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CRAIG'S JUICY NATIVE GRASS GOSSIP & Research - No. 20 - March 2006-October 2008

Inventing Ecological Restoration & Successful Weed Management Technologies

The first agency the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) has set the deadline of 2012 for lowering State-wide, roadside herbicide use by 80%; and two counties, Humboldt and Santa Cruz, are already at zero herbicide use now. Unfortunately, no successful technology is currently available to achieve that purpose, or has been invented yet.

The second agency, Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District (Mid-Pen) manages about 50,000 public acres in the Santa Cruz Mountains, whose native grass, native herbaceous perennial and native annual understory in forested areas was 99% catastrophically removed by grazing 100-200 years ago, and the perennial grasses in sunny locations 90-95% removed, and the wildflowers 70% removed.

The original native plant understory is either absent or is covered with European exotics, and either condition allows for the colonization of new invasive plant invaders into the already weakened ecosystems.

Map of a new weed, the False Brome infestation getting established in a Mid-pen preserve and spreading in its first occurrence in California, around the town of Woodside near Stanford University--this perennial exotic invasive grass loves forest habitats, and can form solid stands. (Map, Mid-pen. 2006)

Some of the invaders like False Brome, has the potential of covering most of Mid-Pen's forested acres eventually, and Harding grass and Yellow star thistle, which is rapidly making solid cover in all of Mid-Pen's open grassland preserves.

Other new invaders are on the horizon, becoming major problems in the Mid-pen Preserves: Rattlesnake grass (originally confined to the Monterey area, moving rapidly northward), Dog's Tail grass (in 1960, only found in two locations in Santa Cruz County, now, is so common in Mid-pen preserves, that a photo of it is shown on Mid-pen's Skyline Preserve web page), annual Brachypodium (already solid in areas of Redwood City's Edgewood preserve), and common pasture grasses like the new aggressive selections of polyploid annual ryegrass and perennial ryegrass.

--- Dog's tail grass, an exotic European weed grass, rare forty years ago, is now so common that it is featured on Mid-pen's web site as a plant found on their preserve. (Skyline Preserve's web page, 2006).

Some successful method of managing these weeds must be invented immediately, and fortunately, Mid-pen. has made a commitment to invest at least a million dollars to manage the False Brome. But will that be enough money, soon enough? You can see from the map of the False Brome, that the infestation is spreading rapidly.

Which of the possible avenues will these agencies take to get the successful technologies they need?

HARDING GRASS is a relatively new perennial exotic, an example of a fast-moving invader that has spread as solid stands, to cover Mid-Pen's land in the last few decades. The plant acts like "land-cancer" replacing the native ecosystem with a monoculture of dense perennial weeds.

Below: The Harding Grass on Russian Ridge from Google Earth, looks like a yellow cancer
(37 deg. 19' 35.64"N, 122 deg. 12' 44.38"W).

In this area, Harding grass was originally only found along the coast, 20 miles to the west, in 1972. Since then it has spread at the rate of about 1/2 mile per year westward. The plant contains DMT, a psychedelic chemical that protects it from being controlled by native herbivores. Photograph of Photograph Russian Ridge, with Stanford lands in the distance, where this weed is moving towards.

WILD OATS, another "land-cancer" has been a major weed problem in California for over 100 years, and Mid-Pen lands and Caltrans roadsides are commonly infested by this annual weed, sometimes growing solidly like the photograph above, where 99% of the native plants cannot survive underneath it. Photo Russian Ridge, Mid-pen lands July 2003, eight months after the area was burned in October 2002.

MID-PEN lands, at least on Russian Ridge, still have some isolated pockets of native grasses and wildflowers that could be managed so they would spread to cover larger areas. Measurements in 2003, after the October 2002 burn found an average of 13% native perennial grass cover of five different species, plus a 25% cover of wildflowers consisting of eleven species, and 2% cover of native shrubs.

UNFORTUNATELY, a July 2006 remeasurment of Russian Ridge, only three years later, found some disturbing sharp downward trends for the perennial native grasses and a very rapid increase in Harding grass cover, using a linear 1,750 ft. 700 toe-point transect.

THERE HAS BEEN A DANGEROUS DROP in the perennial native grass cover at Russian Ridge, to less than 35% of what it was only three years ago, to 4.7%---which means that the whole perennial grass component could become extinct within a few years.

The worst cases at Russian Ridge were the Nassella pulchra (Stipa) cover went to zero in 2006, from a 2.3% cover in 2003, and the Melica cover also dropped in 2006 to zero, from 0.2% cover in 2003.

Sitanion, the most common native grass at 7.9% cover in 2003, is marching quickly towards extinction at only 1.2% cover in 2006, more than an 80% drop in only three years. We are watching the slow-motion extinction of an entire ecosystem.

Overall, the total native grass cover dropped from 13.5% in 2003, to only 4.7% in 2006.

WHY IS A DROP IN PERENNIAL NATIVE GRASSES IMPORTANT? Those grasses are part of every California native ecosystem, and are useful as indicator species, measuring the overall health of your ecosystem. Plus, every exotic grass that invades a natural area, as it grows, gives off natural herbicides that kills off the native grasses as well as the herbaceous perennials and native annuals.

The first to get killed are the perennial grasses and some of the perennial wildflowers like Grindelia, California poppies, Coyote mint, Mule's Ears, Shooting Stars, Calochortus and Brodiaea lilies. Then in the later stages, the annual wildflowers disappear, like the Indian paintbrush, owls' clover, miner's lettuce, the native clovers, and the annual lupines.

Whenever any exotic grass is allowed to invade a natural area, there's going to be death and destruction. Harding grass and wild oats are two common examples. At Edgewood Preserve, the Brachypodium grass and perennial ryegrass, and on San Bruno Mountain, the Rattlesnake grass, have destroyed native grasslands.

For those interested in the science behind the natural herbicides in the exotic grasses, you can read the Journal of Chemical Ecology (at Stanford's Biology library, for example), and Dr. Liu's work on barley in 1994 and 1995 pioneered the concept, and invented a method to measure the effects.

HARDING GRASS, the nasty perennial weed that kills 99% of the native grassland species, one of the strongest forms of "land-cancer", increased within the Russian Ridge area from a 2003 cover of only 0.5%, to an awesome 7.4% cover in 2006--an amazing five-fold increase in spread every year for the past three years.

Here's how nine Mid-Pen Preserve grasslands compare in August, 2006:
From 250 ft. linear toe-point transects; except for Russian Ridge, measured along a 1,750 ft. toe-point transect.

Preserve	Acres	Native grass %	Harding grass %	Star thistle %	Wildflowers %
Fremont Older	738	0	0	82	0
Foothills Open Space	211	41	0	1	39
Long Ridge	1,985	0	0	1	3
Los Trancos	274	10	0	3	5
Monte Bello	2,943	2	1	53	5
Rancho San Antonio	3,800	0	66	0	0
Skyline Ridge	2,143	4	30	0	26
Windy Hill	1,306	0	0	0	36
Russian Ridge	1,822	5	7	0.7	54

THERE'S AN IMMEDIATE NEED to invent successful technologies, to restore Mid-pen's grasslands and wildflowers, before they become extinct.

For thethousands of acres of native grassland resources, the District has only been investing an average of $15 per acre per year for weed management for the last few decades.

That's like handing a shovel to someone and tell them to rebuild 20 miles of levees by hand around New Orleans. No wonder there's a flood of exotics coming in and swamping the native grasslands and wildflowers?

EXPERIMENTS were done at Russian Ridge 1997-2000 to get a cost-estimate of managing the weeds in their native grasslands, and the report stated that "Some level of management is required to maintain biodiversity and limit the spread of invasive exotic plants into Coastal Grassland habitat on Midpeninsula Open Space District lands." (Kephart, 2001)

Here's the results, with the costs rounded out to the nearest dollar:

TECHNIQUE tested at Russian Ridge 1997-2000	Costs $/acre	Decrease in total exotic cover	Increase in native cover	Years back to 99% native cover	Total $/acre
Hand control	$1,141	32%	2%	4	$4,564
Tractor mowing	127	43%	-1%	100	12,700
Herbicide	298	-2%	1%	25-50	14,900
Grazing	647	-28%	17%	never	---
Fire and Native seeding	1,119	-7%	83%	4	4,476
Fire, Hand Control & Native seeding	1,884	28%	41%	4	7,536

PERHAPS A COMBINATION of annual hand control, herbicides and native seeding over four years could produce the best results, of both eradicating the weeds, plus adding back the local native species in the place of the weeds.

For the 5,000 acres of grasslands that Mid-pen owns, that would translate to annually to about $3,000 per acre in 2001 dollars = $15 million for at least 4 years = $60 million total.

NATIVE GRASSLANDS RAPIDLY GOING EXTINCT at Mid-pen Preserves.

Native grasslands are essentially already extinct at four of the nine Mid-Pen preserves-Fremont Older, Long Ridge, Rancho San Antonio and Windy Hill in 2006--whereas only one preserve has native grasses above 10% cover.

Even Foothills Preserve, with the highest native grass cover of the nine preserves, still has three exotics--star thistle and rattlesnake grass--invading on its edge, and nobody is managing those infestations yet.

When any native plant resource ends up at only 2 to 10% cover, like the native grasses at nearly all of these preserves, it is very difficult to measure, or even be aware of the continued downward slide towards extinction.

It's like having a very slow leak in a tire, you don't notice it until it's flat---and as an ecosystem gets closer to flat-lining, the more difficult it can become to save it.

The trend for the northern portion of the Russian Ridge Preserve and its native grass cover, looks like this. Figures are estimates, except for 2003 and 2006, which were measured in July :

Year - Native grass % cover
1850 - 80 %
1900 - 65
1940 - 45
1960 - 40
1972 - 35
1987 - 25
2002 - October burn
2003 - 13.5
2004 - 10
2005 -- 7
2006 -- 4.7
2007 -- 2 - after the July burn
2008 -- ?
2010 -- ?

If the native grasses at Russian Ridge were the Titanic...
...in 2006, here's about how much is left...and someone needs to start breaking out the life rafts yet to save them! And the controlled burns in October 2002 and July 2007, did not bring the percent cover up to the normal 50% or more that is needed for a self-sustaining native grassland ecosystem.

The truly amazing thing about exotic plants invading the California native grasslands, is that the exotics eventually sterilize the area. Once the native grass and native wildflower cover drops below a certain "tipping point", the area become unsuitable habitat for other life-forms and is essentially sterilized .

Butterflies are usually the first casualties when exotic plants invade California native grasses. Walking through Russian Ridge Preserve in 2006, is like "Silent Spring"-- only a few birds, no butterflies, no native harvester ants, and only a few grasshoppers along the roads, and bumblebees restricted to the new acres of yellow star thistle flowers.

Edgewood Preserve in Redwood City, the extinction has occurred of the Listed Endangered Bay Checkerspot butterfly, only a few miles NE of Russian Ridge. This butterfly depends on California native grassland habitat, when exotic-grasses like ryegrass and brachypodium infested the preserve in the 1980s and 1990s, killing off its food and nectar plants. The California native grassland ecosystems is collapsing at both preserves.

Across the entire State of California, it would be important for land managers to measure, to see if all of the relic stands of native grasslands are currently under attack, by new exotics that have invaded in the last 20-30 years, like at Russian Ridge and Edgewood Preserve.

YELLOW STAR THISTLE, the prickly European weed in 2003 is moving onto Mid-Pen lands. This 2003 photo shows the infestation that got started in the mowed trail side, had only moved about 12 feet off the trail that year. By summer 2006, the yellow star thistle along the trail at Russian Ridge, had moved another 220 feet downwind, or an average of over 70 feet a years.

The Mid-pen infestation is less than 30 years old, but this biennial weed has been a major problem in the Central valley for at least 50-60 years.

Every year, summer fires in yellow star thistle-infested Caltrans' medians of I-5 and I-505 in the Sacramento Valley have occurred, and this weed infests an estimated 25 million total acres in California. Caltrans has probably spent over one million dollars and ten years to invent a solution to this weed, without much success so far. You can see photos of some of the efforts at http://www.ecoseeds.com/road.test.html

PURPLE NEEDLEGRASS or Stipa (Nassella pulchra), a low-growing perennial native that used to be one of California's most common grasses, could be a perfect solution to both Mid-Pen's and Caltrans' weed problems. Photo July, 2003, of one of the last stands, along a Russian Ridge trail edge. Height about eight inches, and still green into the summer.

Some of the native California bunchgrasses are low growing, only about a foot tall, and stay green late into summer, and grasses like the Purple Needlegrass, produce the lowest amount of flammable dry thatch per acre.

Unfortunately, this resource is missing from 99% of Caltrans right-of-ways, and less than 1% Purple Needlegrass cover, still exists on Mid-Pen lands. Neither agency had established any program to manage, conserve, or restore this species, considering that these natives will be an extremely valuable restoration resource for the future.

Also, Mid-Pen's five-year 2003 Strategic Plan mistakenly placed invasive weeds in almost last place priority, in third place, at http://www.openspace.org/plans_projects/resource_policies.asp .

FAREWELL TO SPRING and OWL'S CLOVER were very common low-growing native wildflower on Mid-pen and Caltrans lands at one time, and could become common again, once the exotic plants are successfully managed. Photograph Russian Ridge 2003.

HOW WOULD YOU FUND THE CONVERSION PROCESS, from exotics back to local native plants? Caltrans could do what Iowa DOT did to start their native roadside vegetation program, and have the money be part of the next Federal Highways bill.

MID-PEN is surrounded by some of the wealthiest communities in the world: Woodside, Atherton, Portola Valley, Los Altos Hills, Los Gatos and Saratoga for example.

Since the whole process of managing weeds on Mid-pen's 5,000 acres of grassland, will cost a minimum of $60 million over four year's worth of work, there's at least four sources of funding that could be considered either singly or in combination with each other:

1.) Stop purchasing new properties, and divert all that money to weed management of the properties you already own. That would provide the quickest funds to start the job.

2.) Float a bond, a common way for government agencies to raise necessary funds. That's what the State of Florida did several years ago, to start managing the weeds in their State's natural areas. However, Mid-pen is severely limited by the State Public Resources code on the size of the bond, so the next two options may be the only reasonable approach:

3.) Private tax-deductible donations to the District for restoration and weed management. Could get money immediately in the hands of the District to get the restoration process of the wildflower fields started.

4.) Ask the home owners of the District for a District tax increase. There's nothing more difficult politically than to ask for a tax increase, but is still the best long-term solution. When the District was formed 30+ years ago, nobody had a clue on what the costs would be to manage the exotics and restore the ecosystems, so when the original property tax bill percentage was established, those costs were not factored in. Time for an increase?

PUBLIC RESOURCES CODE 5566. It is the intent of the Legislature to provide a district with authority to impose special taxes. A district may impose special taxes pursuant to the procedures set forth in Article 3.5 (commencing with Section 50075) of Chapter 1 of Part 1 of Division 1 of Title 5 of the Government Code. In exercising that authority, a district may establish a zone or zones and a rate of tax for each zone, which is to be applied uniformly to all taxpayers within the zone. All revenue from a tax levied in a zone shall be expended in connection with land and facilities that are located in that zone, including a reasonable amount thereof allocated for general administrative expenses of the district

The COMPLETE FAILURE of the second burn, to manage weeds:

Burn July 2007

Same site, May 2008, return of the weeds in full force, after the current burn.

This is the second attempt by the District to burn the exact same area to manage the weeds. The first burn was October 2002, shown at http://www.ambientalert.com/gallery/russ/russ_briefing.html conducted by Jerry Hull of Ambient Control Systems (Photo: Second controlled burn July 26, 2007 of the northern portion of the Russian Ridge Preserve)

THE EFFECTS OF FIRE are cheap and dramatic, but in the long term, and by itself, does very little to increase the percentage cover of the native bunchgrass plants, that are the keystone species of your "native grassland ecosystem" that you are supposedly managing.

Fire opens ground and increases the broadleaf weed population in the short term, and the exotic wild oats and other weed grasses have the ability to take advantage of the vacancies created by fires, faster than most natives can. The existing broadleaf weeds and new weeds can take advantage of the bare soil created by the fire, like wild lettuce, milk thistle, Italian thistle and yellow star thistle.

Unfortunately, District managers did not conducted any detailed vegetation transects on Russian Ridge, prior to either fire, in October 2002 or in July 2007. Therefore, no scientific measurements can be made to learn what the actual effects of either of the controlled burns were on this native grassland ecosystem.

However, anyone viewing the results of the second fire, as of May 25, 2008, can see that the Harding grass is resprouting vigorously, even after being burned and herbicide sprayed. The Harding grass have come back to life, like the Zombis in the classic horror movie, "The Night of the Living Dead"

Unfortunately, the 2007 burned area also shows a huge drop in wildflowers cover, dropping by 35% by late May, because weeds like Italian thistle, yellow star thistle and wild oats, were able to occupy the vacancies in the grassland ecosystems created by the fire, faster than the natives could.

When you walk through the regrown burned area, you hear the hiss and the death-rattle of the dying wild oats, grown like a four foot tall shroud, covering the native wildflowers and native bunchgrasses,. The wild oats dead stalks sounding like a million ghosts in the native prairie, strangling the life out of the native plants.

There is no positive effect from the fire, on the weed cover overall, and the 2007 fire actually increased the star thistle, Italian thistle, wild lettuce, milk thistle cover, when compared to previous years. In fact, the fire opened up bare ground for a new weed to colonize, a rare species of wild lettuce that was not seen previously, Lactuca virosa. Yellow star thistle seedlings are coming up, as you can see in the photo below:

WHAT'S ALL THAT GREEN? Yellow star thistle and Italian Thistle in the burned area, growing at the density of 100 seedlings per square foot (Photo May 2008).

The one bright spot, is the native grass seeds that were sown after the 2002 fire, those stands are still growing strong, which is what the 2001 consultant's report was recommending. Native seeds must be sown to fill in those bare areas that you create with fire, so that the weeds do not fill in those vacancies.

Burning a native prairie already infested with weeds, and not sowing in native seeds immediately thereafter, is like sanding off the paint off a car, down to the bare metal, and not immediately putting on a coat of primer--one should not be surprised if the car's bare metal rusts, or in the case of the native prairie, if the bare burned soil rapidly becomes more weed-infested.

WHAT'S ALL THAT BROWN STUFF? Solid Yellow star thistle, that got spread further on Russian Ridge from the 2007 prescribed burn. (Photo September 2008)

INSTEAD, seed should be sown on Russian Ridge, of local native grasses like the Western Fescue, which is very low growing and produces a minimum of flammable biomass in the summer. Western fescue produces only 134 pounds flammable biomass per acre (Photo September 2008).

Up to 40 times as much flammable biomass per acre? The three years of burning of Russian Ridge has paradoxically produced more weeds and less wildflowers, and increased the flammable summer biomass, from zero pounds per acre for species like California poppies, to 3,000-6,000 pounds per acre for the wild oats and Harding grass. When Harding grass invades, it piles onto the land, as much as 40 times as much flammable biomass, compared to what existed previously, when only wildflowers and native grasses grew.

The original native cover, had the flammable biomass in summer, as a single sheet of newspaper spread over the land, whereas the exotic grasses like wild oats, are equal to 350 gallons of gasoline per acre.

Acknowledgements: Many thanks to Deane Little, a former Mid-pen Board member, and for Bill Korbholz's (Friends of Edgewood) Powerpoint presentation of the Edgewood Preserve's disappearing native grasslands and wildflowers, shown at the July 18, 2006 San Mateo County Weed Management Area meeting.

Literature cited: Kephart, Paul. 2001. "Resource Management Demonstration at Russian Ridge Preserve, Annual Report 2000. Final Report," Rana Creek Habitat Restoration, Carmel Valley. 19 pages., available from the Mid-pen. District office in Los Altos, California.

Updated October 1, 2008 -
Is time is running out for our California native ecosystems on public lands???