Not "MY" book, but OUR book - part 3

I would like to give a credit to several dozen people, who helped with the book, but I should draw a line somewhere. So I have chosen 5 very special people. And I will start with my wife Marsia. When I met Marsia in 1968 I was curator of the UCR Herbarium. Since then she helped a lot during field trips and in particular taking the responsibility for their planning and organization. And soon after my retirement we have started extensive trips. Without having any special botanical background she was aware of the magnitude and value of this work. So Marsia took the responsibility of the peripheral support of the project's implementation starting from the very beginning to the end - from alpha to omega.
In the early days of UCR Dr. Frank Vasek joined the academic staff as the professor of botany. His field classes soon became very popular and I became his unofficial TA. Then UCR needed a herbarium and he recommended me for the curatorial position. This way with Dr. Vasek's encouragement from being hobbyist I became a professional botanist.
At the very beginning of the Santa Ana River Flora project Andrew Sanders (the present curator of the UCR Herbarium) provided us with a complete list of all known records of plant for this region. Later during the active process for about 3 years Andrew was always available to answer questions about locations and identification of plants appropriate for the book. He read through and offered suggestions concerning the manuscript.
In order to illustrate the book initially we started accumulating hand-drawings by several people, but then suddenly it came to our attention that scanning of fresh plant material would provide a quality of reproduction comparable to photography. But we still needed line-drawings to illustrate diagnostic features. So Gina Richmond showed special interest in doing detailed drawings and her illustrative material is all through the book, especially the one on the Rose family on pages 12 and 13.
Through local friends we were given recommendations for a publisher in Berkeley namely Heyday Press, now known as Heyday. The Publisher Malcolm Margolin and his team were very helpful to Danielle at the stage of book design, giving suggestions how to make it more attractive and reader-friendly. Malcolm was able to find book-sellers, who facilitated successful distribution of the book. He was not only a good publisher but also gave us personal support and encouragement.

Not "MY" book, but OUR book - part 2

The first person to join me and Marsia working on this publication was Greg Ballmer. Greg is an entomologist from UCR. He was working on feeding plants food to the larvae of butterflies called blues (family Lycaenidae) and became very interested in plants in general. His observations and interpretations of plants diversity and my desire to bring the entire local flora to the attention of local people were mutually supportive. In our book the subtle differences between plant species were shown in matrices elaborated by Greg. Commonly observed interrelations of plants and insects like formation of galls on twigs and leaves, leaf-fall and different type of damage were brought to attention and discussed throughout the book for the most part was Greg's contribution.
Then in 2002 the former engineer Danielle Svehla joint the project. She took the strongest and most constant leadership in the formation of the book, and without Danielle it would probably never be completed. Joining the project she made a spectacular shift from engineering to natural history. Her expertise qualified her to set the general plan of the book. In planning the details we needed several publishing experts to take the responsibility, so Danielle felt that she was able to do these jobs and we enabled her to do that. While being in Berkley she has cooperated with Heyday Books in setting the layout of the book. And with combination of their suggestions and her initiative it became a high quality reality.
My botanical expertise didn't include making keys, however Danielle thought that there should have been an overall key in the book. We were acquainted with UCR botanist Arlee Montalvo and she has accepted a challenge of developing a key. After a key of 20 pages was completed the book was ready for publication.
Additionally in the preparation for the second printing in 2010 she made a number of important suggestions.
To be continued...

Not "MY" book, but OUR book

After publication of the book "Flora of the Santa Ana River and Environs" in 2007 initially I was inclined to call it "my book". But after some reflection I have realized that it really is OUR book. 20 years ago my wife Marsia took extensive hand-written notes recording personal and even intimate plant-relationship resulting from my life-long experience. Dr. Gene Anderson's brief natural history guides to the Santa Ana River produced during 1970s served as starting point for this work. The river moves through 3 counties: San Bernardino, Riverside and Orange. It came to the attention of numerous local people that we have a narrow corridor of good natural history material following the river course. And it became evident that it has a great value as a potential educational and recreational site. The establishment of a trail (hiking, biking, equestrian) from San Bernardino mountains to the coast would fulfill this task. Locally a group of people formed an organization called Tri-County Conservation League (TCCL). The TCCL requested that I write a flora of the Santa Ana River. That was the guiding light that kept me going.
To be continued...

An update on Argentine ants and their environs - part 2

I had a one year visit to Australia and nearby areas in 1985-86. It was mostly a camp-out. During that year I spent about 1 week on Kangaroo Island near Adelaide, South Australia. There I have visited a small natural history research station - Pelican Lagoon. There I observed a fairly large red ant, casually resembling our local harvester ant Pogonomyrmex in size and color. This ant was referred to locally as a meat ant (Iridomyrmex purpureus). Thus the Argentine ant was thought to be in the same genus as australian meat ant at the time it was described by Mayr in 1868. But in 1990s it was named Linepithema humile, although remaining in the same subfamily Dolichoderinae. This was justified because the differences between these 2 species were big enough to put them in different genera.
I would like to share some personal experiences with members of this subfamily in Australia, in particular meat ants. If 2 colonies of meat ants live close there is a "war zone" formed about half way between them, in which they are dismembering their competitors. As I know all members of this subfamily are incapable of stinging.
I became aware about an occasional colony of Argentine ants around 1940 near my home in Colton. So, they were not common, but Solenopsis sp. - the fire ants, which have a sting, were common at that time. But with time the Argentine ants acquired a dominant position in areas of human dwellings being a true synanthrope. The Argentine ants have killed all the fire ants locally (as far as I know).

An update on Argentine ants and their environs

Until recently they have been known as Iridomyrmes humilis, but in early 1990s their name was changed to Linepithema humile. I recommend the collateral reading of a detailed Wikipedia article on Argentine ants.
In order to position it with other related organisms I would like to start off with the broadest category. Argentine ants make part of Phylum Arthropoda - animals with joint tube-like legs ranging in size from the Giant Sea Spider with a legs spread of 6 feet or more to the tiny mites of about 80 microns long. The next taxonomic unit for Argenitine ants will be Class Insecta. Among insects there are 2 well distinguished groups: hemimetabola - the most primitive ones with incomplete metamorphosis (grasshoppers, crickets, earwigs, aphids, true bugs, and termites)and holometabola - with complete metamorphosis (beetles, butterflies, flies, and representatives of the Order Hymenoptera, which include bees, wasps, and ants).
Both wasps and bees have a fair number of families, however all ants belong to one family Formicidae, which includes about 19 subfamilies. Argenitine ants make part of the subfamily Dolichoderinae (see Wikipedia article on this subfamily for its specific characters).
To be continued...