FOCL Points March 2008

Excerpt from: American Coot by Rich Sonnenberg, President of the El Dorado Audubon Society

What is the most common bird at the Colorado Lagoon in winter? It’s the American Coot, or “mud hen” as they are sometimes called, with over 300 of them at the Lagoon currently enjoying their winter in “sunny” southern California. Lots of coots stay year-around in the southland, but the coots at the Lagoon, except maybe one or two, take off in the spring, presumably to their breeding grounds in Canada. Read more...  

FOCL Points September 2007

Excerpt from: Ice Plant: Floral Friend or Foreign Foe?? by Eric Zahn, Biology Faculty, CSULB

Some call it “sea-fig,” and some call it “Hottentot,” others call it “Carpobrotus,” but most people call it “ice plant.” Yet, regardless of its name, ice plant has become quite a controversial California cultivar.

In fact ice plant does not refer to just a single organism. There is an entire botanical family of plants regarded as ice plants.  Ice plants belong to the Aizoaceae or “fig-marigold” family, which consists of over 2,000 herbaceous succulent species of plant, almost all of whom originate exclusively from a small coastal area in South Africa.  These plants vary in shape, size, color, and habitat preference; however, they are all limited to growing within Mediterranean climates. Read more...

FOCL Points April 2007

Excerpt from: A Salt Marsh Unseen by Eric Zahn, Biology Faculty, CSULB

During a short walk around the Colorado Lagoon a watchful eye can come across all sorts of curious marine organisms.  The ice cream cone shaped shells of the California horn snails dot the mud and sand flats. Underneath the footbridge, which has become encrusted with bryozoan colonies and sea squirts, moon jellies are gently undulating. Pelicans dive, egrets perch, and herons stalk their prey, while cormorants spread their wings as they seemingly worship the sun.  It is enough stimuli for an enthusiastic photographer to fill up their entire memory card. Read more...