Latest Flora of North America Stories
By Keith Rogers By KEITH ROGERS REVIEW-JOURNAL With 70,000 to 80,000 sage grouse scampering through thickets of high desert shrubs in Nevada, a casual observer might think the chickenlike bird is hardly a candidate for listing as a threatened or endangered species. The Nevada Department of Wildlife estimates, however, are down this year from 100,000 grouse in 2005, and the ratio of chicks to hens is the lowest recorded since the early 1980s. That gives weight to arguments by...
By ERIC FEBER By Eric Feber The Virginian-Pilot The state's Department of Forestry is asking residents to get a little squirrelly. They want you to round up as many nuts as you can. And that doesn't mean you should turn in spooky ol' Uncle Elmo or your weird cousin Harold, the Virginia Department of Forestry (D.O.F.) simply needs help collecting "tree nuts," better known as acorns. As part of its year-round "Going Native" volunteer project, the D.O.F is calling on residents to help...
By Ray Grass Deseret News For years now, the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources has been working with private landowners to help improve feeding opportunities for deer, elk and cattle. On Monday, roughly 300 acres of mountain sagebrush on private land adjacent to Hardware Ranch in Cache County was treated with an herbicide called Spike. The end result will be a thinning of the sagebrush and a rapid growth of tasty grasses and forbs, primary food sources for both wild and domestic animals....
By > JOSH SISKIN I would like some advice on what kind of tree I should plant in my front yard for shade. I live in Mira Loma (Riverside County), where it is very hot in the summer and cold and windy in the winter months. I would like something fast-growing and preferably evergreen that would not hurt my plumbing. One last thing: My yard is small, so the tree should not be too large. >Rachelle Romero, Mira Loma Most evergreen trees are not known for producing shade. Exceptions would be...
By Beth Partin When it comes to noxious weeds, Colorado, like many other states, suffers from an embarrassment of riches. Take myrtle spurge. It seemed perfect for a dryland garden, resembling nothing so much as a yellow-flowered sedum. But this xeriscape favorite has invaded sunny, dry areas in the foothills, where it carpets slopes and crowds out native vegetation. Despite its good looks, it's on List A under the Colorado Noxious Weed Act, which means that by law it must be eradicated....
Conservation group WildEarth Guardians formally petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on Thursday in hopes that the government agency will offer express protection of an endangered lizard found in New Mexico and Texas.The sand dune lizard has been on the Fish and Wildflife Service's list of potential candidates since 2001. In 1997, researchers at the University of New Mexico wrote that it might be too late to prevent the lizard's extinctionWildEarth spokespersons said they want to see...
U.S. researchers travel to Canada next spring to study simulated global warming involving about 2,000 sugar maple tree seedlings. Northern Illinois University Professors Lesley Rigg and David Goldblum have been awarded a $260,000 National Science Foundation grant to simulate global warming on sugar maple seedlings now growing in Canada's Lake Superior Provincial Park. The researchers will build rain-exclusion, temperature-controlled structures over the seedlings to simulate temperature...
DES MOINES, Iowa -- A new species of North American bamboo was recently discovered by Iowa State University and University of North Carolina botanists, making it the third known native species of the hardy grass in the United States. The "hill cane" was discovered in the Appalachian Mountains. It's different from the other two native species of bamboo, which were discovered more than 200 years ago, because it drops its leaves in the fall."We tend to think that we ... know our...
LONDON (Reuters) - Black cohosh, a herb popular for relieving hot flashes and other symptoms of menopause, may be linked with liver damage and products containing it will in future carry a warning, Britain's drug regulator said on Tuesday. The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) said a review of all available data had concluded that liver injury resulting from black cohosh was rare but could be serious. "In the light of this advice, the MHRA is working with the...
By Anne Harding NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Some products now sold in the US as black cohosh don't contain the popular herbal medicine at all, a new study shows. The herb has been used for several decades in Europe and North America to treat menopausal symptoms and some clinical trials have suggested it can indeed help treat hot flashes. Black cohosh is becoming scarce in the wild, raising the possibility that manufacturers may turn to related Actaea species that are cultivated in...
Latest Flora of North America Reference Libraries
The Redwood National and States Parks, also known as RNSP, are located along the northern coasts of California in the United States. RNSP is comprised of the Prairie Creek Redwoods State, Del Norte Coast, and Jedediah Smith State Parks, created in the 1920’s, and Redwood National Park, encompassing an area of 133,000 acres. These areas protect 45 percent of the red wood old growth forests that occur along 38,982 acres of California’s coastline. Many Native American tribes including the...
Symbol: CYACC2 Group: Dicot Family: Cactaceae Duration: Perennial Growth Habit: Shrub Native Status: L48 N Synonyms: OPACC Opuntia acanthocarpa Engelm. & J.M. Bigelow var. coloradensis L.D. Benson Colorado buckhorn cholla Distribution: County distributions for the following U.S. states are available at PLANTS:AZ, CA, NV, UT Classification: Kingdom Plantae – Plants Subkingdom Tracheobionta –...
White Baneberry (Actaea pachypoda) also known as Doll's Eyes, is a species of flowering plant native to eastern North America. It grows in clay to coarse loamy upland soils. It is found in hardwood and mixed-forest stands. This is a herbaceous perennial plant that grows to 19.75 inches high. It has toothed, bipinnate compound leaves that are up to 15.75 inches long and 12 inches broad. It has white flowers. Its most striking feature is its fruit. The fruit is a tiny white berry, whose...
The Elf Owl (Micrathene whitneyi) is a member of the owl family Strigidae that resides in the Southwestern United States. They mainly live in southern Arizona, Texas and parts of California. They migrate to Mexico in September. They are often found in evergreen oak habitat and are easily found during their breeding season. It is the smallest of owls and is about the same size as a sparrow. They are overall gray-brown with white spots on the shoulder and a white bar at the wrist. They are...
The Gila Woodpecker, (Melanerpes uropygialis), is a medium-sized woodpecker of the desert regions of the southwestern United States. They range through southeastern California, southern Nevada, Arizona, and New Mexico. Its habitat consists of low desert scrub typical of the Sonora desert. They build nests in holes made in saguaro cacti or mesquite trees. There, they typically lay 3-5 white eggs. The back and wings of this bird are spotted and barred with a black and white zebra-like...
