by Kathleen Wong, UC Natural Reserve System For the undertakers of the insect world, death must precede the arrival of a new generation. Burying beetles of the genus Nicrophorus need a carcass on which to lay their eggs and feed their larvae. The hitch in this plan: the fact that dead bodies tend to be […]
Related Articles: Angelo Coast Range Reserve
2021-22 Mathias Grants awarded
The border between the ocean and dry land is a tough neighborhood. Residents of the intertidal zone—tidepool animals such as mussels and limpets, snails and barnacles—are alternately battered by waves, then exposed to drying sun.
Delivering environmental data from the NRS
By Kathleen Wong, UC Natural Reserve System Climate is the hottest topic in California these days. As global warming heats up the West, it’s set off a cascade of effects ranging from toxic algal blooms, to tree die-offs, to wildfires of unprecedented size and ferocity. The situation has everyone asking the same question: what is […]
2020-21 Mathias Grant recipients
By Kathleen Wong, UC Natural Reserve System Most people will be staying close to home in 2021 due to the pandemic. UC Santa Barbara graduate student Samantha Sambado will not be among them. Her doctoral research will take her on multiple journeys up and down California, in search of ticks and the human pathogens they […]
Teaching a field program amid a pandemic
Krikor Andonian and Tim Miller, instructors of the NRS’s California Ecology and Conservation program, deliver a report from the field on their Fall 2020 course. CEC program is one of relatively few UC classes being conducted in person right now, and is likely be the only one that will remain in its own social bubble […]
Swapping a weatherbeaten cabin for snug modern quarters
This story is part of NRS reserves transformed by Proposition 84 funds, a series describing the facilities improvements and expansions at NRS reserves supported by Proposition 84 bond funds. By Kathleen Wong, UC Natural Reserve System In California’s North Coast region, people have long been accustomed to making do. Trips to the store can be […]
2019-20 Mathias Graduate Student Research Grant awards
By Kathleen Wong, UC Natural Reserve System Joshua trees will be under the gun in the California of the future. Scientists predict that it’ll become too hot and dry for these striking Mojave plants to persist in much its the high desert habitat by 2100. How much water these treelike yucca plants can store at […]
California Heartbeat Initiative soars ahead
By Kathleen Wong, UC Natural Reserve System A University of California project to study the availability of water in California’s ecosystems is off to a soaring start. The California Heartbeat Initiative (CHI) uses drones, sap flow meters, and other remote sensing techniques to monitor the water status of plants across large swaths of the landscape. […]
Limited underground water storage make plants less susceptible to drought
Plants accustomed to accessing smaller amounts of moisture stored in underground rock formations are more resilient to drought conditions.
Angelo soils yield potential antibiotics
By Robert Sanders, UC Berkeley Soil, the source of our best antibiotics, can be more thoroughly mined for new drugs and other useful chemicals with the help of metagenomics. In a paper appearing June 13 in the journal Nature, UC Berkeley researchers report sequencing the genomes of every microbe in a teaspoon of soil from the […]
Hidden ‘rock moisture’ may be key to tree survival during drought
by Robert Sanders, UC Berkeley An oft-neglected layer of weathered rock underlying the soil on hillslopes could be a significant reservoir for water, providing critical moisture for trees during droughts, according to a new study by scientists from UC Berkeley and the University of Texas at Austin. William Dietrich, a professor of earth and planetary […]
Tracking water through California ecosystems
OAKLAND, California—The University of California Natural Reserve System has received a $2.179 million grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation to monitor the pulse of water through state ecosystems. The California Heartbeat Initiative-Freshwater (CHI-Freshwater) will link plant responses to environmental conditions such as heat waves, rainstorms, and drought on a landscape scale. The results […]
Baird award supports research at Berkeley NRS reserves
A new award program has been established to supportresearchby UC Berkeley graduate students at NRS reserves. The Carol Baird Graduate Student Award for Field Research will fund UC Berkeley graduate students conducting field research based in or around Angelo Coast Range Reserve, Blue Oak Ranch Reserve, Hastings Natural History Reservation, Point Reyes Field Station, and Sagehen Creek […]
NRS on Open Road TV
The scenic and scientific glories of the NRS will grace TV airwaves next Sunday, July 24, on an episode of Open Road with Doug McConnell. The longtime Bay Area television host takes viewers on journeys to explore the natural, historical and cultural treasures of the Bay Area and California. The show focuses on parks and open spaces protected […]
The critical zone: where life happens
by Jennifer Huber, Berkeley Engineering Science isn’t generally considered an extreme sport, but you wouldn’t know that by watching researchers in the Eel River Critical Zone Observatory scale hundred-foot-tall trees and wade through rushing rivers. “The job description includes diving, swimming and snorkeling,” says hydrologist Sally Thompson, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, “along […]
2015-16 Mathias Grants awarded
Fourteen University of California graduate students have been awarded 2015-16 Mildred E. Mathias Graduate Student Research Grants from the UC Natural Reserve System. The students, from six different UC campuses, each received up to $3,000 to fund field projects at 24 different NRS reserves. Virtually all of this year’s successful proposals will study ecology, evolution, […]