guzzlers and other small freshwater sites

The Reserve maintains several human-made freshwater sites. A few are large seasonal ponds and some are much smaller. These smaller freshwater spring substitutes we call guzzlers, originally put in in the 80's. We have 18 in all.

 

Most of the guzzlers have native vegetation and cover providing refuge for lots of different critters. My goal is to recreate conditions that might exist at a freshwater spring site. Few of these reference sites remain in the watershed, but there are some.

We also have two small excavated areas that hold freshwater some months of the year. Right now, when all other large ponds are dry, these two smaller ones continue to hold water since the recent 4 inch rain event.

Shirley Murphy investigates one of the smaller ponds.

 

eucalyptus

Over 200 species planted in the states in the last hundred plus years. A few became invasive and now I'm dealing with what was once hope for economic prosperity. This water sucking tree is right at home at the Reserve. It's not all bad. The little research that has been done doesn't make this species out to be the demon of all invasive species. In fact, a eucalyptus forest may support a diversity of species comparable to an oak forest (see Elkhorn Slough's Coastal Training Program references on Eucalyptus, http://www.elkhornsloughctp.org/). This is a bit dangerous to say; nevertheless it's the truth and we need facts to help inform decisions.

What I'm most concerned about is that these trees have been used to dry wetlands. I'm also concerned with fire, but we won't get into fire right now. Back to wetlands. . .one restoration strategy is to remove eucalyptus from around important freshwater wetlands that support listed species such as the Santa Cruz long-toed salamander, California red-legged frog, and Western pond turtle. All of whom use a particular freshwater pond on the Reserve called Cattail Swale.

In hopes of securing as much freshwater as possible for Cattail Swale, we have begun the process of removing eucalyptus saplings from an adjacent upland canyon. By saplings I mean anything less than 12 inches diameter at breast height (DBH). Even these small trees take time and care to remove. Each stump is treated with herbicide so it won't grow back (at least I hope not).

For almost every eucalyptus removed, a coast live oak grows underneath. My long-term goal is to help this particular canyon above Cattail Swale return to native coast live oak forest. It won't be difficult. It WANTS to be a coast live oak forest. The pieces are already there. There's just one piece that doesn't really fit. Yep. The eucs don't belong here.

California Red-legged Frog

Today we supplemented water to one of our dry ponds on the Reserve. It was recently excavated to create a small area in the deepest part of the pond that could be inundated with water early and retain water later in the season. The reason we are doing this is to create breeding habitat for the California Red-legged frog, a threatened amphibian with a significant population here at Elkhorn Slough. The rain we have had so far has not been enough to fill the excavation, thus our supplementation. Let's hope for some procreation!