On September 1, 2010, a fire blackened 85 acres of the Santa Rosa Plateau Ecological Reserve near Murrieta. This part of the Reserve is currently closed and is scheduled to be reopened in approximately a year, after the trail, which was not in good condition before the fire and was damaged further by it, is re-routed. Yesterday I received permission to accompany Tom Chester and Mike Crouse along a section of the Wiashal Trail that winds through the burn area and we botanized across a good section of that area both along the trail and off-trail. The large shrubs such as chamise, oak and mission manzanita, all seem to be happily resprouting, and the charred ground has produced a crop of beautiful wildflowers including a great number of snapdragons, whispering bells and gilias. An upside-down V next to the common name is for a taxon I had never seen before, and an asterisk indicates a non-native species. Tom Chester's flora of this area is here.

San Diego pea
Lathyrus vestitus var. alefeldii
Fabaceae
[Named for Friedrich Christoph Wilhelm Alefeld, 1820-1872]

Strigose lotus
Acmispon strigosus
Fabaceae

The Photographer

Long-beaked storksbill *
Erodium botrys
Geraniaceae
[Picture at lower left shows the furrows above the fruit body]