On a short walk today I made some observations beyond what I posted in inat. In some ways plant life especially has really taken off. The paths I use to get up into the oak woodlands from the meadow and just overrun with soaproot on the ground and poison oak everywhere else. It occurred to me, that if I started to have a reaction to poison oak then I couldn't do this project anymore! What a bummer. So the understory of the oaks is just loaded with green life; besides soaproot and P.O., there is california rose in bloom, rushes, various wildflower species and baby live oaks and doug fir. Also there's broom moving in. I'm not a fan of the invasives, and I pull the babies when I see them coming up near the active channel, but today I stepped into the opening of an old marijuana garden cut out of a broom patch, and it was alive with activity. Unseen animals bedded down beneath it scattered, birds of all kinds hopped from bush to bush and the bees were just insane, flying into all the little blooms. Honey bees, bumbles, you name it. I think I was just happy to see so many "local" residents benefiting from the thick patch. I think I have a new sit spot!

This last week was full of El Nino power and the canyon got a lot of water. While the River levels didn't go as high as first predicted, we definitely saw some changes. Hobson creek filled quickly once the feeder streams got underway, and I took a walk to see where one of them started and found a spring coming right out of the hillside! I know of another one too. If we get a really dry summer again, I wonder what those springs will be like. I'll keep my eyes on it.

My "I wonder" questions are for now: did all that rain knock away many of the blossoms (and therefore fruit) we were seeing in our plum and other rogue fruit trees? What will happen to our wildflowers? Any chance for a good flush of spring fungi? And most of all -- with all that water -- what will happen with our steelhead??

It looks like the hazelnuts are going to have a bumper crop this year and the butterflies are already out. Spring has definitely arrived, my favorite time of year.

So, so, so happy we finally got Fish and Wildlife to cut the fence that was blocking the creek. Water levels are already coming down but they say March should bring more water. The few small steelhead we've seen in the pools should then have a chance to move down to the River or can head further up past the fence blockage and where the water runs year-round. Victory!

Spring is revving up and there are flowers coming up everywhere. Most of the spring plants are showing including Coltsfoot and Mugwort down by the water, and buttercups, hedge nettle and shepherd's needle up in the meadow. The old fruit trees are flowering and the wild plums are just white with blossoms. My two mystery trees remain mysteries although I know both are in the rose family and I expect I can check them periodically to see what fruit they produce.

I found more fungus than I expected after a fair spread without rain. The agaricus have finally popped up and the cup fungus and helvella are still holding strong in the meadow despite the warm sun. Lots of small species I couldn't identify were growing in clusters on rotting wood in both the oak woodlands, and creekside meadow.

Wonderful walk today. I'm noticing so many species flowering or budding. The hazelnuts right outside had catkins galore and several female flowers which are so lovely now that I know how to spot them. Interestingly, several trees have almost no catkins/flowers at all. Those are the trees that are in the deepest shade. Now I'm understanding why certain trees produce more nuts and others almost none at all. A gray squirrel was on a tiny branch in a big-leaf maple, munching away at a whole bunch of seeds he'd grabbed from the end of the branch. He was shoving them in just as fast as he could.

The wildflowers are coming! The milkmaids are everywhere in the understory, but the fetid adder's tongue have mostly already been pollinated and are done - I was surprised to see that. Up on "Trillium Hill" as I call it, the namesake flowers are literally everywhere. A huge redwood met its end this winter, and I wonder if the sudden burst of sunlight has prompted the little beauties to go wild. In the meadow I'm already seeing buttercups, and the wild plum trees are just white with blossoms. The neglected old apples and cherry tree haven't even leafed out or bloomed yet. Mugwort and coltsfoot are already coming up and the beginning of Solomon's seal is coming as well. The wild roses have their leaves coming in and the lone Acacia is started to leaf out too.

Mushrooms are still popping up here and there, mostly inky caps in the wood chips, some huge cup fungus in another leaf pile and a couple massive springtime amanitas.

The creek's level looks low to me but I haven't devised a way to measure that. Nonetheless there is a good-size steelhead roaming around the usual swimming hole that a fish always chooses and that always dries up in summer. Happily, the fence that was blocking the watershed further up was FINALLY cut so that fish could pass. Maybe a fish will go up further next time, now that they can. I'll keep watching the fish, as we usually do, and root him on to go up further or make his way to the river - they say March will bring more rain that could make it possible.

I walked all the way down to the Russian River this morning noting how high the water was. It has already gone down since yesterday when it was raining. Down by River Rd the Hobson Creek channel is engineered but there aren't any major obstacles that would block fish. So far, none have been seen.

From there I went on a hike to photograph and I.D. mushrooms. There were many more coming up than I'd seen the other day. The biggest surprises were a huge Jack O' Lantern at the base of an oak snag, and many clumps of delicious Black Chanterelle.

Update:
went back out a few hours later to show my boyfriend the Jack O' Lantern and a couple huge branches the storm brought down and found two more species: Redwood Rooters and a clump of perfect Oysters on a log I passed twice today!

GRAND TOTAL SIXTEEN SPECIES TODAY!

Coming back from breakfast yesterday morning we pulled up and noticed the creek was filling, literally before our eyes. Last year I was lucky enough to catch it, but it was a trickle took a long time to advance. Yesterday, after a decent rain in the morning, the creek was filling up quickly, going around boulders, spreading out over the rocks and filling up the pools with no problem. It was so exciting to watch it advance. I took photos, videos and well, no more camera in the creekbed until the waters go back down. Exciting!

The wildlife camera in the 'special spot' returned some interesting finds! There isn't a good place to secure the camera, so I stuck it on a ledge in the bank. When I came back to get it I immediately saw that the camera had been knocked over, covered in dirt and the strap was laying over the front of it. Hmm... Sure enough the videos revealed that it lasted less than a day before at least five animals came to mess with it. They knocked it over then started playing with it. It was hard to ID anything because the critters walked ON the camera rather than looking directly at it. But amongst the flashes of fur, tails, eyes etc. I could see that one night it was a large-ish rodent (I'm thinking curious woodrat), another night a raccoon (definitely saw the striped tail) then what I think was a cat, because of the way its eyes looked and the movement of the body and it stretched and walked slowly over the up-facing lens. It seems like this is a good spot, so now I need to find a better way to secure the camera!

Not for the faint of heart maybe, I think I've discovered a wildlife hub in the creek bed, just north of River Road and the Hobson Creek Bridge. There's an old craggy apple tree bending over the creek, this year just loaded with juicy apples, and yet all around the tree are steep banks, covered in Himalayan blackberry with no clear escape routes. This year I noticed several kill spots all in the same stretch and it finally hit me - through the years that is where I always have found kills sites. So I wondered, do we have a smart predator down there waiting for unsuspecting wildlife to visit the apple tree and then Bam! So this would be the ultimate spot to observe. If nothing else, lots of potential predator/prey action.

We got some rain this morning! It wasn't much but the clouds suggest a little more this evening. I hope so! On my walks the past two days the autumn colors have been bright and beautiful. The temperature is notably cooler and the wind is coming up. I set up the wildlife camera again after finding a fresh trail, and set it low to capture thirty second video - hopefully we'll see something fun. I also found a few good sit spots that might be successful in spotting birds and insects. I'm looking forward to getting this project started off right.