Mediterranean Cabbage Removal

Posted on by friendsofthewildernesspark

On Saturday, February 28, a terrific group of volunteers removed Mediterranean Cabbage (Brassica fruticulosa, also known as Twiggy Turnip) from around the trail and little stream near the Claremont Hills Wilderness Park entrance.

With its yellow four-petaled flowers and narrow, spreading, bumpy seed pods,  B. fruticulosa somewhat resembles its more infamous near cousin Sahara Mustard. B. fruticulosa is native to the southern Europe and North Africa, and was first reported in the US in 1996. It has since emerged as a highly aggressive plant in Southern California. Like Sahara Mustard, it comes up early – typically in December or January – and you can see that by the time these photos were taken in February, it had already set seed. It will, however, continue to flower for a long period of time – perhaps through June – and forms dense persistant stands that displace native plants.

B. fruticulosa was first noted in the park in 2018, when three plants were reported by the little seasonal stream where it crosses the trail near the main entrance. Since then, it’s spread, and there are now thousands of plants up and down the trail and upstream and down stream along the little stream, so we are trying to get it out while there is still some hope of control, and we collected 14 large contractor bags full of these nasty plants. (Nasty to the environment, that is; they are reported to be edible.)

Here are some photos from the workday:

Mediterranean Cabbage with its characteristic 4-petaled flowers and bumpy seed pods.
Kris removing Mediterranean Cabbage from the stream bank.
Brian at work on Mediterranean Cabbage.
Emily with a bunch of uprooted cabbage.
Jackson with a bouquet of prize Mediterranean Cabbage specimens.
Paul filling bags of cabbage.
The weed workers – Brian, Jackson, Joscelin, Cristina, Ash, Paul, Candida, Emily, Richard, and Kris with bags of Mediterranean Cabbage. Pauline and Calvin are not in the photo because they were still pulling cabbage!

Although your intrepid photographer forgot to take “before” photos, you can enjoy some mustard-free “after” photos.

The trail after Mediterranean Cabbage was removed from the sides.
The Rangers’ storage shed with no more Mediterranean Cabbage.

Many thanks to all who came! If you’d like participate in the future, just use our contact form to get added to our mailing list.