Pasture

Posted on by friendsofthewildernesspark

In the winter, you can often see Northern Harriers in the Wilderness Park. Unlike other hawks that hunt from on high, these unusual hawks fly very low over the ground, looking and listening for rodents. They have a disk-shaped face looks and functions much like an owl’s, with stiff facial feathers helping to direct sound to the ears, and they rely on hearing as well as vision to capture prey.

Last week one was hunting in Johnson’s Pasture and stayed in the same area for more than an hour, allowing your intrepid photographer to snap enough photos that some of them came our more or less in focus.

Here you can see how close they fly to the ground at times.

The Northern Harrier flying very low over the side of Johnson’s Pasture Road. ©Nancy Hamlett.

In the Wilderness Park, you can often look down on them and spot the distinctive white patch on the rump.

The Northern Harrier flying low showing its white rump patch while a cyclist rides by on Webb Canyon Road. ©Nancy Hamlett.

This Northern Harrier must have been a female, as the females are brown above (males are grayish) and pale with brown streaks below.

Another view of the Northern Harrier hunting showing the brown color above and the distinctive white rump patch. ©Nancy Hamlett.

If you see one of these in the Park, take a few minutes to watch it. They’re awesome! They’re not likely to be here too much longer for this year. Although some are sighted in LA County throughout the year, most of the Northern Harriers migrate to the very northern US and Canada for the summer.

For more information on Northern Harriers, check out All About Birds.