This is the Pepperwood Podcast, a production
of Pepperwood, a nonprofit conservation organization
based at a 3 ,200 -acre nature reserve near Santa
Rosa, California, in the heart of the traditional
homeland of the Wapu people. At Pepperwood, we
aim to inspire conservation through science.
And on this show, we talk to scientists, stewards,
and environmental educators about what they do
and how they do it. We hope to give you a glimpse
into the real experiences of folks who devote
their lives to taking care of local ecosystems
and sharing them with others. Welcome, dear listeners.
I'm Julianne, environmental educator and your
host for this podcast experience, and we have
such a treat for you. Our guest on this episode
is one of the most eloquent, intelligent, and
passionate scientists I have had the honor to
meet, and she is going to take us on a poetic
and scientific journey through our California
grasslands. Michelle Halber is Pepperwood's Ecology
Research Manager, and I am fortunate to say that
Michelle was the first representative of Pepperwood
that I spent time with when I first inquired
about volunteering here 10 years ago, back when
she was the Preserve Ecologist. Whenever I listen
to Michelle describe the plants and animals that
inhabit our grasslands and the care with which
she studies them, it reminds me of why I fell
in love with this place and why I feel so lucky
to have become a part of this team. Once you
have listened to our conversation, you are going
to want to hear more from Michelle, believe me.
And a resource that you can check out immediately
is her webinar on grasslands titled California's
Grasslands, The Forest Beneath Our Feet, which
is available on the Pepperwood Foundation YouTube
channel. We'll also provide a link to that in
the show notes for this episode. In that video,
Michelle expands upon many of the ideas that
we touch upon in today's conversation, and she
provides an incredible set of accompanying visuals.
Even walking your eyes through how an experienced
grassland ecologist looks at an expansive grassland
in such a dynamic and fun way, don't miss it.
Additionally, Michelle serves on the boards of
both the California Native Grassland Association
and the Milo Baker Chapter of the California
Native Plant Society. Those are two other organizations
that provide very important advocacy toward grassland
conservation and have many more online resources
to dig deeper into grasslands. California Native
Plant Society even has a website that will let
you know what native grasses and wildflowers
are suitable for your own backyard. We'll provide
links to both of those organizations in the show
notes for this episode. Okay, let's not dally
any further. Let's get to it. Please enjoy this
discussion that I had with Ecology Research Manager
Michelle Halber in October of 2024. So thank
you, Michelle, for sitting down and talking to
me about grasslands. It's going to be really
fun to hear more about that. because we know
a little bit about how the research goes in the
forests, which is maybe a little more recent.
Is it true that I think you've been monitoring
the grasslands for even longer? Is that true?
Yes, we started our annual grassland monitoring
project in 2011 when I first came to Pepperwood.
So yeah, that's a couple of years before those
forest monitoring plots were even being thought
of. So that's really neat. I'd like to get down
with the cast of characters that you spend time
with because I love the belly botanizing, literally
being on your belly and botanizing that you get
to do in the grasslands is so intimate. So who
are those little, who are the little characters,
who are the little species that you are monitoring
out there? Yeah, so we have... so many amazing
plants in our grasslands most people look out
and see you know just these rolling hills and
they all kind of look you know if it's springtime
they might look a little bit green maybe with
little patches of brown and in summer they're
fully brown and so it looks like it's just one
plant right one grass right just a continuous
grass right but if you actually get down and
you press your face closer, right below your
knees. You might need to get a nice cushy pad
to kneel on if you're like me and want some comfort.
And if you dig down in there, what you'll notice
is there's layers upon layers of all these different
species that are coexisting in this amazing space.
We have taller grasses like harding grass, which
is actually a perennial exotic grass. And what
I mean by that is perennial means this is a species
that can live more than one year, often many,
many years. And it is exotic, meaning it... did
not originate from California. Oh, okay. This
was a plant that was introduced as erosion control,
actually, after the 1964 Hanley Fire. And it's
also, unfortunately, invasive, which is a different
term we use for plants that tend to move into
an area and take over and can kind of reduce
biodiversity of an area. But it's a very tall
grass, so it's one of the ones you walk through,
and it can be shoulder height, sometimes over
your head, depending on the year. And a lot of
birds really like this grass. It provides a lot
of forage. But unfortunately, it does reduce
our biodiversity. Gotcha. So all right off the
bat, we're thinking about species and how they
interact with each other. Sure, yeah. And then
if you go a little bit deeper down, maybe in
a lower layer, maybe I can call it a sub canopy
of our grasslands. Even though we don't have
forest canopy overhead, there are different layers
within the grassland itself. And further down,
you might get... into some of your annual grasses.
These are grasses that live their entire life
cycle in just one year. They germinate as seeds,
usually in fall or after initial rainfall occurs.
That moisture encourages germination. And these
are the green grasses you see coming up this
time of year. We're in October. they often produce
that kind of golden hills of California look
in summer. They go fully dormant, they die back
in summer months, and they drop their seeds that
wait as these little, you know, embryos and seed
coats in the soils waiting for the next rainfall
to perk up and grow again. We also have native
perennial bunch grasses. These are some of my
favorites. Native perennial bunch grasses are
native to California. They're endemic to this
area. And they can live, depending on the species,
sometimes upwards of 100 or 150 years. That long?
That long. And these are plants that often have
really, really deep roots that go meters deep
into the soil, 10 feet or more deep into the
soil. And the reason they do that is because
they need to survive those really hot, dry...
summer months and tap it by having roots that
go that deep they can tap into groundwater throughout
those dry months and stay alive very precious
commodity at this time of year when it's so dry
out there absolutely and they're in bunches so
they don't create kind of the carpet effect that
you see of those exotic annual grasses instead
they'll be in these little clusters and that
allows space for other plants and animals to
coexist so you get a lot of diversity of plants
within our native perennial bunch grass systems
great and that includes a lot of your wildflowers
oh yeah right so if you're a good player and
you have all these bunch grasses with space in
between you can have things like native clovers
you can have Buttercups, poppies are some of
our favorites, etc. Absolutely. All right. So
a grassland, when we talk about grasslands, we're
not just talking about even grasses, right? So
then those flowers, and I think we kind of refer
to those as like forbs, right? Any of the plants
that are green but not woody? Correct. That's
a great term. Yeah, we call them forbs, which
are a lot of your wildflowers that you see out
there. Yes. One thing that people don't really
think about, and I like to remind folks, is that
grasses are flowers too. Oh, that's a good point.
They kind of are wildflowers. They just don't
have really... bright showy petals. Bright showy
petals on things that we normally think of as
wildflowers attract pollinators, right? So it's
like these big showy pieces that pollinators
can hone in on and come in and get their nectar
reward or their pollen reward and help pollinate
that individual. But that takes a lot of, you
know, biological energy. And grasses are actually
one of our most recently involved lineages of
plants. And they, instead of spending all this
energy on these bright, showy parts, this expensive,
biologically expensive pollen and nectar that
they have to protect, and that dependency on
pollinators to do their reproductive work for
them, grasses have evolved out of that and instead
have these non -showy... They're kind of like
petals, but they're called different terms. Botanists
like to use lots of fancy words. But they're
basically flower parts that then just open up
and dangle in the wind, and the wind does their
pollination for them. Oh, so I don't think I
knew that, that grasses were newcomers, evolutionarily
speaking. But it does make sense that they've
sort of found a way around this. relationship
dependence right that some of the showy flowers
do correct okay so they tend to be wind pollinated
that's like a more common way of going about
it that's really cool well and if you're talking
evolution and lineages humans through our own
evolution have really relied upon grasses for
our existence especially for food so rice is
a grass corn is a grass Right? Wheat, I assume.
Wheat. Is grass. Barley. Highly, you know, sort
of. Oh, my gosh. So, yeah, like major staples
of human food. Correct. In terms of at least,
you know, some cultures anyway. That's kind of
a lot of different cultures that you covered
there. Really rely on grasses. All right. Well,
that's interesting. They're newcomers kind of
like we are, like we haven't been around that
long evolutionarily speaking either. So I guess
we're all sort of in partnership here. Do you
have any favorites in terms of who you monitor
or maybe rare species that you don't get to see
very much? Oh, we have a really nice, delicate,
rare plant at Pepperwood called Jepson's Leptocyphon.
Jepson was a botanist in California. Oh yes,
of course, the Jepson guide. How can I forget?
The botanist's bible of sorts. So Jepson was
a botanist, and leptocyphon is the genus. Lepto
meaning long, cyphon meaning tube. Quick little
interruption here. After our conversation, Michelle
double -checked on the word leptocyphon, and
she wanted to offer this correction. Lepto is
not Greek for long, but instead Greek for thin
or slender. Well, it's all Greek to us, and I
think you'll find that slender tube works just
as well as long tube to support her description
of this sweet little plant, which I'll get back
to now. And if you can imagine this little plant,
it's very delicate, maybe one to two inches tall,
with kind of a bottle brush. of leaves and bracts,
which is a fun term to look up another time.
And these delicate little, out of these clusters,
there's these delicate little pale kind of cream
to pinkish flowers that have a very tiny long
tube that opens up into a little star. And sometimes
they're called false baby stars. But what's amazing
is... With that really long floral tube, the
nectar reward is way down, away from where an
insect could land or hover in front of the flower.
And so you have to imagine what would be pollinating
this flower that has this really long tube. And
it's likely moths, butterflies. Oh, with those
long tongues that they can stick out. Yeah, that
they can fit all the way through that leptocyphon.
Oh, so these tiny... little plants that eat,
you know, the relatively large insects to kind
of hunker down and find them. That's really nice.
Yes. Another one of my favorites is bird's eye
gilia, gilia tricolor, and it has blue pollen.
It's just absolutely fantastic to look down at
this very, very tiny, maybe, half an inch wide
flower that has like this purplish rim on the
outside, kind of a cream color on the inside.
And if you look at the male stamens, they're
called, they have this lovely blue pollen. Very
exciting. Fancy. I like it. All right. Dressing
up for spring there. You got to get down on your
belly to see it. Okay. That sounds worth it.
I'm there. Fantastic. So really you get to kind
of shrink your world down into like little tiny.
parts of it, as opposed to sometimes when we're
looking at trees, we're really backing up and
looking at a big picture. But your world shrinks
down to these little tiny wonders of the grasslands.
That sounds like a lovely experience. It really
is. And it's also something to think about with
regards to what you're talking about is spatial
scales, right? So grasslands might be vast. You
might have these large swaths of grasslands,
you know, rolling hills in California. But when
you get up close, If you just take a few steps
from one place to another, you can be within
a completely different plant community within
that grassland. You really got to pay attention.
You really have to pay attention. And a lot of
it has to do with the local environment. You
know, how rich are the soils? How poor are the
soils? How moist are the soils? What slope or
aspect are you on? Whether or not you have that
harding grass in your way and you're trying to,
you know, out -compete this really hardy plant.
of those components can lead to a very dynamic
and uh diverse mosaic of species and communities
out there so even though it looks like one you
know backdrop of green There's a lot going on
at those smaller scales. Right. And you've already
described it a little bit as like the tallest
of grasses, which are maybe shoulder height for
us, are sort of like the canopy of a mini forest.
Yeah. So yeah, if I think about two steps in,
if I were a giant that were as tall as a tree,
two steps would take me to a very different part
of the forest in the same way. So wow. Nice.
What a fun little like mental image to... play
around with next time I'm walking around in some
grass. Great. When does the monitoring for grasslands
take place? Is it year round? No, actually at
Pepperwood, we like to go out into our grasslands.
We basically visit the same places year after
year in the first part of May. And we chose that
because that's a time of year where... we're
really close to the peak of productivity and
diversity. So we have, you know, the most number
of plants, most number of species kind of flowering
or doing their thing at the same time. So we
can identify them. But also we have. almost peak
productivity. So we can get a sense of how much
biomass or how much plant material is produced
year after year above ground. Gotcha. That seems
like a pretty magic time in late spring, early
summer, because we've got a lot of solar energy
coming in, right? And we also have the warmth,
which is allowing all of the species to be a
little more productive, a little more active.
But we also... Unlike in fall, we have all the
moisture that's left over from the winter rains,
hopefully. So that seems like a big... crossroads
of things. Um, in terms of if I were a plant,
I would care very much about that time. Yes.
Very important. Okay. Well, and by picking, we
actually picked the calendar dates of May 1st
through 15th every year. Um, because a, you know,
just logistically, it's a lot easier to calendar.
I know where I am every May 1st through 15th,
but also, um, it's not too late in the season.
If it's a really dry year, like some of our extreme
droughts we've experienced, right. We can still
identify species. There's still stuff there.
We know what it is. And it's also not too early
in these kind of cooler, wet years that we have.
So in California, year to year, it's highly variable,
which is exciting because that creates, you know,
all these different assemblages or groupings
of species. They might, you know, in really dry
years, we might have species overlapping, like
early bloomers and late bloomers all blooming
at the same time. Just a big hurry. It's compressed
and we've got to get our reproduction done before
we die down, right? We're annuals. we're going
to die. And then otherwise in the wet years,
it might spread out. So it's quite exciting.
Okay. But logistically, that also might mean
if you only have the same 15 days every year,
and if anything goes wrong, that must really
get in the way of the process. Is that right?
Uh -oh. Yeah, for sure. So we'll keep our fingers
crossed as next time we come around to May for
you, that everything is going smoothly. Well,
I decided to have both my children right around
that time. So, you know, I missed a couple field
seasons. That does happen. Well, fortunately,
you have a great team who can back you up, I
hope. Absolutely. Absolutely. Fantastic. So when
you're doing this work year after year, and you've
been doing it for now, okay, you said 2011, 2024.
So we're almost getting up to a decade and a
half worth of data. Does that sound right? So
yeah, we have 14 seasons. 14 full seasons documented
in the computer. How are you hoping that having
this information might change the kind of work
that gets done here at Pepperwood or anywhere?
Yeah, so when we're out there, what we're looking
at is, you know, at Pepperwood, we're an actively
managed or stewarded landscape. And what I mean
by that is we are... Taking care of our grasslands,
including ecological processes that historically
were here to maintain grasslands as grasslands.
Grasslands are a vegetation community that requires
some form of disturbance to keep it a grassland.
If we remove that disturbance, what often happens
is you get shrubs moving in and then forests
moving in in their place. And that's a process
that's called succession. By having some form
of disturbance, whether it's wildfire, prescribed
fire, maybe it was historically elk moving through
the range. you know, doing their grazing and
their hoof punches they pass through in these
larger herds, all of that activity would reset
that successional clock back to a grassland,
maintaining that diversity of herbaceous species.
And so instead of having these historical...
processes like elk we no longer have elk unfortunately
right but we need that disturbance to keep our
grasslands grasslands we bring on cattle and
we have cattle that graze here regularly and
so our monitoring is able to basically assess
you know given all the stewardship we're doing
how are our grasslands doing from year after
year are we reaching the objectives that we set
as responsible land stewards, one of which is,
you know, one of our main goals is to support
and hopefully enhance native biodiversity. Right.
So going out there and seeing who is there, how
much is there, how is that changing year after
year, given all of these wonderful activities
we're doing, are we sustaining, are we enhancing
our grasslands? Right. Well, and that must be
difficult to decide when you're seeing results,
when you're seeing changes, or if you're seeing
not changes. whether the stewardship that we're
doing and the choices we're making in terms of
management are the drivers of those changes or
not changes, or if it's something beyond our
control. Yeah, or even an interaction of something
not in our control, like climate change and grazing.
Are we going to graze the same way we're grazing
now if it is going to be hotter and drier in
the future with maybe different species moving
through? And so this, what we call the adaptive
management cycle, is really important. It's all
about setting objectives, going out there, and
doing the actions that you hope. will give you
those outcomes you're looking for monitoring
the impact and the outcomes coming back you know
into the office crunching the data like the scientist
I am and sharing those results with our team
to really look and and have conversations about
what's going on you know for instance let's say
bare ground starts increasing well maybe there's
too much bare ground. What does that mean, too
much? If you have too much bare ground, maybe
there's a risk of erosion, right? You're going
to lose your topsoil. You're going to have gullies
forming in your grasslands. Maybe you're losing
diversity of species that are creating these
blank spaces, or maybe you're overgrazing. So
we can go to these places, we can look at them,
have conversations and fine tune how we're impacting
and kind of nudging the trajectory of our land.
So in some ways, your results aren't just impacting
like future work at Pepperwood. In some ways,
your results are at least... coming into the
conversation of what's happening currently at
Pepperwood. So it's a very quick turnaround because
you're working so carefully together. Yes. It's
an annual cycle really. And we gauge, you know,
each year, ideally each year, you know, how,
how we're doing, what we can do better and how
we can fine tune moving forward. That's great.
Yeah. Fun. Have cattle been a part of this landscape
for as long as you've been here? As long as I
have been here, yes. Okay. Yes. Great. And when
I first came on staff, one of the things I was
most impressed with was that Michael Gologly,
our preserve manager, he really wanted to make
sure that our intention of keeping grasslands
grasslands was supporting the historical ecology
of this area. Right? So one of the questions
was... were these grasslands always grasslands?
Yeah, for how long has that been the case, right?
And if so or not, how do we best steward? Do
we want to plant trees instead? Was it once a
forest? And then maybe the, you know, homesteaders
that came out here in the 1850s, where they set
up their orchards, their vineyards, they had
their grazing sheep and goats, you know, did
that convert forest to grasslands? That was a
big question Michael had. And he recruited a
local historical ecologist, Arthur Dawson. Cool.
And a scientist at UC Berkeley, Rand Evett, to
do some various analyses and assessments. And
Arthur Dawson... looked at maps from the 1940s
to, I think, the early 2000s. And just within
that short time span, the difference of our grasslands
from 1940s to 2000s was a reduction of about
10%. Oh, so if anything, we used to have quite
a bit more. We used to have more, even in a short
period of time. Yeah. But if you go back further,
he also reoccupied the 1800s census locations.
took place at Pepperwood. And with those historical
documents in hand, I hope it was a photocopy,
probably. With the photocopy of those documents,
he was able to stand in the same location and
look out in the same direction and read their
descriptive, you know, assessment of the land.
And sure enough, most of the places where it
describes these rolling hills, you know, with
these various grassy ridge tops, speckled with
oaks, is exactly what we see today. And then
you combine those historical documents with some
of Rand Evett's work. He looked at phytoliths
in the soils. Oh, you're going to have to break
that down for me. Phytolith. I love words. Phyto
meaning plant, lith meaning rock. Okay. So these
plants have... really remarkable ability. They're
chemists by nature. And they can create these
crystalline bodies inside of their tissues called
phytoliths that are made out of silica. And silica
doesn't decompose over time. And so different
species will have different shapes. Different
assemblages of species will have different densities.
And grasses are particularly rich in silica.
Right. Right? So Rand is an expert in phytoliths,
their structure and composition and densities.
And he took lots of soil cores throughout Pepperwood.
And the deeper you go in soil, the further back
in time you're going, essentially. You're exploring
that history. And what he determined, looking
at the phytoliths of pepperwood, is that our
grasslands were predominantly grasslands and
have been for a very long time. And in fact,
he detected a lot of our native species, like
purple needlegrass, our state grass, as well
as California fescue and others. That's so fun.
And also, if you consider indigenous burning,
that... most likely probably if not 100 % happened
in this region, that fire, the routine fire at
regular intervals likely also kept these rich
tops as grasslands. That's so great. So that
all provides evidence and support for us maintaining
these disturbances and these natural processes,
right, through cattle instead of elk and through
our good fire or prescribed fire instead of wildfire.
Yes. Well, I think one thing we definitely covered
with Devin back when we chatted with him was
that prescribed fires are a much more pleasant
and relaxing experience than any wildfire could
ever be. Absolutely. We're 100 % on board with
that. And it's great to hear that we're sort
of picking up the stewardship that has been being
done here for so many thousands of years after
having let it lapse for some time. But we're
picking it back up and we feel really confident
that that's going to maintain the ecosystem.
ecosystems and hopefully even enhance them. Absolutely.
Love that. All right. Well, what makes the long
-term monitoring that you're doing out there
in the grasslands possible? Because I know how
hard it is to get out there every year and to
get this data. It's so precious once that time
passes, especially with this small window. So
what do you feel like supports you and your team
making that happen? Oh, there's lots of different
elements. I mean, the first that comes to mind
is the nice caffeinated beverages we have before
we go out and sample every day. Also, the teamwork
and camaraderie and the fun that we have is really,
and the passion about our landscape and doing,
you know, caretaking these places with intention
and with an ecological sensitivity. Right. That's
something that we all bring to the table. We
care about. So we're all behind this work and
just the sheer joy of learning every year. Right.
And one thing I love is that my coworker, Michaela,
when she was first training on our grassland
monitoring, she would call me on cell phones
across the preserve and be like, oh, I'm standing
in this one place. I'm like, oh, are you in Quadrat
9? Yeah. And I'm like, oh, here's the list of
species from my memory because I visited that
place time and time again. And you just learn
like who's there, how they stay there sometimes
for year after year. And sometimes they blink
out. As far as like actual financial support,
you know, it's really important that. People
recognize that nonprofits like us doing this
work are funded through their financial support
and their memberships and their donations. And
so we're just totally indebted to all of our
supporters. We also get some grant funding here
and there. But long -term projects, they tend
to fizzle out because they're not... they're
not these like emergencies that need to be taken
care of, right? They're not these like glamorous
things. You're like, oh, it's just business as
usual. But the value of these data sets has yet
to be expressed because we are, thank goodness
we had this monitoring in place prior to the
2017 Tubbs and the 2019 Kincaid fires because
we now have a pre -wildfire data set and a post
-wildfire data set under all these different
burns that are happening and the fact that we've
experienced multiple droughts in that time period
as well we just we're going to learn a lot about
the complexities of wildfire grazing climate
change you name it in an age when people more
than ever just really want to support the natural
resources and beauty that we have in our region
yeah that's on one hand like lacking a crystal
ball it can be very difficult to tell a potential
grant funder hey In five years, we're going to
really need this data. But on the other hand,
maybe knowing that like disturbance and change
and... emergencies and the unexpected is always
coming somewhere down the line. Right. Hopefully
they can start to see like, hey, we're going
to need this before data. I don't know what it's
before, but some stuff's going to happen in the
future. So we're going to need to know what's
going on now to be able to make the comparison.
Right. And, you know, we've been just talking
about the plants of grasslands, but there's also
so many wildlife that require grasslands. Absolutely.
We have North American badger that move through
the preserve, you know, creating birds. and moving
on their way. We have a lot of native birds that
utilize our space, our grasslands in particular.
We have migratory grasshopper sparrows, which
are not very common and move through the region.
But there's a lot at Pepperwood and they're ground
nesting birds. So they nest, they have their
nests just vulnerably like on the ground where
they can be predated upon. That's a gamble right
there. But our grasses support these animals.
Western meadowlarks is... another one of my favorite
species in grasslands with their kind of canary
yellow, or I should say Western meadowlark yellow
chest and their brilliant songs and the flocks
of them and the sound of their wings as they
flap through the grasslands. There is a North
American breeding bird survey and in California,
Western meadowlarks have been in decline since
1960. However, at Pepperwood, we monitor our
birds in April through June, and western meadowlarks
since 2007 have continually increased at Pepperwood.
So the opposite of the trend we see sort of nationally.
Correct. That's so good to hear. We are the refuge
that they are taking, I hope. Well, and it speaks
to, they're an indicator of grassland health,
and so it really speaks to the careful stewardship.
and caretaking that we provide for this space.
Well, great. So I know it sounds like we have
a very specific... protocol for maintaining our
understanding of the bird species. We've got
that annual breeding bird survey. What other
kind of monitoring goes on for the animals in
the grasslands? Oh, yeah. We have a wonderful
wildlife picture index project where we have
basically a grid of cameras. They're each placed
about a kilometer apart, 20 cameras at Pepperwood.
We also have 20 cameras up north at Modini Preserves,
which is run by Audubon Canyon Ranch, of which
you know. Very well, Jillian. I spent five years.
working there love it there and love the relationship
between us and them well we're in a modeled um
wildlife corridor between us and and modini and
so by having these grids we can watch how these
animals move through this landscape um including
all the grasslands in between sure absolutely
well that's wonderful okay so those are two major
ways we have this breeding bird surveys and then
um and then the the wildlife cameras many of
which i'm sure end up in grasslands in our grassland
rich landscape yes and we also have um cover
boards which are basically a square or rectangle
of plywood that's plopped on the ground and some
of those cover boards are in grassland communities
and we essentially go out there with interns
and volunteers and scientists we lift these boards
and look at what's underneath and what we're
particularly interested in are what we call herpetofauna,
reptiles, amphibians, as well as invertebrates,
insects, scorpions, and such. That's great. So
even though the forest monitoring plots sort
of have their own little world, there's a lot
of crossover between the kind of data we're collecting
for grasslands as with forests, just maybe in
a slightly different sort of annual ritual. Yes.
Okay. Well, and if you think about it, the understory
of a forest is really just a continuum with the
open canopy grasslands. That's right. There aren't
like some solid boundaries around that, right?
Yeah. You go from complete open, herbaceous,
dominated grasslands or rangelands to maybe a
slight shrub to forest edge to under the canopy.
And you see a lot of similar species that occur
throughout. Sure. And then, of course, some unique
ones that really need the sun or ones that really
don't want to have direct sunlight. So you have
a little bit of both. Yes. And so when you're
doing forest work, you know, the trees, they're
200 plus years old often, like some of these
old oaks that we're dealing with and mixed hardwood
forests, right? So they're representing kind
of ancient climate in a way. Whereas with rapid
climate change that's occurring, if you really
want to detect change and where these communities
are going, you look beneath your feet. Right.
The grasslands are the first ones that are going
to respond because they're faster growing and
faster dying. Yeah, those herbaceous species
underfoot, the shrubs that are germinating, the
tree seedlings that are coming up, that's the
future forest under your feet. Right. So we're
documenting all that underfoot stuff in our forest
every year as well as our open grassland. Great.
Oh, that sounds like a really good time. I'm
sure it's also very tough and hot, and May can
be a warm time of year, so I'm sure you earn
the snacks you get at the end of the day there
and use up all of the caffeine that you consumed
early on. What is something that you think people
just need to know about grasslands? Grasslands
are actually one of the most threatened vegetation
communities in California. We've lost almost
90%, if not more, of our native grasslands. They
host, I think the statistic is 90 % of endangered
and threatened species. That includes plants
and animals. They use grasslands. So they're
often the first places that are developed. not
well understood because they are so complex on
short spatial scales or small spatial scales
but also short time scales and what I mean by
that is my favorite grassland is a grassland
that has recently burned because what happens
is with that fire it wakes up the seed bank In
some cases, it might have been they're sleeping,
waiting for 50, 60 years. And some of those seeds
are still viable and ready to go? They're viable,
and they wake up, they germinate, and you have
these blooms that are absolutely gorgeous. Like
after the Tubbs fire, our grasslands woke up.
And what that did to me, it woke me up to the
fact that if we don't have fire in this equation
of stewarding grasslands, we don't fully understand
the full potential. Of that community, of the
seed bank that is there. And there's this temporal
scale that we really need to be thinking about,
not just spatial scale, but temporal. And these
periodic events over time that replenish that
seed bank, right? That's very, very critical.
And we don't know much about that throughout
California because we've been suppressing fire
for over 150 years. And grasslands, as you say.
you know, they function on a slightly shorter
time scale than the forest. So the 200 years
might have been really impactful to a species
that maybe has much shorter turnover than a 300
-year -old oak tree. Yeah, who knows what species
are lying there asleep under your feet, you know,
as you're walking through. Well, that's mysterious.
I'm excited. I'm excited to think about that.
Well, Michelle, this has been a delightful conversation.
Thank you so much. I know what a busy lady you
are. So thanks for stopping by and taking some
time. time to talk to us about grasslands oh
this was so much fun thank you for having me
you're welcome ah michelle is my hero see i'll
bet you thought i was being over the top with
worshipfulness in my introduction at the beginning
of the episode but isn't she an absolute poet
please share this experience with anyone in your
life who you think deserves to fall in love with
california's grasslands Ways to support the podcast
and Pepperwood itself include sharing our Facebook
and Instagram announcements, which we post for
each episode. You can also subscribe to our podcast
feed on Spotify or YouTube or wherever you access
your podcasts. And you can register to attend
one of Pepperwood's community events, classes,
workshops, or stewardship workdays and invite
someone along with you. We will include a link
to our classes and events page in the show notes
for this episode to help you access all of that
fun. And as part of the education team, you might
think I'm biased on the side of the events and
classes, but I'd actually like to highlight the
stewardship workdays because they are the most
direct and tangible way to get to know and support
the native bunchgrass communities that Michelle
described in our conversation. Our stewardship
volunteers are the backbone of our bunchgrass
planting program. You can join us in late spring
to collect native bunchgrass seeds. You can join
us in fall to prepare and sow those seeds in
the shade house. Or you can join us in the wet
season, strap on your boots, and help plant baby
bunchgrass plugs out on the landscape. During
the past two wet seasons, our volunteer and staff
have planted 25 ,000 native bunchgrass plugs
each year. So join us to help those valuable
species support our soil health, contribute to
carbon sequestration, and provide many other
ecological functions. Thank you to all of my
fellow staff members at Pepperwood who help support
the production of this podcast. And now... Snap
to attention and prepare your ears for the Nature
Sound Guess Who Game. At the end of episode three,
the Nature Sound challenge clip sounded just
like this. And we have not received any guesses
for that critter as of this recording, so you
all might be as puzzled as I would be. The identity
of the sound maker in that clip is... the western
meadowlark. What? Sternella neglecta? The very
same grassland -loving songbird that Michelle
mentioned in today's conversation? Did I plan
this? I promise you I did not. I had already
planned for that meadowlark call to be revealed
in this episode, and I was so tickled when Michelle
highlighted their population dynamics in our
chat. I will admit, however, that I purposefully
chose a type of call from this bird species,
because they have several vocalizations, that
I consider to be slightly less characteristic
of this species compared to the one that I know
best. You meadowlark lovers out there will probably
know what I mean. The Western Meadowlark song
that I listen for every time I'm out on the reserve
sounds like this. That's sometimes referred to
as their song, whereas the challenge clip is
referred to as a call. They have at least one
more distinctive call, a forlorn little sound
that goes like this. Aww. Any of those vocalizations
might come from a Western Meadowlark, and they
are all sourced from the Macaulay Library, which
is run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. The
challenge clip was recorded and contributed to
that incredible resource by Randolph Little,
the song by John Patterson, and the second sad
little call by Bob McGuire. If you are interested
in birds and bird calls, definitely check out
their associated website, ebird .org, where you
can search for species or by region under the
Explore tab. They have an incredible database
of sounds, images, and additional information
about hundreds of bird species. But before you
run off to peruse ebird .org for the next two
hours, Listen closely because here comes this
week's challenge clip in 3, 2, 1. And again in
3, 2, 1. I wish you much luck and fun in figuring
out the mystery noisemaker from that clip. And
don't forget to submit your guesses on our Facebook
or Instagram episode announcement post or email
it in to podcast at pepperwoodpreserve .org.
Thanks for listening, folks. And until next time,
keep your ears tuned into nature.