An Academic Resource of the Claremont Colleges
Posted in News, Sightings, Web Updates on May 17th, 2013
We’ve recently added nine new insects to our BFS invertebrate list – one bug, three flies, two moths, one butterfly, and two bees. Here they are: Bug: A rough stinkbug – Brochymena sp. (Hemiptera:Pentatomidae) Rough stinkbugs, Brochymena sp. occur throughout North America. Rough Stink Bugs are often found on trees, where they are very well-camouflaged [...]
Spring at the BFS means that our volunteers return to managing invasive annual weeds, and this past Saturday, the volunteers removed Italian Thistles (Carduus pycnocephalus) from the entry drive and the east side of the ‘Neck’. The thistles are still in their rosette stage, but they have grown large enough to spot easily. The area [...]
Last year we spotted the very nasty Sahara Mustard (Brassica tournefortii) in the Foothill Blvd parkway at the BFS. We have been keeping our eyes out for any that might spring up this year, but we almost overlooked them. Instead of being large plants with a typical open bushy appearance, this year’s Sahara Mustard plants [...]
Posted in Sightings on Jan 24th, 2013
Ho, ho, the mistletoe hung where you can see… Songs about mistletoe wafting through stores during the holiday shopping season got me wondering about mistletoe at the BFS. This time of year, when the leaves are off the Western Sycamores, you can certainly see that many of the trees are hung with mistletoe. But aside [...]
Posted in News, Sightings, Web Updates on Nov 5th, 2012
A new plant invader has been spotted at the BFS – Melia azedarach. This tree is commonly known as Chinaberry, but also has many other common names, including Texas Umbrella Tree, Persian Lilac, White Cedar, Bead-Tree, Cape lilac, Ceylon Cedar, and Pride of India. Several sprouting clumps of M. azedarach growing in the Foothill Blvd [...]
This past Saturday, a group of hardy volunteers turned out on a cool, misty day to complete the cattail clearing at pHake Lake. Our main target for the day was “south beach”, a supposedly open area on the south shore of the lake used by many classes. So everyone was in the water or in [...]
Posted in News, Sightings, Web Updates on Oct 9th, 2012
We’ve recently added six new insect taxa to our BFS Invertebrate List – two bee flies, a shore fly, a butterfly, a cuckoo bee, and a wasp. Thanks to the folks who helped observe, photograph, and identify these insects, including Jonathan Wright, Hartmut Wisch, John Ascher, Joel Kits, Martin, Wayne Mathis, and the folks at [...]
Posted in News, Sightings, Web Updates on Aug 25th, 2012
Since our last update we’ve added fifteen new taxa to the BFS invertebrate list, including 1 katydid, 2 bugs, 2 beetles, 3 flies, 1 butterfly, 5 bees, and 1 wasp. As always, many thanks to everyone who’s helped observe, photograph, collect, and identify these inverts, including Ben Stapp, Jonathan Wright, Hartmut Wisch, John Ascher, David [...]
Posted in News, Sightings, Web Updates on Jul 4th, 2012
The BFS Mammal List has been recently updated. In the last year, in addition to confirming that we still have the Western Harvest Mouse, we’ve added five new species to at the list – all bats: Tadarida brasiliensis (Mexican Free-tailed Bat) Eptesicus fuscus (Big Brown Bat) Lasionycteris noctivagans (Silver-haired Bat) Lasiurus cinereus (Hoary Bat) Myotis [...]
Although the BFS volunteers collected fistfuls of thistles last week, they didn’t quite get all the ones by the toad pond and southeast corner of the wake, so they went back this past Saturday for a few thistles more. We also collected some Italian Thistles that were in the vicinity. When we thought we had [...]