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After driving by the Carpinteria Salt Marsh for nearly two years, I actually walked through part of it today. At 230 total acres, it is a remnant following a hundred years of agricultural and urban development. In fact, the entire reserve is completely surrounded by urban warehouses, trailers, apartments, streets, homes and beach homes.+(Small).JPG)
Today the incoming tidewater was clear - and the Santa Barbara ChannelKeepers have worked effectively to obtain cooperation from local nurseries and greenhouses that were found to be discharging irrigation runoff (fertilizers & pesticides) into channels that led directly to the marsh. While a very serene setting, long-term disturbance is easy to detect as only about 1/2 of the plants growing in the marsh are actually native to the site. The rest are all escaped exotic weeds or ornamentals. There did not appear any evidence that controlling such invasive plants was a current priority.
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A large portion is managed by the University of California Natural Reserve System - primarily for research purposes. Access is strictly limited - other than one nature trail. +(Small).JPG)
I was 'art support' for my wife Jeannie who was participating in a local 'paint-out' organized by SCAPE (Southern California Artists Painting for the Environment). She required a super-size ice tea w/lemonade from MickieD's, so I was able to gain entry to a normally-locked access by way of the SCAPE activity and gain much-needed 'kindness points' in the process!+(Small).JPG)
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Local artist Chris Chapman led the pastel paint-out. Even her stash of pastels looks colorful!.JPG)
Green Heron on a mud flat..JPG)
And in flight over a channel.+(Small).JPG)
Evidence of the marsh's 'megafauna' - a raccoon.
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And a shorebird had walked the trail before me.+(Small).JPG)
A crab hangs out on the edge of the mudflat/channel boundary.+(Small).JPG)
Dodder, a member of the cucumber family has no chlorphyll and is a generalist parasite - and this one is Salt Marsh Dodder, Cuscuta salina v. major.
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See? It even has flowers - looks just like pumpkins? No? +(Small).JPG)
The yellow-flowering shrub is a member of the aster family and grows on higher ground between the channels where tidal flooding does not occur. Santa Ynez Mountains in the background, average 2,000'+
2 comments:
Do you know anything about the sea lion conservation site? I heard there is one in Carpinteria...
I'm one of the volunteer docents at the Carpinteria Salt Marsh, and I'm especially interested in the birds, and bird tracks, there. I really enjoyed reading your post!
I believe the "shorebird" tracks in that photo might actually be the tracks of an American crow. Not that we don't get plenty of interesting shorebirds in the marsh; we definitely do. But those look like crow tracks to me.
The sea lion conservation site that the previous commenter mentioned sounds like a reference to the harbor seal pupping location on the other side of Carpinteria from the marsh, near the Casitas Pier. You can reach it from the Carpinteria Bluffs. It's really quite spectacular; one of the only mainland pupping sites for harbor seals in this section of coast, and you can get right above where the seals are and see them birthing and caring for their babies. It's pretty quiet there now; December through March is the prime pupping season.
This site has some good information about it, including a video, photos, and a map: harbor seal rookery.
Hope to see you there sometime!
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